Dd (nearly 7) is gradually losing her hair - why?

[souvenir]

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Your poor dd. This happened to ds2 (5), who up until then has gorgeous, golden, surfy curls.

In his case it was as a result of serious illness (he nearly died from pneumonia after getting flu in December 08), but it could just as easily be caused by long-term low grade illness or infection.

If it is telogen effluvium, it will recover, in most cases within 6 months of the hair loss starting. We went and had a consultation with a local hairdresser who advised lots of layers to give the impression of thickness until the growth recovered. We took her advice and he looked better straight away.

telogen effluvium

Hope this helps.

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My DS did the same when he was 6 yrs (slow and steady-we didn't notice at first)and he ended up seriously ill with pneumonia-when he recovered his hair grew back.Keep checking at the doctors-don't just ignore.

I think a long-term low grade infection that has been undetected may be enough to cause it in some cases. (You mentioned signs of low grade infection in her blood results.)

DS2s hair loss was noticeable but gradual and having started in March has only just started to abate.

As for diagnosis, our GP hadn't heard of it but looked it up and agreed it sounded right. Our hairdresser however, had heard about it and was able to reassure us.

I agree with piscesmoon. If you really don't feel she had been ill enough to cause it, keep on at your gp and ask for referral to paeds if necessary, especially as they have detected an unknown infection.

Hope you get to the bottom of it soon.

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My DS (4.2) had this, except his hair fell out over the space of a week! I would say he lost about 80% of his hair in total.

He also had the blood tests which came back normal apart from being slightly anaemic, but the same as your dd not enough to need iron tablets. DH's cousin is a GP and he advised it was telogen effluvium. He had been run down for quite a few weeks, with different colds and sicknes bugs and he said that was enough to cause it.

This all happened over Christmas and New Year and his hair has since grown back. He had wavy thickish hair before it fell out, but now he has very thick, cork screw curls! Everyone comments on it

Hope this reassures you a bit, I know how upsetting it is to see it happen

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As far as I'm aware its self limiting, ie hair growth always recovers. It is caused when the follicles all go into resting phase at the same time, so no permanent damage is done. We were told 6 months for regrowth to begin.

Poor thing, it must be tough on her. Fortunately for us ds2 didn't notice as, being a boy, he rarely bothers looking in a mirror and his friends didn't appear to notice either.

That said, I was really upset about it when it was at its worst, I cried every time I found some of his lost hair, and I was really upset when his curls went.

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Initially we just noticed how much thinner his hair seemed. Later, we were finding hair everywhere, particularly bad after a bath - it looked like we'd just bathed the dog with the amount of hair floating in the bathwater!

But then I suppose girls probably brush their hair more frequently, so would lose a bit each time rather than ds who has to be pinned down to have his hair brushed before school in the morning so visibly lost more at that time iyswim.

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I had something similar myself after a bout of pneumonia a few years ago. They couldn't find anything wrong with me at all.

I had a ponytail so that the hair covered my scalp and bought lots of funky hats.

I ended up getting my hair cut off in the end, it was too depressing seeing my ponytail get thinner and thinner. I stuck with the hats though.

I think it was about 4 months from noticing my hair falling out to getting it all cut off. It grew back fine and I soon had lots of hair again.

Buy hats! It is apparently summer so you need to protect her from getting a sun-burned scalp which is no fun at all.

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This happened to my DD a few months ago, I thought it might be hormones or stress. I now think it was after having the 'flu at Christmas, apparently if they have been ill, the hair will fall out a few months after, especially if they had a temperture. It was literally falling out in handfuls for a couple of months, but then just stopped and it is growing back.

I cut her hair into a bob to lessen any stress on it.

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My DD had a really bad eczema flare up that started in Centre Parcs. Her skin really deteriorated over a 2 month period and ended up on a weeks course of oral steroids (Prednisone). Two weeks later she was losing approximately 300 hairs a day. We are now at four months later and although she has loads of new hair growth, she is still losing in my opinion too much on a daily basis. Dermatologist said it was Telogen Effaluvium. I just want it to end, so sad to see.