I think I saw an item about her on some TV program. Good for her!! She is so brave and I wish her much luck.

My cousin has this too. I just can't imagine!

Linda

I know of a couple of people that have that. One a young boy and the other a man about 50. She is very brave indeed and a good role model.

For certain a role model in encouraging others with this condition not to let it stop them, but did she not compete wearing a wig (and said in an interview that she would wear a wig during public appearances)? Where's the bravery in that?

On the role model/bravery scale, I believe that standing much taller is Robin Roberts -- the morning-TV show host who went on TV and did her normal publicity and public appearance stuff bald when she lost her hair during treatment for breast cancer.

Maybe the pageant contestant felt she needed a wig to compete without being tarred by a "sympathy vote," tho she did get a lot of publicity beforehand.

And here's what just astounds me: She went on at least one TV show, talking about her baldness, without a wig. Here's what she said in an interview:

âÂÂNo beauty queen should fit into a box and look like a Barbie every time they wake up and none of us do, as you know. So I hope to show people that you are beautiful and whatever makes you different, you should embrace it.âÂÂ

She had a perfect place and platform to show her beauty, baldness and all (and she is a lovely looking girl--look at her photos without the wigs). But she didn't do it.

beg to differ pam...she wanted to be seen as every other woman there with hair and not garner a sympathy vote based on her condition...everyone was well aware and yes we all saw her on pre-programs...besides i'm sure, if she had been chosen as miss america, it would have been as a "normal" person, not based on one facet of her life...

i've have cancer and was bald for several months, but i didn't/still don't want to be defined as oh there is that lady who had cancer..i want to be known as a wife, mother, and grandmother...i bet miss deleware feels the same while competing, but will to continue a beautiful spokesperson for alopecia...

She had said that showing that people with alopecia can live full "normal" lives would have been her cause if she won the title. She wanted that to be her defining image. Her cause is terrific, and it's needed. But she competed with the image of something else entirely, covering her true self up as if she felt she had to pretend in order to get a real shot. She would have been equally beautiful without the wig and educated many people instead of abiding to America's standard "beauty" definition of what a Miss America should be. She wanted to have it both ways.

Maybe she wore the wig (and was bald in some shows),
to show young people that there were options, and not
to despair about being bald the rest of their lives.

Telling them, "you can't fix the baldness, but if it
torments you, you can wear wigs, etc., to make you
happier".