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January 2004
Galleria Convention center
Atlanta, GA
Awards Banquet
I am receiving several awards after a very productive year for me.
I am surrounded by friends and family and being courted by all of the "mover and shakers" in my business world.
I have a beautiful girl by my side who is the light of my life anf and has been for 10 years.
I am planning on "popping the question" , since the whole event is being videotaped and a lot of our friends and associates are there.
I had bought a ring and had my little speech all memorized.
I had asked her parents for their approval to marry their daughter.
My secretary has been taking photos all evening and I can really "cut the rug" after a few Coronas.
After buring up the dance floor (picture the gopher in Caddyshack) I go and sit at our table and tell her that I am going to do this insane marriage proposal thing (once bitten, twice shy) and I look at the shots that she has taken that evening.
I ask her who is the guy with the big bald spot dancing with that cute brunette from my office.
She tells me that it is me.
I panic!
I knew that I has been losing hair but to be confronted with the glaring truth in hard print is almost more than I can take.
I just had no idea that I had that huge bald spot and it just devastates my confidence.
I know that it is extreme but I just could not go through with my plans that evening and have not to this day regained enough confidence to go forward with those plans.
As the days move by, I become more at ease with situation but am resolved to have it taken care of ASAP.
I went to Dr. Coles seminar in Atlanta and make my mind up to have procedure done but probably will wait until next year, when my schedule is much less busy to have procedure done.
Westin St. Francis Hotel
San Francisco, CA
May 5, 2004
On short vacation with "my girl" who is quite upset that we are not following through on charted course of marriage, kids etc...
I received a call from Dr. Cole's office, a follow up on my attendance at seminar the previous month, and in casual conversation I make a decision that I am not going to have this procedure until late fall 2004 or after 1st of 2005, due to my schedule and plans for this summer.
I did tell Michelle that I would be interested in standby since I live close to Atlanta but that I was really in no hurry at this point.
May 6, I get a call from Sherri, telling me that I can do a 500 FIT on May 10 if I want to schedule. Making a spur of the moment decision, I agree to do it even though it means ending my vacation several days early and leaving "my girl" in a not so good mood.
She can't believe that I would just drop our vacation and leave her alone there to go and get hair transplants.
I really don't know why I decided to go ahead but after making my mind up to do it I booked a flight home for May 9 and left the city by the bay late that night.
Atlanta, GA
May 10, 2004
Arrived @ Hartsfield around midnight and home about 3 AM on May 10, threw my bags in the living room, checked VM, Email and ran by my office to see what fires needed put out, took care of business, showered and left to go to Dr. Coles office @ 6:00 to avoid traffic jams (a 1 1/2 drive for me, I was scheduled to be there @ 9:00 AM).
Alpharetta, GA
May 10, 2004
No traffic!
This is unbelievable but fantastic, so I arrive @ 7:30 AM and do some work with my notebook in car waiting on office to open.
At this point, jet lag, lack of sleep, apprehension, fatigue, some other emotion issues all combine to put me in a very strange mind set almost a surrealstic state, and to top it off it's my birthday!
Just a very weird vibe to everything, last minute decision, leaving "my girl" alone in San Francisco (well she did have my credit cards to keep her company).
Anyway, the staff starts showing up so I get out and go in the office.
I get a call from, "my girl" in San Francisco and she is just so upset that I didn't follow through with my plans @ the Awards Banquet and now have deserted her (so to speak) to have this hair transplant.
She tells me that my prorities are skewed.
I thanked her for being "so supportive" and "so concerned" about my problems.
It all starts to go downhill quickly at that point.
10 years together with the most wonderful girl that I have ever been with in my life, a beautiful relationship and a wonderful future all disappear in a matter of minutes just because nature decided to take away my hair and leave me with a bald head!
My complete and utter frustration with losing my hair and everyone else's total lack of concern about it was just a little too much for that morning.
I am not vain but everyone has pressure points that trigger strong emotional reponses both rational and irrational.
Losing my hair just triggered something in me that I have no control over.
I am somewhat impulsive but this means a lot to me.
Getting my hair restored would give me the self confidence to get back in the game ....to take on the world again.
Apparently, it means nothing to anyone else in my life!
Maybe I don't need those people in my life anymore if they feel that way.
I'm sure that I don't need that person in my life anymore!
I tell that person how I feel.
It's not a very good start to the rest of my life but if I am to go on alone... you can bet that I will.
Feeling like I have just been ran over by a freight train, I make my way into Dr. Coles office and I am met with Sherri's megawatt smile and as we go through all of the paperwork, she really made me feel comfortable and more at ease with the whole situation as I am sure she does with other clients.
After getting the paperwork out of the way, Rony takes some shots of my problem areas and they lead me to the treatment room.
I meet the team that will be assisting Dr. Cole ( Leith-just a super guy with a great low key sense of humor, Nelson-quieter but also a super guy with a good personality, Louise- a great girl with just the best and most positive manner, Juliana- I tried to guess her nationality, with clues from Dr. Cole and just hearing her voice, since I couldn't see her...but Louise let it slip-I would never have guessed it....just a super group of people...I would love to date all of the girls and hang out and have a beer with the guys anytime...they are just the sort of people that it is easy to associate with)
Rony, comes by and hooks me up with T1 Inet connection and I choose some movies to watch while I am having the procedure done.
At some point during the morning, I found myself taking a short "catnap" and wake up a little embarrased hoping that I wasnot drooling and snoring
The anethesia (SP?) was not painful and the procedure was not the least bit painful other than sitting still for the whole day which is very hard for me. You may want to ask for a cushion-that chair gets hard after a while!
Dr Cole and his staff just made me feel so at ease and went above and beyond to keep me pleasantly occupied while they went about the procedure.
After getting my donor site shaved,a new haircut and getting the donor and recipient area numbed, Dr. Cole came in and discussed what my goals were for this session and we disussed doing strip vs. FIT.
He says that he will do either, it's my choice so I go with FIT over strip just because I don't want a scar. Dr Cole started punching the donor grafts, assisted by the different techs, and then made the recipent sites.
I believe that Nelson, removed most of the grafts and Leith and Patrick placed most of them under Dr. Coles supervision.
Dr. Cole was in and out the whole day, with the techs,doing grafts, sites and placements.
I had a great lunch and then we started the afternoon session with the same routine.
The feeling of the procedure is a little strange. Crunching sounds when Dr. Cole made recipients sites but no pain at all. Little tugs when they remove the grafts.
After a long day, we finished about 7:00 PM, and I had more photos made and left to stop by CVS to pick up my meds.
As I started to Leave Dr. Cole asked me if I wanted to come by the next day to do some more.
I thought it was a great idea since my donor site is already buzzed.
In the matter of 24 hours I have traveled from coast to coast, slept maybe 3 hours, had a "major" life changing procedure ( I hope), had my birthday and lost the girl the my life has revolved around for years.
I made it home around 10PM and just went into "off mode".
No pain, no problems, no complications.
I had a small amount of bleeding from donor site but it was not painful at all
Dr Cole and his staff just made this the most pleasant experience that it could have possibly have been.
They maintain your privacy, make you feel at ease and comfortable with the whole procedure.
My only regret is not asking those girls out on a date !
I will post Day 2 and 3 as time permits.
Sorry for all of the background, emotional BS but I just wanted to share my mindset @ the time of procedure.
My next posts will be directly to the point of the procedure itself!
If anyone has any questions email and I'll be happy to discusss my procedure with you and answer any questions that I can.
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