I have thick hair; thick, unruly, inobedient Irish locks.  Thick curls + humid desert temperatures = frizz disaster.  On the richter scale of hair disasters, without question, it measures around ‘8’, i.e., horrific disaster almost all year round – fatalities expected.  Summer is the enemy in my ‘hair care’ strategy (!!).  In summer I feel like a sheep that has not been shorn; a sheep who is being punished because it didn’t provide a sufficient amount of offspring in the spring ( I would say ‘lamming’ season but, not being from farming country, I am not sure if that is spelled with an ‘m’ or a ‘b’!).  My scalp is constantly damp and the beads of sweat just inch their way up the strands of my hair until it feels like it does when I am working out in 40+ degrees…..soggy and greasey.

However, since I have been in Dubai, I have noticed or at least thought my hair has been getting thinner.  Whilst I bemoan my ‘thick coat’ at every opportunity, I would rather be a ‘collie’ than one of the world’s ugliest, hairless dogs.  Not too long ago I suspected my top coat was thinning.  Whilst I had length and thickness, my crown seemed ‘flat’.  For a time I convinced myself it was the weight of my growing, heavy hair pulling the ‘crown’ hair downwards.  When that excuse didn’t fly, I blamed my ‘teeange baseball cap wearing days’.  Apparently heat/sweat causes thinning of hair.  Just look at Tiger Woods, Andy Murray and other sports personalities who spend a lot of time in the sun/heat and wear UV proof protective headgear.  It seems, in the sandpit, it is not just the Nike sponsored Pros who are afflicted with this gradual yet sudden hair loss.  A regular Dubai shower will do it for you!

It seems I am not the only one complaining about hair loss.  I know, I know.  Some of us lose hair all the time.  In Dubai the pale coloured floor tiles highlight the evidence so much more than the European carpet clad floor.  But when you pull out clumps of your hair in successive hairwashes, you do begin to wonder.

Apparently it is all in the water.

However, it seems there is hope for those of us affected by this ‘disorder’, a shower head attachment which reduces hair loss and which saves the planet at the same time.  Having heard of the mystical powers of such an instrument from another celt, I found myself brandishing a shower head, in what I am sure appeared a very accusatory manner, at the cash counter of my local pharmacy.  I thought this was the answer to all my prayers.  Apparently not.  The stoopid attachment only attaches to removable shower heads……and that is not something I use each morning.  My shower head is attached to the wall.  I LOVE my power shower and I am NOT willing to sacrifice that for the ‘remote’ possibility that I may encourage my Irish ringlets to perform a Riverdance encore!