Hair growing completely differently around scar after brain surgery

[Gumbo]

I had brain surgery a couple of years ago, leaving a 20cm long scar that's quite thick. I then had further surgery a few months later ... the incision was more or less in the same place as the 1st one (although they removed a pile of infected tissue at the same time).

My hair has always been pretty straight and easy to manage. But since the surgery, the whole area around the scar has got frizzy, wild, curly hair growing out of it! (Nothing growing out of the main scar itself which is to be expected, but all of the surrounding scalp now has very different hair to the rest of my head). I assumed that time would resolve this but that does not appear to be the case. My hairdresser is fascinated baffled by it as she's never seen anything like this before. I recently encountered someone with the same problem, only opposite to me (her hair is curly, but her scar tissue hair is straight).

Has anyone else had this? Is it a standard 'thing'? Will it ever be normal or will I look ridiculous forever?

I appreciate in the grand scene of things, I've survived brain surgery and am healthy so I shouldn't complain...

How frustrating! Maybe you could try using a keratin treatment (Brazilian straightening) on the frizzy area? I've bought the kits from Amazon before and they work well at smoothing hair for a couple of months, as long as you use the correct shampoos etc afterwards. They're a bit of a faff on whole heads as you have to use straighteners on small sections repeatedly to seal the keratin in, but on a small area I imagine it would be much simpler. You'd get several applications out of the kit too.

Congratulations on your recovery

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll have a look at that. It probably doesn't help that the scar is shaped like an S rather than being straight

I don't own straighteners (never needed them before) so I'll clearly need to do some research on this. I've been using anti frizz shampoo in the meanwhile but it doesn't seem to help a lot...

Yes it's bizarre but I suppose it's a bit like people's hair growing back differently after they have had cancer?

As pp said Brazilian straightening might do the trick, lots of salons offer it (obviously more expensive that doing at home) but if you don't have straighteners anyway that might be the easier option

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll be doing some investigations into the whole straightening malarkey.

I'm surprised that nobody else has said whether their experience of large surgical scars on their head now has different hair! I fully appreciate that brain surgery isn't particularly common, but MN is full of people with utterly random knowledge and 1st hand experience of really odd stuff (eg. "my knees have gone a strange shade of green since I've had a bad dose of bubonicleprosypox and I don't know how to treat it, the doctor says it's normal" is generally followed with someone saying, "ooh - I had this, there's a shop in a Brick Lane that sells bagels that also has jars of leprechaun sweat on the bottom shelf near the back - it worked a treat for my green knees" - and then a few more people confirming this is indeed the way forward! )

Did you have chemo or radiotherapy as it’s well documented that hair may grow back curly ?

I will be back once I've checked dp's head. He's had it short since surgery...

You are not alone

www.reddit.com/r/curlyhair/comments/otgk8j/curly_hair_loss_after_surgery/

My daughter had a small operation on her head many years ago. Her normal hair is chocolate brown and very straight. The hair that grows back around the scar was black curly and about 4 times thicker than her normal hair. It took a few years but the difference in the hair is not as noticeable now although it is still different.

@MyrtlethePurpleTurtle

Did you have chemo or radiotherapy as it’s well documented that hair may grow back curly ?

No, no chemo or anything.

@MyrtlethePurpleTurtle that's really interesting, thank you.

@user1498572889 that brings me some hope, thanks!

My sister had a brain haemorrhage and subsequent surgery a couple of years ago. Fortunately, no change in hair colour or texture around the scar.However, her daughter suffered from that condition a few years ago whereby she pulled out lots of hair in clumps. Her hair is naturally a dark auburn colour, whereby the new growth is a much darker brown colour.

Yes - here too. Scalp not brain surgery and the hair was weird - extra thick and coarse and very kinky and wiry. I got a skin infection and that but went too and the rest is ok! Very odd.

@Hamsteronrollerblades how long ago was that... did it ever go back to normal?

Mine didn’t go back to normal but I ended up with a giant bald patch for ages so my standards lowered! I figure it’s more obvious to me - hopefully yours goes if you can’t make friends with it.

The changes after chemo are caused by the hair follicles being damaged by chemo. Could the surgeon have stretched the skin on your scalp thus damaging the follicles?

@RachC2021 That's an interesting thought; yes, they use a strange device to pull the scalp back from the skull I saw a photo of my exposed brain with my skull removed that I'm pretty sure I wasn't meant to see so that may be what caused it.