My wig journey began in 2008 when I was 31 years old. It had taken me nearly 12 years to finally put aside my fears and try to help myself. Until then, I was wearing my hair in barrettes and ponytails every day, trying to hide my thinning hair that I later found out was caused by lupus. I wanted to express myself with my hair style, but I felt trapped by what I was going through. I felt myself slipping into depression. I kept telling myself that I was being vain and petty for wanting to look pretty.  I had become stuck in a rut of feeling physically unattractive and pitying myself. As the years went on of losing more hair, I felt myself becoming more invisible to others and myself, rarely wanting to engage socially with other people. At some point, my hair loss progressed to a level where a ponytail wasn’t covering my scalp. I wasn’t fooling anyone before but now, I couldn’t even fool myself. I had looked online at wigs but now I had decided that I was going to take the plunge. I realized that wanting to feel pretty wasn‘t being vain at all. I deserved to pamper myself and that didn't define me. My first wig style was the hair I had longed for, long, wavy, and luscious. But looking back, it was more of a costume wig. I had no idea what I was doing, there weren’t many wig tutorials online back then. Even with the initial disappointment of how unrealistic the wig looked on me, this experience sparked hope. Seeing myself with hair reminded me of who I was when I was carefree and confident. As a grad student, I didn’t have much extra spending money, but I decided getting a ‘good’ wig and finally feeling better about myself was as important as buying groceries, so I took an deeper plunge and bought a Raquel Welch wig. I wore this style for a while, buying it over and over again. I began by wearing the wig during weekends, and soon I couldn’t wait for Saturdays to come. I felt most alive when I wore my wig. In 2010, I graduated from grad school and moved to a new city. This may sound corny, but I felt like I could completely transform myself and truly be myself. I started wearing wigs everyday.  I also changed to wearing human hair wigs. The past 10 years have been the best years of my life.  I’ve experimented with toppers and wigs in different styles and colors. And in living my life more fully, I opened myself up to others.  In this time, I’ve met the man I married in 2014, and we have a daughter together. My husband loves me with or without wigs. He supports my wig journey because he knows that without it, I wouldn’t quite be the person he fell in love with and the person I want to be.