Oh God, what have I done?!?

[Slyfive]

Not that I advocate this kind of thing at all, but you can get dermal fillers if it bothers you that much, personally I think it looks kinda cool.

[Sir Harry]

Welcome, Navigator! I agree with what Slyfive said.....I think it looks great!

[mrzed]

The other fellows have given good advice. the  30 day rule, described elsewhere would be a good idea.

looks like your friend did a good job getting the remains down.  the bald look is becoming.  the wrinkles are the unique you.  makes you special.  but something you are not used to seeing, thus the 30 day rule.

i always shave the back of my head by feel. just takes a little getting used to.

also, since you don't normally see the back of your head, it will be awhile  before you get  used to seeing it in photos, specially up close as the ones you posted.  30 day rule. 

i still sometimes do a double take when i see a photo of myself from behind, but i'm loving the look from the front and that's what i have to see.

be encouraged.  Merry Christmas. May you be blessed with a great reception to your new look from friends and co workers.

[Switchy]

I have seen other gents that have the same type of scalp, and have many more wrinkles in it.  However they keep their head shaved and are happy with it.  None of us are perfect.  The way I look at it is like sly five says and others this is your unigueness .  So enjoy it.  Take your time to shave it. 

Welcome.   

[Navigator]

Thanks guys for your support. Very tempted to just call in and ask if I can work from home for a couple of months lol. But once you get over the shock factor, yeah I guess it's not actually as bad as I imagine when I'm not looking at it. According the google image result, it could be a LOT more severe so I guess I'm lucky. Already had a dozen facebook likes from people I know but they haven't seen the back yet lol. I guess I'll find out how noticable it is or not once I leave the house and face the outside world. I grew a beard recently (cut it down to a Van Dyke when I lost the hair as the beard just didn't look quite right to me with no hair - yeah, I know we're always most critical of ourselves lol). People say it takes courage to grow a beard in a mostly clean-shaven world. Ha! Try shaving your head, especially when the back of it looks all wrinkly lol.

I'm still not sure whether or not to keep it sly. To be honest, if I had known that's what my head looks like, I would've just gone bald naturally and not shaved it. Which, of course, wouldn't make much difference eventually lol. If my head was normal, that would be a different story. I guess that's the hardest thing. It's hard enough trying to decide whether or not to be BBC when your head is perfectly normal, let alone when it isn't lol.

[Switchy]

You said it my friend and you have a good out look.  With your beard and glasses.  I think it looks good.  You can always wear a cap it you get bothered.  But as You said we are all most critical , we beat ourselves up that other people could care less.     We have to remember NO ONE is Perfect.  Some may think they are but we all know better.  You are the one that has to act with self confidance.  If something bothers me I make fun of myself. And then it is no fun for others to say anything.  They think I am cool for it.   

[Switchy]

I would recomend that you give it the 30 days and shave your self take you time .  Hold the skin taunt and you will not have any problem.

[Papa Don]

Hello and welcome Navigator.  As others have said, We're not perfect.  In my case, I don't have wrinkles, but I have divots all over the head. Kind of looks like I have been beaten with a golf club.  I have been BBC for over three years now.  At first I had thoughts much like yours.  Not once has anyone commented negatively.  Most normal people may notice, but will not comment.  We all are who we are.  If your pleasant to those around you ,you will reap what to soe.  Those who might be negative are of no matter!  Hang in there and have faith in your common man.

[TheSlyBear]

As others have said, no one's perfect. I have a large red birthmark covering my entire right cheek. Our imperfections are things we sometimes just need to become accustomed to, and they make us who we are.

Ultimately, do what makes you happy, but you do look great sly!

[D.A.L.U.I.]

It's obviously not normal, just as I suspected.

Welcome Navigator to SBG.  Your condition does appear to be cutis verticis gyrata, but it's not something that's weird at all.  I first saw a guy with a shaved head with the condition when I was returned to New Orleans after Katrina.  I worked for the City and we had to live on cruise ships in the river because there weren't any services for water, electricity and sewerage anywhere else immediately after the storm.  We, the city workers, first responders, police, etc. all lived on two cruise ships--interesting but another story.  There was an officer on our ship, great guy who worked like a Trojan to make sure that we had everything possible to make our lives as comfortable as possible in very bad conditions, good food, clean quarters--and we really got to know him well.  He was a great guy, and the ladies in our groups really liked his looks--they found it masculine, sexy and not at all off putting.  He had lots of confidence in his work and social interactions.  If you do what you do as a person and a man half as well as he did, no one is going to think your somewhat unique look is anything but a positive.  The only one who can turn it into a negative is you. 

[Razor X]

Ultimately you have go with whatever makes you feel the most comfortable.  You've gotten plenty of reassurance here that it looks OK, but you need to take a little time to get used to it and decide how you feel about it.  My main concern would be that if might be difficult to keep it shaved clean on a daily basis.  In that case, a short buzz cut might be a better option.  I would experiment with both to see which you like better.

[Beardman]

G'day mate, welcome to the family. Even with the wrinkles I think you look fine.

I myself have the divots all over my head too like Papa Don, I also have scars and nasty little crater too. Until recently no one had even commented on them... Thats 6 months with no one other then me and my mother and sister (who initially helped me shave my head) noticing. Even then my boss when he noticed, never said anything negative about it, just sort of made the comment in passing and we moved on.

I believe it really does just create some character, and I like the way my bald head looks, even with all the imperfections.

Just take some time to get to work out how to shave your head effectively, work nice and slowly at first, and pull the wrinkles in tight if you can, so as to avoid accidently cutting one, because that's probably going to be the spot it happens. But I bet that if you give yourself 30 days you'll have learned how best to shave your head and you'll have even stopped fussing about how the wrinkles look, as you said, you can't even see them so don't worry

If anyone has anything to say about them you could always make comment about how your brain is so big that it broke through your skull or something like that, it's all about you being confident, and then other people will leave the topic be.

[Navigator]

Thanks for all your support guys. It's really appreciated. 

Well, I've now been outside and been to work. Pretty sure I made an old lady on the bus a bit nervous. I think she thought I was a well dressed thug or something lol (well it kinda looks like somebody smashed me in the back of the head with a broken bottle or something, after all!). I will need to learn to smile more often so I don't creep people out lol.

My opening line to my coworkers was "So I went out and got myself a hip post-apocalyptic haircut and nothing even happened dammit!" That broke the shock a little lol. I fielded stares and dropped mouths every time someone new saw it but of course it only lasts a few minutes of curiousity and then everybody goes back to the far more important job of worrying what other people think of them.  Most people seem to think I lost a bet or did it on a dare lol. If only - then I might have some money to show for it.  I've been compared to Bryan Cranston (in Breaking Bad, of course) and Lex Luther lol.

It's gonna take a while to grow back anyway of course so I guess this is a good opportunity to kinda do a practise run on what the best thing to do is when I do permanently go bald, probably within the next few years at the rate I'm going (and yes, in my frantic googling on my condition, it seems hair loss is common so that could be why I'm losing my hair in the first place). I'm not quite sure I'm ready to be sly permanently yet but it is something that will definitely happen sooner or later whether I like it or not lol. So I may as well prepare now.

Razor X - yep, this terrain is definitely gonna be hard to shave clean. My intention originally was to do a buzz cut to see how it looks but turns out, as happens with my newly uncovered condition, the hair grows thickly in all those little cracks and bumps and it looks really uneven, or at least it did when I buzzed it, which is why I had to go completely sly. It looked terrible lol. Maybe starting from sly will allow it to even out, who knows. So I think the best action at this point is to just let it grow back and keep an eye on its progress so I know what to look out for next time. It might be that I will be able to keep a short buzz cut in future by having just enough length to cover or even out the bumps, or perhaps having a barber try to even it out somehow once it's long enough. Then once my hair really starts falling out bigtime, I'll know the best way to cut it to minimize the contours. Or if I like it better than my old haircut, I can just stop at the point where it looks best.

Otherwise, if it turns out there is no way to effectively minimize both the balding and the bumps, at least I have a lucrative career ahead of me as a disfigured movie villian.  At last, my dreams of world domination will come true...

I do miss the beard I just spent 2 months growing so I'd like to grow it back out around the Van Dyke eventually, much like you did recently. Mustache and chin are the weakest part for me and the cheeks and underside fill in much better so I think it will be a better result than hacking it all off and starting from scratch.

In the meantime, I'm renting out all the movies and TV shows I can find with bald people in them...Breaking Bad, Major Payne, etc. And paying attention to just how many bald guys are out there. It helps to normalize the sudden hair loss.

[Navigator]

Also, just out of my own morbid curiousity, how old do you guys think I look without hair? I think it makes me make older because well, a. I'm bald! and b. my head is suddenly a lot wrinklier lol.

[Beardman]

Really, most people think they look younger once they go sly. I'd peg you at probably mid 30s.