My Experience with Egocentricism

As I was grading discussion posts on egocentricism, I was reminded about my own recent egocentricism experience last year and wanted to share.  

A bit of background: My entire adult life, I was known for 2 things, my long, blond hair, and my figure (of course there is so much more to me but I know these are traits others knew me by).  I was image conscious.  Fast-forward to October 2014: I was 36 years old and diagnosed with breast cancer.  I was faced with losing the two things I was known for.  The fit, pretty, bubbly girl with long blond hair and a hourglass figure was gone.  Now, I was scarred, flat chested, 20 lbs heavier from steroids and chemo, and bald.  My husband could tell I was struggling and took me out on a date.  I had always been a relatively confident person, but that was when I had my appearance to hide behind.  I remember wiping away the tears as we pulled up to the steakhouse.  I felt like everyone was going to be staring at me.  I was embarrassed.  I felt bad for my husband that he now had an 'ugly' wife.  I felt bad that the other customers had to eat while looking at me. I was so engrossed in myself, at the time, I was absolutely over-estimating the amount of attention others were paying to me.

Now that I'm a year and a half removed from this situation, I can absolutely realize my feelings of egocentricism.  While to an 'outsider' it seems silly and unrealistic that the rest of the world is paying that much attention to you, but it was very real to me at the time.  It felt very similar to being in high school and having a monster zit on my face just in time for the homecoming dance.  While these feelings are characteristic of teenagers, they can also creep up even once we graduate into adulthood.  I'm happy to report, that after a few outings, I started to 'snap out of it' and realized that no one cared if I was bald.  People didn't look at me in disgust.  Honestly, people didn't look at me at all.  I was overestimating that others were observing my behavior - just as we do in adolescence. Once I was able to step away from my egocentricism, being bald was actually very freeing.   

Summer 2014

Winter 2014