My Moth Eaten Face

Around a year ago, I noticed under the right side of my jaw a smooth as a peach bald spot, glowing like a lamp amongst my oh so macho stubble. I decided at the time that this was caused by the strap of my cycling helmet, and thought little about it at the time.

Until of course it started to spread.

What was a patch about the size of a 20p coin began to expand, and looked to meet up with other small bald spots that had sprung up on the side of my face, fringed with white-blonde hairs. My facial hair on that side has now disappeared like melting Arctic ice, and the process has now started on the other side, where I have patches the size of 10p coins thinking about arranging a confab.

It is alopecia barbae, facial alopecia hair loss.

It's an auto-immune disease, my body is not happy with my hair. T-Cell lymphocytes are attacking my hair follicles, surpressing hair growth.

My reaction has been rather laissez-faire, figuring that it is blatantly obvious diagnosis and not much can be done other than slap steroids on it. However, with the patch on my right rather large now and not going away any time soon, I'm thinking that it might be right to give it a go.

The worry is, of course, that it might spread to my scalp and cause baldness. However, it will do this whether I worry or not. I keep my hair cropped very short these days in any case, so hopefully it won't be too noticeable if it does start. The other option is that it will just grow back of its own accord.

I wish it would, as it feels like I've got crop circles on my face on one side, and the other occasionally resembles a traditional obscene graffiti drawing.

Si