Technically, Monica Edwards did not win FabOver40, the national online beauty contest for women ages 40 or older that raises money for breast cancer awareness.

The 53-year-old retired police officer advanced through three rounds of the competition, ultimately finishing seventh in her group in a contest that drew more than 180,000 competitors.

Yet in another sense, the competition succeeded as an affirmation of something Edwards had already found.

For 40 years of her life, she would never have imagined describing herself as fabulous.

Edwards suffers from alopecia, more commonly known as baldness.

“When I was 12 years old, I had a small patch of hair that fell out,” Edwards said. “My parents didn’t know what it was. They took me to the family doctor and he gave me different medicines, but by the time I was 13, all of my hair had fallen out. It wasn’t until then that my parents took me to a dermatologist, who said I had alopecia. We’d never heard of it.”

There are different types of alopecia. In some, the hair loss is confined to patches. Sometimes, it is temporary. Edwards learned she had alopecia areata totalis, which means total permanent hair loss. It is an autoimmune disorder.

It is estimated that 1-in-1,000 people worldwide suffer from alopecia areata, but as a young teen, Edwards seemed all alone at an age when girls were beginning to associate beauty with hair and makeup.

“It was a struggle, very rough, especially as a child,” said Edwards, who grew up in Flint, Michigan. “A lot of bullying. I couldn’t walk down the hall without somebody pulling my wig or hat off. It was hard to make friends. I had a sister that was with me in school, so it was just she and I. It wears on your self-esteem quite a bit and it can send you into depression, even if you have family to help and support you.”

For the next 40 years, Edwards tried to disguise her baldness as much has possible, spending thousands of dollars on wigs, hats and hair replacement products.

“I never felt free,” she said. “There were times when I tried to accept it and just be who I was, but I just wasn’t ready.”

In 2015, Edwards retired from the Flint Police Department and moved to Columbus to take care of her father, who had cancer and passed away in 2018.

She said she has tried a variety of jobs since then, but hasn’t found the right fit. She has found something else, though.

“I started seeing videos and pictures of people who were embracing (their baldness),” she said. “Then, in July, I started dating a guy who told me he wanted to know the real me. He said, ‘I see you change your hair a lot, but what does the real you look like?’ I told him that I was waiting for us to get to know each other better before you see.”

The arrival of her new boyfriend came at a time when Edwards was already trying to embrace her baldness.

“It was baby steps,” she said, “One day, I went and sat on the porch without my wig. The lady who lived next door saw me and asked, ‘Are you OK?’ I explained that I had alopecia and that I just decided to sit outside without my wig. That was a big step. The next step was going to the grocery store and then going to church.”

Edwards said she was finally ready to show herself to her new boyfriend, although not in person. She was still afraid of his reaction.

“My daughter said, ‘Mom, why don’t you FaceTime him?’ So I got up my courage and got on FaceTime with him,” she said. “I didn’t have my wig on. His face lit up and he said, ‘You are beautiful!’”

It was exactly what Edwards needed to hear.

“I had never felt free all those years,” she said. “Once I took my wig off, I saw my beauty for what it was. I realized finally, that hair and makeup was what made me beautiful. It was being the real me that was my beauty.”

On her FabOver40 introduction, Edwards wrote: “I’m 53 years old, I’m a Alopecia warrior! I have recently embraced the fact! I have been forming connections with other Alopecia warriors!”

Edwards encourages those who are struggling to come to terms with their alopecia, seek out support groups. A great place to start is the National Alopecia Areata Foundation.

Edwards didn’t win the two-page magazine spread and the $40,000 prize that goes to the winner of the FabOver40 contest.

But she didn’t really need that to confirm what she had spent most of her life denying.

“I’m definitely over 40,” Edwards said. “And I absolutely feel fabulous.”

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].

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