Follea

Hair Loss Wig Renewed – Why This Wig Looks So Natural

by Y on July 8, 2020

As a person with hair loss who wears wigs for that purpose, I strive to always have them feel as natural as possible, and as much as “ME” as possible.

I probably get more questions about this wig than most any other due to how natural it looks. Where this wig started and where it is now are two very different places due to age and the evolution through time with coloring and also a perm. I recently got this piece back from my beautiful friend and and Master Wig Stylist, Sophie Hafner and before even putting it on, I decided to film a bit to talk about it, then put it on for you, and also share some pics from the life it’s had from 2015 – Present. It’s been colored several times, and permed in 2017.

In this video in addition to showing the renewed wig, I also discuss the reasons I think that contribute to this being such a natural looking piece (Spoiler Alert: cut, coloring, perm – and also due to the age, it has less density, which adds to a very imperfect natural look).

I think once you are ready to move on to a new piece, you may want to consider renewing your existing one and have it as a new look/style for the wig rotation. I actually was fairly convinced that this wig had reached the end of its lifespan, but turns out I was wrong, she’s got some more life left.

Initially when I started wearing wigs in 2012 I wore them out of the box, with just hair cutting (which in itself is magical for a wig), but once custom coloring entered into the equation, my wig wearing life enhanced 10 fold with how natural the pieces looked and came to life. Here is the video, I hope you enjoy!

Sending much love to all!
XOXO
~ Y

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Bang Bang, Color Choices and Life Oh My!

by Y on August 28, 2017

I came into Sophie’s salon today because I need a change, my life is changing, and I feel my hair needs one too. I have this gorgeous Follea wig that was formerly a 5010, and she’s been beautifully colored already once before, and banged… However, as I’ve evolved over the years in life and in hair wearing, so has what I want out of my wig hair wearing experience. I’m much more explorative and adventurous. I have found you need to get a little dirty to get a little more beautiful. That probably makes no sense, but I was always very vanilla with my hair needs, but working with my girl Sophie Hafner, has leveled up what I thought could be possible. So here I sit, with a wig and bangs, and feeing I need a little something something.

While my life has been in flux and ever changing, I want you to know, I’m still here…. hair loss took away my life for a long time, but in return it gave me so much more. I have found love, friendship, and you, all of you.

In my spirit of gratitude and feeling thankful, i want to thank all of you amazing women who have supported me, without the love and support of the Women’s Hair Loss Project, I wouldn’t be able to be where I am today. While some people say I gave them life and hope again, you gave me life and hope. Mad props always to Follea who let me feel like myself again, and for eventually finding my sister for another mister, Miss… Sophie Hafner… can I formerly thank you hair loss. Like thanks. I thought my world was over, but I didn’t know at the time when I was 21 (I’m 39) that my journey was really just beginning.

Sending Much Love and Hugs to You All.

XOXO

Y





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Purple Extensions In My Wig? Yes Please! :)

by Y on February 23, 2016

I reflect back on my hair loss journey, and if you asked the 21 year old scared girl beginning to loose her hair in 1999, if she could ever imagine life with and after hair loss, she (me) would have said, “NO” and then cried uncontrollably… as I always used to do… daily. Impossible to process, and yet here I am. I’ll be 38 years old in 2 months and this affliction stole over a decade of my life. I am not making use of hyperbole when I say that. My 20’s came and went, and all I had were memories of devastation and a complete feeling of being helpless, powerless and destined to exist in a state of forever suffering. Paralyzing.

I’ve written a tremendous amount on my blog about my hair loss, finding my acceptance… removing the shackles of hair loss and taking back my life.  This change came for me in 2012 when I started wearing hair and realizing, that while not perfect in the respect that it’s not growing out of my head… it was perfect enough. I could go out and portray myself to the world, as I wanted to be seen (the way I looked before my  hair loss) and feel good about myself again. It was a process, it took time. I cut my hair super short (buzzed in back, long in front) so I didn’t have to see my hair fall out anymore and I could have a cute edgy hair cut that I could wear, one where people would think I just was just so bold to wear a style like that, not knowing I do it out absolute necessity. Since my hair loss began when I was so young I never really got the opportunity to do anything fun with my hair… cuts, colors and styles etc., was not an option. I was just praying it stopped falling out. [click to continue…]





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You Are Perfect…. And My Living Proof Serum

by Y on August 13, 2015

So that is pretty much a title that makes no sense, on the surface… but if you watch my video below it will. I am trying to get back into the swing of things, and when I mean in the swing of things, I mean into working on my site here, communicating with everyone (to the best of my ability) and helping in any way I can.

My main goal, since starting The Women’s Hair Loss Project,  has always been to make sure no other woman ever feels she is alone in this journey. I know hair loss. Intimately.  I know what it is to deal with hair loss at a young age, since I started to loose my hair at 21… I’m 37 now, and I hope no one has to ever struggle alone, the way I did.

Once I started wearing wigs and found Follea in 2012, it ultimately,  for me was how I was able to accept my hair loss.  I really wanted women to know that there is life after hair loss, even in the worse case scenario.  I know not everyone can accept wearing wigs, it’s not perfect, it’s not our hair… but it can still be pretty awesome, it’s been a journey to say the least.. and if you read my last post, you will know this journey still continues for me.

Over the years I have received emails with the question of why do I wear sunglasses in my videos and photos. I want to answer, and answer why I am now taking them off.  [click to continue…]





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My “Re-Birthday” at Follea – Lina’s Journey

by Lina on August 7, 2014

Hi girls. I was planning on making my first trip to Follea in the fall but I had an incredible opportunity to go last week – so, hello, I went! Our lovely admin is piecing together a video on my visit so that I can share that with you (stay tuned). I’m going to post a few more blogs on my visit to LA and how it has helped me with my acceptance and growth but I want to share my Follea visit because it is about, well, hair (mostly anyway, haha).

Without going through my l-e-n-g-t-h-y journey to finally get to the hair wearing phase (cuz, you’d be missing at least a week of work!) I’m going to go straight into why I travelled almost 4,000 km to go to Follea.

I am two years into wearing hair and I would say one year in completely being used to my new normal, normal being wearing wigs full-time. I have been through a number of pieces that, looking back, were great to start but as I grew in my journey, I felt my hair-wearing needs changed. I would have to say to finally get to the stage of accepting that my hair was leaving me and that I needed to re-gain my life, was a very long, painful, sad, arduous journey. Phase 2 of the journey was getting used to wearing hair, any hair – it was just as difficult in its own right but thankfully not near as long. I know that lots of women here on the WHLP have echoed the same sentiments but I cannot stress it enough, cut yourselves a break ladies, hair loss sucks and she’s a tough one to plow through.

Fast forward, so I am at the hair wearing stage and what has happened in two years? Well, I went from toppers, to shaving my head, wigs, letting the hair grow in (cuz, somehow it was going to re-grow in thicker and much better, pfff) to shaving, to regrowing to finally shaving and keeping it shaved as I feel, in my case, I’m not fooling anyone and I look “healthier” in a shaved head. So, accepting my shaved head I began to think why not try a gripper and get rid of the wigrip? I never would have heard of Follea if it wasn’t for WHLP and let’s face it, Y rocks some killer locks, so I began to investigate. The more I stalked the Follea web-site and watched pretty much all their gripper videos – I decided, well if this is my fate (to wear hair), let’s see if I can get THE hair and THE comfort to take me through life. [click to continue…]





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Color Me Happy: Natalia’s Color Update! [Video]

by Y on October 13, 2013

What’s better than an awesome wig? An awesome wig with a color touch up! Wigs fade, the color lightens or whatever… I don’t know the technical mumbo jumbo other than the color changes over time. I got Natalia (my Follea Lifestyle 5030) in May 2012, and she had lightened up to the point where her color just wasn’t working as well for me, so it was quite clear she needed some color-love. I took her to see Vicka at Follea and explained to her how naughty Natalia was, and how her color just wasn’t right for me anymore.  I didn’t want her to be a totally different color, I just wanted to get her as close to the original color as possible. Vicka suggested that would best be accomplished with low lighting the entire wig, and it indeed proved to be a great suggestion because Natalia is looking slamming hot! I am sooooo happy with how the color came out.

It’s really just a subtle difference, but it makes a huge difference in how it blends with my bio hair and looks against my skin color. I feel like I have a brand new wig again, it’s awesome! After seeing how supa fabulous Natalia came out I’ve decided to take Anya back to Follea, so Vicka can work her color magic on her as well. I’ll be looking forward to her updated freshened up 2013 color 🙂





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Working Out In My Wig At The Gym, Making Mila (Follea Aero-2) Sweat

by Y on July 10, 2013

Took Mila (my Follea Aero-2 Wig) to my circuit training class for the second time. We both survived, and I brought the camera along to share with you how she looks when she has been worked out!  A little over a week ago I made my first attempt at wearing Mila to the gym, I posted about it on Facebook, and I was a bundle of nerves wondering how she would hold up, if she would slide, how it would feel etc etc etc., the list goes on. I made it through that workout just fine, but decided to fine tune Mila’s look for optimal heart pounding endorphin raising, serious cardio blasting circuit training.

For today’s workout , I pinned the front bang area hairs to the side because they got sweaty plastered on my head last time.. not great. Also, last time I left my hair down for way too long, perhaps I was just enjoying being one of those gals at the gym on the treadmill with her hair down and swishing all around, or perhaps I knew that the ponytail isn’t Mila’s best look in my view, maybe it was a little of both. Either way, once my neck started sweating the hair got a little stuck together in the neck area, and Mila just wasn’t looking as cute as when she walked in… poor girl. Eventually I put her in a looped ponytail but it was too late, the sweatiness had taken over.  This time, from the start of the workout, I put her in the looped low ponytail and it was just sooooo much better and I felt so much more confident wearing her to the gym today. I think as with anything else, the more you do it the more confident you will get with it.

So ladies I’m happy to report, that with the assistance of the WiGrip, that Mila can pretty much do anything, including sit-ups, pushups, treadmill, squats against the wall… and oh, so much more.  

Happy video watching 🙂

P.s. I make a comment at the end, that it was a long video — and really this video isn’t that much longer than my others, but I had a whole separate six minute first part I recorded this morning before I left the house, I decided it would make the video too long so I cut it out.





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A Visit To The Brow King (Damone Roberts) In My Queen (Follea Lifestyle Wig)

by Y on June 14, 2013

Howdy Everyone!

It’s get your eyebrows waxed Friday, at least for me anyways, those little brows of mine where getting crazy so me and Anya (Follea Lifestyle wig) wandered our way to the brow king in Beverly Hills to get those babies fixed up. This was my second brow waxing with Damone at Damone Roberts, and he did yet another fabulous job on giving me some sleek brows to go with my supa sleek hair 🙂

While brow talk is fun, I know you gals care less about the particulars of the brow wax, and more about how it is wearing a wig in a situation where someone is that close to your face, am I right or what?  For me,  it’s totally fine and I’m pretty comfortable with it at this point. I have sort of gotten into the habit of spilling the beans whenever someone is going to be in that close of a proximity to my face (waxing, facials) but there have been times I’ve gotten waxed and never said a word, and I’m almost positive the person waxing had no idea, I sort of just take it on a case by case comfort level basis. I think the only thing to be mindful of, and this goes for the dentist chair too, is that if the eyebrow waxer is very close to your hair and pressing against it with their leg as you lay back, you need to be VERY careful when you sit up. There have been a few times I felt like I almost left my wiggie behind on the chair as the leg of the person had trapped “my” hair, LOL. Can you imagine? That’s the stuff wig nightmares are made of, so there are small things like that to watch out for.

This video update also discusses my hair cuts plans and provides a closer look at Anya’s hair color almost a year after I originally got her. Upon watching the video back, I realize it’s not really a true color representation, she appears lighter in person than she does in the car, but it’s a pretty color just the same.

Happy Brow Friday!

XOXO





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Mila’s ( Follea Aero-2 ) Makeover! Video & Pics

by Y on April 18, 2013

Closeup of Mila’s New Color

Hi Everyone!

It’s been QUITE awhile since I’ve made a video, been supa dupa busy these past few months, but things are now settling down and I wanted to do a video (embedded at the end of this post) about my darling Mila’s little makeover aka dye job! I’m fairly new to wig wearing, and as of May of this year, I will have been wearing wigs for  one year, so I’m sort of learning along the way about new things, such as the color of the hair lightening up over time.

If you didn’t know, Mila is my Follea Aero-2 wig, born in the color 5030, which is a light brown/blonde color, a perfect match to my bio hair. Over time her color started lightening up and it got to a point where I didn’t think it blended well with my own hair anymore. If I didn’t use my hair it wouldn’t have been as big of an issue, but I do use my own hair with all my wigs, and I definitely need a color that blends.

Enter… Hair Color

I decided to take my misbehaving girl to Vicka at Follea in Beverly Hills, and show her how naughty she’s been 😉 I explained to Vicka that I wanted the color to match my bio hair as much as possible, obviously within reason, we are talking about hair color here, not hair cloning! I’m fairly flexible in the color of my wig, as long as it’s a good blend and goes well with my skin tone, if it’s too dark I look like I should be holding out a bag and saying “Trick or Treat!” [click to continue…]





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Mila (My Follea Aero-2 Wig) Joins Me For a Car Update!

by Y on November 28, 2012

You know me, sitting in traffic with an iPhone in hand is a recipe for yet another car video update 🙂  xoxo





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