The brave and the bald
August 2, 2006 | 12:00am
Prostrate examinations.
Adult bedwetting. GMA lasting up to 2010. But there is nothing that keeps a grown man up at night more than the prospect of waking up to premature hair loss. And, as any grown male can tell you, anything premature has horrendous consequences.
I used to take comfort in the fact that men inherited their hair from their maternal grandfather. And my maternal lolo, God bless his soul, had a full head of curly black locks well into his 80s. But this was a "fact" my mom told me. Another "fact" my mom told me when I was six was that I would marry my yaya if I didn’t learn to sleep by my lonesome by the time I turned 18. I am now 30-something and single, and my yaya and I are still not married (We have since learned to live with our platonic relationship). But these little pseudo-factoids I gleaned from my mother made me question her maternal wisdom, especially since I have been waking up recently to clumps of hair lying beside me on my pillow. And, believe you me, that hair isn’t my yaya’s.
I knew no more follicles could go to waste, so I wanted to find out if I was laboring under any more baldness "facts" which I needed to verify lest I swiftly become Swenson Hair Care’s client of the year. I was initially comforted to discover that my mom wasn’t as inaccurate as most government news reports: there is a 50-percent chance that a person shares the same hair trait as his maternal grandfather. But then I was slightly perturbed to find out that baldness occurs in varying forms in about 66 percent of adult males at some point in their lives. However, the next fact I uncovered caused involuntary bladder discharge: more recent research has shown that a person with a balding father has a "significantly greater chance" of experiencing hair loss (I chose not to reprint the actual hair loss percentages for fear that other potential hairpiece-wearers might pass out before finishing this article).
After cursing whoever made this fact public knowledge over the Internet, I barged into my dad’s office to seek his comfort. But as soon as I saw my reflection staring at me from the back of his head, I dropped to my knees and cried. "Why me, Lord?" I wailed. "Doesn’t the world already have enough reflective surfaces!?"
According to the book Why Men Don’t Have a Clue and Women Need More Shoes, number four among a woman’s turn-ons is a full head of hair. Throughout history, hair on the head was considered a badge of raw masculine power. That being the case, why does God gift us with a full head of hair in our youth only to take it away when we reach the age where we can finally take out our dates without having your jealous yaya chaperone you? (What, do you mean it was just me!? Mom!!)
My impending loss of hair has made me not only question my mom’s parenting skills but also God’s good judgment when it comes to human evolution. Why does he continue to make us grow hair in places where we least want it but make it stop in places where we need it the most? Lord knows what his purpose was in having a disproportionate amount of hair growing around my right nipple. And wouldn’t it have been more merciful on His part to spirit our hair away overnight instead of prolonging the agony over the years? That’s like piecemeal circumcision. On a daily basis. Does this mean that I have to rely merely on my sense of humor coupled with a well-toned musculature as the only means to attract Venusians as I approach my young adult mid-life crisis?
Fearing the day that cruel, ignorant children will run up to me and ask if they can rub their armpits on my head, I conducted a bit more research to find out if I could prevent what might be my "significantly greater chance." It turns out that the most common form of baldness is a progressive hair thinning condition called androgenic alopecia, a.k.a. "male pattern baldness" (a.k.a. "Why, God, why?") that occurs in adult human males. This condition is often characterized by hair receding from the lateral sides of the forehead known as "receding hairline" or "receding brow" or "traitorous forehead." And to top it all off: the top of your head may develop an additional bald patch as well.
The trigger for this type of baldness is an overproduction of male sex hormones or androgens. These androgens flood the system and switch off hair production at the top of the head. In other words, the more mojo you got, the more kalbo you get. The androgens, in turn, are produced by your adrenal glands, which protect your body during stressful encounters situations and give you that extra oomph in dangerous situations. These situations include protecting vital organs when your girlfriend discovers a text message on your cell phone from someone who calls you koya and is asking for her "weekly load." In situations like these, your adrenals go into overdrive and spit out more androgens than your body requires which eventually leads to hair loss.
The reduction of stress levels can keep scalps from going balimbing on us. Thus one of the first steps to keep your follicles loyal is to ask your significant other not to stress you out too much. Find an opportunity to tell her: "Sweetheart, please stop asking me questions about that women who texted me koya, do you want me to lose my hair?" (Tell me if that works). Otherwise, you can find other means to reduce non-essential stress, like office work. In my case, I have unilaterally decided to come to office three days a week for health reasons. Salary deductions be damned! After all, do you think your company will acknowledge all your hard work by paying for your hair plugs?
Much to the delight of my couch potato-loving brethren, weight training can actually have a detrimental effect on your crowning glory: buffing up actually increases your testosterone levels. And Lord knows your hair is more important than your health. But before you coagulate back onto your La-Z-Boy while shoveling another spoonful of sisig into your mouth, you unfortunately still need to avoid fatty foods and red meat lest your adrenal glands go into overdrive. This is because fat is the raw material used by the body to manufacture the sex hormone that makes you go bald. Moreover, you can’t totally form a single unit with your La-Z-Boy: you still need a modicum of regular cardiovascular exercise to keep your androgen levels down. So, the question is: How can you maintain a cardiovascular lifestyle while you congeal all over your couch? My advice: sit five feet away from your TV set, hide your remote control and watch bootleg porn on your VCD without locking your door. I guarantee that that will keep your heart rate up. Works best when your mom is at home.
The next piece of baldness "folklore" may or may not spell stress relief for those of you who discovered Tiktik at age 10. As Catholic schoolboys, we were warned by biology teachers that frequent ejaculations caused baldness. If that were true, then all men above the age of 17 should be bald by now. However, there may be a burst of truth to this: ejaculation causes testosterone levels to temporarily elevate. However, scientists who wear very thick glasses and have a lifetime subscription to www.sexkittens.com view this belief with much skepticism. Although I think that Discovery Channel’s Myth Busters should put this urban legend to the test. Or Studio 23’s The Men’s Room on Wednesday nights, 11:30 p.m. (shameless plug, sorry).
For the male readers who have not rushed to their optometrist to check if their grade has gone up, the next question to ask yourselves is: When my hair follicles finally stage a coup, should I go all fascist on my scalp and smother it with a hairpiece? Not wanting to offend men who might be members of my future support group, I have never considered wearing a hairpiece because the ones I’ve seen so far look so… unnatural. Nothing short of a short-range nuclear missile could mess those hairdos up. And what I fear more than going bald is to have an artificial life form occupying my scalp.
However, I have uncovered a surefire way to keep the hair on my head more firmly rooted than a political appointee. And that is through castration. However, I understand that this option is best reserved for eunuchs or members of the Sistine Chapel choir. And philandering politicians who spend our taxes buying up Makati condos for their number twos (these guys deserve to go bald and blind).
Next week: Fortune Favors the Bald (And not just because my mom’s name is Fortune). For comments, suggestions, and if you are wondering why I consider it premature hair loss even when I’m in my 30s, let me break it down for you: as long as I live at home and enjoy life support from my parents, anything before 50 is premature for me. Send me hair replacement solutions at ledesma.rj@gmail.com or www.rjledesma.com.
Adult bedwetting. GMA lasting up to 2010. But there is nothing that keeps a grown man up at night more than the prospect of waking up to premature hair loss. And, as any grown male can tell you, anything premature has horrendous consequences.
I used to take comfort in the fact that men inherited their hair from their maternal grandfather. And my maternal lolo, God bless his soul, had a full head of curly black locks well into his 80s. But this was a "fact" my mom told me. Another "fact" my mom told me when I was six was that I would marry my yaya if I didn’t learn to sleep by my lonesome by the time I turned 18. I am now 30-something and single, and my yaya and I are still not married (We have since learned to live with our platonic relationship). But these little pseudo-factoids I gleaned from my mother made me question her maternal wisdom, especially since I have been waking up recently to clumps of hair lying beside me on my pillow. And, believe you me, that hair isn’t my yaya’s.
I knew no more follicles could go to waste, so I wanted to find out if I was laboring under any more baldness "facts" which I needed to verify lest I swiftly become Swenson Hair Care’s client of the year. I was initially comforted to discover that my mom wasn’t as inaccurate as most government news reports: there is a 50-percent chance that a person shares the same hair trait as his maternal grandfather. But then I was slightly perturbed to find out that baldness occurs in varying forms in about 66 percent of adult males at some point in their lives. However, the next fact I uncovered caused involuntary bladder discharge: more recent research has shown that a person with a balding father has a "significantly greater chance" of experiencing hair loss (I chose not to reprint the actual hair loss percentages for fear that other potential hairpiece-wearers might pass out before finishing this article).
After cursing whoever made this fact public knowledge over the Internet, I barged into my dad’s office to seek his comfort. But as soon as I saw my reflection staring at me from the back of his head, I dropped to my knees and cried. "Why me, Lord?" I wailed. "Doesn’t the world already have enough reflective surfaces!?"
According to the book Why Men Don’t Have a Clue and Women Need More Shoes, number four among a woman’s turn-ons is a full head of hair. Throughout history, hair on the head was considered a badge of raw masculine power. That being the case, why does God gift us with a full head of hair in our youth only to take it away when we reach the age where we can finally take out our dates without having your jealous yaya chaperone you? (What, do you mean it was just me!? Mom!!)
My impending loss of hair has made me not only question my mom’s parenting skills but also God’s good judgment when it comes to human evolution. Why does he continue to make us grow hair in places where we least want it but make it stop in places where we need it the most? Lord knows what his purpose was in having a disproportionate amount of hair growing around my right nipple. And wouldn’t it have been more merciful on His part to spirit our hair away overnight instead of prolonging the agony over the years? That’s like piecemeal circumcision. On a daily basis. Does this mean that I have to rely merely on my sense of humor coupled with a well-toned musculature as the only means to attract Venusians as I approach my young adult mid-life crisis?
Fearing the day that cruel, ignorant children will run up to me and ask if they can rub their armpits on my head, I conducted a bit more research to find out if I could prevent what might be my "significantly greater chance." It turns out that the most common form of baldness is a progressive hair thinning condition called androgenic alopecia, a.k.a. "male pattern baldness" (a.k.a. "Why, God, why?") that occurs in adult human males. This condition is often characterized by hair receding from the lateral sides of the forehead known as "receding hairline" or "receding brow" or "traitorous forehead." And to top it all off: the top of your head may develop an additional bald patch as well.
The trigger for this type of baldness is an overproduction of male sex hormones or androgens. These androgens flood the system and switch off hair production at the top of the head. In other words, the more mojo you got, the more kalbo you get. The androgens, in turn, are produced by your adrenal glands, which protect your body during stressful encounters situations and give you that extra oomph in dangerous situations. These situations include protecting vital organs when your girlfriend discovers a text message on your cell phone from someone who calls you koya and is asking for her "weekly load." In situations like these, your adrenals go into overdrive and spit out more androgens than your body requires which eventually leads to hair loss.
The reduction of stress levels can keep scalps from going balimbing on us. Thus one of the first steps to keep your follicles loyal is to ask your significant other not to stress you out too much. Find an opportunity to tell her: "Sweetheart, please stop asking me questions about that women who texted me koya, do you want me to lose my hair?" (Tell me if that works). Otherwise, you can find other means to reduce non-essential stress, like office work. In my case, I have unilaterally decided to come to office three days a week for health reasons. Salary deductions be damned! After all, do you think your company will acknowledge all your hard work by paying for your hair plugs?
Much to the delight of my couch potato-loving brethren, weight training can actually have a detrimental effect on your crowning glory: buffing up actually increases your testosterone levels. And Lord knows your hair is more important than your health. But before you coagulate back onto your La-Z-Boy while shoveling another spoonful of sisig into your mouth, you unfortunately still need to avoid fatty foods and red meat lest your adrenal glands go into overdrive. This is because fat is the raw material used by the body to manufacture the sex hormone that makes you go bald. Moreover, you can’t totally form a single unit with your La-Z-Boy: you still need a modicum of regular cardiovascular exercise to keep your androgen levels down. So, the question is: How can you maintain a cardiovascular lifestyle while you congeal all over your couch? My advice: sit five feet away from your TV set, hide your remote control and watch bootleg porn on your VCD without locking your door. I guarantee that that will keep your heart rate up. Works best when your mom is at home.
The next piece of baldness "folklore" may or may not spell stress relief for those of you who discovered Tiktik at age 10. As Catholic schoolboys, we were warned by biology teachers that frequent ejaculations caused baldness. If that were true, then all men above the age of 17 should be bald by now. However, there may be a burst of truth to this: ejaculation causes testosterone levels to temporarily elevate. However, scientists who wear very thick glasses and have a lifetime subscription to www.sexkittens.com view this belief with much skepticism. Although I think that Discovery Channel’s Myth Busters should put this urban legend to the test. Or Studio 23’s The Men’s Room on Wednesday nights, 11:30 p.m. (shameless plug, sorry).
For the male readers who have not rushed to their optometrist to check if their grade has gone up, the next question to ask yourselves is: When my hair follicles finally stage a coup, should I go all fascist on my scalp and smother it with a hairpiece? Not wanting to offend men who might be members of my future support group, I have never considered wearing a hairpiece because the ones I’ve seen so far look so… unnatural. Nothing short of a short-range nuclear missile could mess those hairdos up. And what I fear more than going bald is to have an artificial life form occupying my scalp.
However, I have uncovered a surefire way to keep the hair on my head more firmly rooted than a political appointee. And that is through castration. However, I understand that this option is best reserved for eunuchs or members of the Sistine Chapel choir. And philandering politicians who spend our taxes buying up Makati condos for their number twos (these guys deserve to go bald and blind).
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