Hair loss is something many new moms experience, but don’t always talk about.
Everyone talks about that pregnancy glow.
“Everybody feels the glow, everybody feels healthy and happy,” said Dr. Jenny Arango Longo. “Hormones have a very positive outlook on all these things and really helps you kind of bring all that out. It does have a lot of benefits for your skin, for your hair, things like that.”
It can be quite the experience as the body goes through many changes.
“It kind of feels like you have the baby and you’re like, ‘OK, here’s your child, go on and good luck,’” she said. “While you’re caring for a newborn, your body goes through a lot. Apart from healing, you start to lose your hair.”
Longo is the Chief of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Memorial Hospital Miramar.
She sat down for a chat with Local 10’s Nicole Perez to explain what happens to a woman’s body after childbirth that causes them to lose so much hair.
“Your estrogen levels are very high in pregnancy, which causes your hair follicles to go through a phase in cycles, causes that hair follicle to stay in that growth phase,” she said. “So that’s why your hair looks shiny and it grows more and it looks denser.”
She explained that when a woman delivers a child, she has a sudden and rapid decline of that estrogen, and when you have a rapid decline, many of those follicles are getting pushed into the next phase, which is the resting phase.”
“You see breakage in your hair, but we’re getting a large proportion of these follicles kind of doing it all at the same time,” she said. “So that’s where you begin to see all that shedding happen.”
Arango said every case is different, but it can typically start anywhere from two months to five months postpartum and last up to a year.
“You’re going to be showering, brushing your hair, kind of just going through your hair with your hands and you’re going to see a lot of that hair kind of coming through,” she said. “You really shouldn’t see like patch work, like patches falling off, because that could be signs of other things, maybe an autoimmune disorder, maybe some medications that you’re taking, just a bunch of other stuff that could be happening, not necessarily related to postpartum.”
She went on to explain that how the scalp is treated can be very important as well.
“(Because of) all the chemicals that we use, the dyes, the bleaches, this and that,” said Arango.
Which takes us to Sarraccino Salon on Las Olas Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale, which is where Perez goes to see her hair stylist extraordinaire, Federrico Sarraccino.
Newly postpartum and working on television did not exempt Perez from dealing with what every other mother goes through: lots of shedding, awkward regrowth and a very embarrassing hairline that requires a lot of hairspray.
For postpartum moms who are dealing with shedding, balding or thinning, here is some advice from the professionals:
“Try not to blow-dry every day,” said Sarraccino. Combing is very important. Always use a wide-tooth comb and don’t brush it when the hair is very wet, because it’s very fragile. If you blow-dry your hair, you just use a heat protector.”
He also had some advice for women who are freaking out because this is happening.
“Remember that this is a self-limiting situation, meaning it is going to come back to normal,” said Sarraccino. “Unfortunately, there isn’t a magic potion. It will get better. Eventually, it will come back, but it is going to take some time.”
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