How do I choose a wig that will suit me?
When a lady comes to me having chemo or alopecia, I usually advise them to bring a photograph with them of what their hair looked like when they had hair. This is what I do personally, so not many or any probably other hair dressers create this service, but I usually like to take the lady to the shop where we can buy the wig, where I can help choose with her. When somebody goes in to buy a wig, theydon't actually know what they're looking for because they've had no experience. They've had no need to buy a wig apart from maybe a fancy dress party and they're usually just stupid fun wigs. But to actually try and choose a wig that was like your own hair is not as obvious as one may think. There's a variety to choose from, plus a variety of colors, and I usually advise clients to get as close to what they had before because that's what's going to make them feel more like their old selves. On the other hand, if someone hasn't got me beside them helping to choose a wig, my advice is to literally take as recent a photograph as possible of yourself when you had hair and take that along to the wig shop and say, "Look, this is what I used to look like. Can you advise me on which wig can get as close to they way my hair used to look?" The people that work in wig shops are very experienced in dealing with chemotherapy patients and alopecia patients, so they are very sympathetic to the person that's coming in to buy a wig. To take a photograph is the most important thing, because the lady or the man in the wig shop can't read your mind and can't see the past of when you had hair, so he needs some direction as to which way to help you choose a wig.
