The Great Shed of 2008

For reasons that will never be clear to me, I experienced a terrible shed starting around the middle of July 2008.  I remember every morning handfuls of hair coming out as I brushed my hair and braided it.  It was alarming to say the least.  I'd always thought that the normal pattern of shedding hairs that have completed their growing cycle and having these replaced by new hairs was pretty much a constant thing with little variation.  Perhaps a lot of my older hairs just completed their growth cycles at the same time...?

Having never been faced with this before, I wasn't sure what to do.  After it went on for a month, I knew something had to be done because the ends were getting noticeably thinner and ratty looking.  I had Amanda cut about 4 inches off the ends.  It had been a long time since I had had that much cut at once.

This was how it looked in September:

The shed is not too noticeable here because the thin ends had been removed.  I could definitely feel the dimished density, however.  The worst of the shed was over in about two months.  Here was my hair in October:

It was disheartening to see that length gone but all I could do was hope for steady regrowth.  Fortunately, by the end of the year, my shedding pattern had returned to normal.