The Pros and Cons of Shaving Your Head

Just to be clear: I am a man in my mid-30s, living in southern California. And I am writing this from personal experience. A little over 3 weeks ago, I grabbed my clippers and shaved my head for the first time. If there is any other human being on planet Earth who is better suited to write this article, I would like to meet him and become best friends.

If you’re reading this, you’re  somebody who is coping with their hair loss and at a crossroads, right? That’s a fair assumption, isn’t it?

Less than a month ago, I made the decision to shave my head. And while this article isn’t going to cover how I came to that decision, I think it’s important to pass along everything I’ve learned from the past 24 days.

Here are the pros and cons of shaving your head, written by someone who just shaved their head. First, let’s tackle the pros:

PROS

Sense of freedom

I can’t overstate this enough. Just like that, I wasn’t a baseball cap everywhere guy anymore. I wasn’t a “well if I style my hair perfectly and it isn’t windy outside today, most people won’t even know I’m balding” guy anymore. When I took that step and decided to shave my head, I felt liberated. I felt free. For a long time, my receding hairline was a cross that bore heavily down on me, weighing me down. Shaving it all off took that weight off my shoulders.

A new you

Mentally, I felt like a new person. This new version of myself, freed from the shackles of a receding hairline and the emotional obstacles that accompany it, felt like me who can conquer anything.

Higher self-esteem

To put it bluntly, shaving my head made me happier. For the longest time, I felt like I was at a metaphorical crossroads – should I keep my receding hairline and the awkward hairstyle that I grew accustomed to? Or should I go in a different direction and just shave it? I sat on that fence for a long time, and taking that step and making that choice made me feel better about myself. To be candid, my confidence went up in many different ways – just ask my girlfriend.

However, just like with all life decisions, not everything comes out a net positive. And that’s where the cons come in:

CONS

General upkeep

You don’t shave your head and call it a day, repeating the process at the same interval that you would get haircuts. Instead, the upkeep is time-consuming – the second you complete the head shaving process, (what’s left) of your hair starts growing right back – immediately. This means you’re going to have to go over the shaving process multiple times a week just to keep the “look” you are now going for.

The act of shaving it is a pain

Oh, you thought shaving your head meant you didn’t have to worry about anything, huh? Wrong. I’ve realized over the past few weeks that my head is… oddly shaped, to say the least. That means it’s not as easy as just grabbing my electric shaver and getting it done quickly and going about my day.

Nope, I’ve got a mole on the back of my head I have to constantly worry about nicking. I have a little lump on the top of my head that makes it impossible to get a clean shave up there. Fun times, let me tell you.

(And I’m not even referring to using a razor shave either, which comes with its own complications – like a perpetually irritated scalp, razor burn, and general cuts and rashes.)

The emergence of the horseshoe

Ah yes, the dreaded horseshoe. It might as well be a blinking neon sign on your head that reads I LOST MY HAIR, EVERYBODY! 

Jessica Oslo, Vantis Institute’s Co-Founder and Clinical Director, puts it best: “When you start shaving your head, what will happen is you’re going to get this 5 o’clock shadow of the horseshoe unless you Bic-shave it.”

Could you avoid this by shaving your head with a Bic-razor every day? Of course you could. Is it worth it? Of course it isn’t. So as it turns out, your shaved head is controlling you instead of the other way around.

You don’t have hair anymore

Your hair is part of your identity. From the moment you were placed in the barber’s chair for the first time as a kid to the first time you threw product in your hair as a teenager to going over your same hair care routine as an adult, your hair has been a big part of you who are. And in a flash – just like that – it’s all gone. Whether that’s ultimately a good thing or a bad thing is debatable, of course, but as for me? I hate loss of any kind. Not having hair felt like part of me was missing.

I’ll be honest, it took me over a full week to even recognize the person in the mirror staring back at me. Every time I used the restroom, or took a shower, or brushed my teeth – I was taken aback. It wasn’t the most enjoyable week of my life, that’s for sure.

But here’s my little secret…

Looking back, I wish I knew about Vantis Institute.

I mean, sure, I knew about this particular industry in general, but I didn’t know the specifics. Maybe I binged watched too much Arrested Development over the years and I didn’t want to turn out like Tobias Funke:

And I’m not afraid to admit it: in my head, hair loss treatment companies were fly-by-night operations operating in relative secrecy with questionable methods and techniques that simply don’t really work. I did absolutely no research to come to this conclusion (this was purely my preconceived notions), but that changed when I put in the time to get to know the ins and outs of Vantis – and honestly, of the industry in general.

So do me a favor, and scroll back up. Do you see everything listed under the “Pros” section of shaving your head? They’re real, but they require you to keep up with it. Shaving your head is a process you need to be constantly aware of and doing more times than you probably want to admit.

But that sense of freedom, the feeling of a new you, higher self-esteem?

Those are also the benefits of hair restoration treatment with Vantis Institute. What Vantis brings to the table is a unique proposition. They’re not giving you the gift of something you never had – they’re giving you the gift of what you have lost, essentially giving you a new-and-improved version of yourself.

And unlike shaving your head, the benefits of Vantis are long-term.

So yeah, I wish I knew about Vantis before I took the plunge and shaved it all off. I wonder my last 24 days would’ve been. Whether I’d be second-guessing myself like I am now. I certainly would’ve have written this blog post, that’s for sure.

And as I sit here in my office with the faint reflection of myself staring back at me through my computer monitor, I catch myself begin to notice the dreaded horseshoe on my head that is a signal that it’s time once again to shave my head for the hundredth time this month.

I sigh to myself. But I bookmark Vantis’ website on my browser, and I carefully make sure I have their office number in my contact list.

Just in case I get tired of shaving my head.

Just in case I’m ready to take that final step towards freedom.