Why is my son's teammate bald?

October 13, 2007 5:48 PM

[Nosyfilter] What illness/condition would cause a little boy to lose his hair?

My son is playing a sport this fall with a child who is bald, I assume from an illness or chronic condition. I don't know the parents well enough yet to ask, but I'm curious what it might be, especially since he is well enough to play a recreational sport with some risk of physical contact or falling. Apologies if this question is in bad taste, but I find myself spending more time wondering about it rather than watching them play.

posted by Sweetie Darling to health & fitness (20 comments total)

Alopecia areata? Or how about good old chemotherapy?
posted by gramcracker at 5:52 PM on October 13, 2007

Alopecia.
posted by ruwan at 5:52 PM on October 13, 2007

Could be alopecia.
posted by amyms at 5:52 PM on October 13, 2007

I saw a guy on TV recently who lost all of his hair when he was about 11 due to alopecia. Nothing else was wrong with him, just no hair.
posted by amro at 6:02 PM on October 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

nthing alopecia. I had a couple bouts of it in high school (I never had a problem with it when I was a kid though, but I hear it's quite common) in which I ended up with several huge bald spots.

According to him (from what I recollect, this was about 10 years ago): Some people lose all their hair, some just get bald spots. Some people will go completely bald, while some people will lose their hair and regrow it. And it's not caused by stress as most people assume.
posted by zippity at 6:04 PM on October 13, 2007

oops, "According to him" = dermatologist.

And for the record my hair grew back each time it fell out and hasn't fallen out in at least seven years or so.
posted by zippity at 6:24 PM on October 13, 2007

Does he have any hair at all? (eyebrows, eyelashes, etc.)
posted by winston at 6:28 PM on October 13, 2007

I knew more than one kid at school who lost their hair while receiving cancer treatment. Even when they were better it took a while to grow back.

I also know more than one person who shaved their head in solidarity.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 6:34 PM on October 13, 2007

Britain had a Gold medal-winning Olympic swimmer Duncan Goodhew with the same. I often wondered if he had a distinct advantage not having to shave down :D Not an impediment to sporting success, at least.
posted by Abiezer at 6:37 PM on October 13, 2007

Also, when you say "lose" his hair, are you saying that you know for sure that he used to have hair?
posted by winston at 6:38 PM on October 13, 2007

It could be chemotherapy for leukemia. That doesn't always incapacitate someone totally.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 6:40 PM on October 13, 2007

If the kid was on chemo, they'd probably have mentioned it, so it sounds like plain alopecia. Harmless and not contagious, if slightly disfiguring. We had a neighborhood kid who had it probably 45 years ago, and it was fun to watch what they did to the poor kid because nobody had a clue. I remember the last thing they tried was putting that white surgical tape all over his head because some people reported growing hair under it by accident after they took it off. (I think some time later, it just started coming back and that was the end of it.) They haven't made the tape in years; it was what nerds used to hold their glasses together.
As far as I know, they still don't have much of an idea why it happens. I don't think Modern Medical Science has come very far in 50 years on this problem.
posted by unrepentanthippie at 6:41 PM on October 13, 2007

nthing alopecia, especially if he's otherwise healthy. a kid with cancer or other serious illness probably wouldn't be allowed to play a contact sport for insurance reasons.
posted by thinkingwoman at 6:49 PM on October 13, 2007

We have a couple of folks at the office who have shaved their heads as a solidarity thing also, out of respect to someone they are supportive of.
posted by unrepentanthippie at 6:50 PM on October 13, 2007

slightly disfiguring

having had alopecia myself, i'd say it's more than slightly disfiguring. the emotional toll is huge, especially if you've had a full head of hair your whole life. imagine people staring at you because you've lost about 75% of your hair in funny splotchy patterns. when i get patches of hair loss i also get an itchy rash and a runny nose, like hay fever. the hair usually does eventually grow back but you have to be patient.
posted by brandz at 6:58 PM on October 13, 2007

brandz:

Kids are less sensitive to those kinds of things. I was comparing what this kid had to someone with a facial disfigurement on the scale of losing part of a jaw to cancer.
posted by unrepentanthippie at 7:40 PM on October 13, 2007

well, i can't read your mind, unrepentanthippie. in any case, it's never a good idea to put down (minimize) anyone's illness.
posted by brandz at 7:49 PM on October 13, 2007

There was a guy I was at secondary school with who had no hair at all, no eyebrows, etc. He told us this was because he'd had blood poisoning when he was younger, and as a consequence of either the infection or the treatment his hair had all fallen out and never come back.

He was perfectly healthy, and a member of both the school's rugby and cricket teams. Having bumped into him ten years later, he's still completely bald and still very fit.
posted by Lebannen at 4:28 AM on October 14, 2007

Thanks, all. I'm hoping that at some point over the course of the season one of his parents will slip it into conversation, but in the meantime this information will help me to keep from wondering and worrying irrationally.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 1:20 PM on October 14, 2007

Ask the parents. They'll probably be relieved that you asked them outright rather than the hinting-around thing that the rest of the parents are probably doing.
posted by desuetude at 7:09 AM on October 15, 2007