Trichotillomania is a really strange-sounding word. If you didn't know what it is, it might sound like a joke — or like a fake disease from a sci-fi novel. In reality, it describes a disorder that also might sound fake if it doesn't affect you: obsessive hair-pulling. Those who suffer from it feel an insatiable desire to pull out their own hair, often causing large bald patches on their heads or loss of eyebrows and eyelashes. This disorder can affect anyone in any age group, but it’s more commonly diagnosed in women ( 80 to 90% of sufferers are female, to be exact ). Innocuous enough as hair-pulling may seem, the reality of living with trichotillomania can be anxiety- and shame-filled, and sufferers often go to great lengths to hide their habit.Let me jump back a bit and talk about when I noticed myself pulling out my own hair, long before ever hearing the disorder named. I was 12 years old, sitting in my seventh-grade English class in early fall. I remember the warm Southern sun heating up the classroom and making me sleepy; I don't remember the lecture at all. I was bored. I casually ran my fingers through my (at the time) long, curly hair when suddenly, I felt something strangely rough. I snapped to attention and hunted with my fingers along my scalp, attempting to find what it was. Finally, my fingertips closed in on a single strand that was curlier than the others — rough and thick. I pulled it out at the root and instantly felt a wave of relief. I set the hair on my desk and ran my fingers over it, wondering how long it had been on my head. It must have been growing for months. Worse yet, were there more? My hands went back to my scalp, and thus began a long and unending hunt for the imperfect hairs.It started slowly. I only pulled in class and, even then, occasionally. But as I got older, and school became more stressful, I began to pull simply for the feeling of relief it gave me. Here was something I could control. There was something imperfect about myself, and all I had to do to fix it was diligently root out these wild, ragged hairs and rip them out. Piles would form beside me as I did homework or sat to read a book. I would scoop them up and flush them down the toilet so my mom wouldn't notice, even then realizing there was something worrisome about this behavior.It wasn't until years later, in high school, that I truly realized I might have a problem. By this time, I was also pulling out my eyelashes, my eyebrows, even armpit and pubic hair; the thicker and kinkier, the better. I usually wore my hair down, but for a photo shoot before a school dance I put it into two braids. It was in these photos that I first saw it: my bald spot. My scalp was clearly visible, and there was a mess of regrowing hair sprouting from it at awkward lengths; it jutted out just off-center from the top of my head. I couldn't smooth down the frizz, I couldn't cover up the thinness, and I had no idea how long it had been there or who had noticed it. I immediately deleted the photos, took out my braids, and started wearing a beanie to school. I missed the dance.