Hair Loss Awareness Month is a national initiative that takes place every August to raise awareness of this common experience, which affects more men and women than many people may realise.
Russ Nicholson, the founder of Cheltenham's HeadStrong Clinic, knows first hand how much hair loss can affect people's self-confidence and sense of identity, and how talking about it is the first step towards getting that confidence back.
SoGlos speaks to Russ about why hair loss needs a national awareness month, and his new Hats Off, Gloucestershire campaign, which aims to get more people talking openly about hair loss.
August is Hair Loss Awareness Month. Why does an experience like this deserve a national month?
Because for something so common, it’s astonishing how alone it can make you feel. Hair loss is one of those things people quietly carry on their own. They assume they’re the only one, that it’s a bit vain to be upset about it, that they should just get on with it. The idea of Hats Off it to give everyone permission to say, out loud, 'actually, this affected me more than I let on.'
I’m one of those people. I lost my hair young, and for years I didn’t talk about how much it bothered me because I didn’t think I was allowed to. If a month like this had existed then, and I’d heard someone say what I was feeling was normal, it would have made a real difference. That’s the whole point of it — turning a private struggle into a shared conversation. Once it’s in the open, it loses a lot of its power over you.
How many people are affected by some form of hair loss?
It's far more common than most people think. In the UK, around 6.5 million men are living with hair loss right now, and it isn’t only a men’s issue – an estimated eight million women experience it too. Roughly 85 per cent of men have noticeably thinning hair by the age of 50, and for a lot of us it starts much earlier than that, in our 20s and 30s, which is exactly what happened to me.
The odds are that it’s either you, or someone sitting at your table – your dad, your brother, your mate, your partner. When you actually see the numbers, the strange thing isn’t how many people it affects. It’s how few of them ever mention it.
Why don’t more people talk openly about their experiences with hair loss?
Two things, really. The first is that we’re told it’s trivial: 'It’s only hair.' People say that with the best of intentions, but when it’s happening to you it doesn’t feel small at all. It chips away at you in photos, in social situations, at work. It’s always there in the background. Being told to shrug it off just teaches you to keep quiet about it.
The second is that men, in particular, aren’t brilliant at talking about how they feel about anything, let alone how they look. Surveys suggest close to nine in 10 people feel there’s a stigma attached to hair loss. So instead of talking, we hide. Most of the men who come to see me arrive in a cap or a hat, and a lot of them tell me that very few people ever see them without one on. That hat becomes a place to disappear.
I see the other side of that silence too. SMP takes time, I’ll often spend 12 or 13 hours with someone across their treatment and in that time people open up about things they’ve never said to anyone. It tells you the conversation was always there, waiting. People just never had a safe place to have it.
Why is it so important to talk about hair loss, and how can we encourage more open conversations?
It matters because the silence is heavier than the hair loss. When you bottle something up, it quietly starts shaping your decisions, the events you skip, the photos you dodge, the opportunities you don’t put yourself forward for. Naming it takes a surprising amount of weight off.
If you’re worried about someone, my honest advice is: don’t lead with the hair. Don’t open with 'have you thought about doing something about it?' – that lands as a criticism, even when you mean well, and it makes them feel more self-conscious, not less. Lead with the person. A simple, genuine 'how are you doing at the minute?' goes a long way. Pick a moment where you’re shoulder-to-shoulder rather than face-to-face – a walk, a drive, the car on the way somewhere. Men especially tend to open up more easily when they’re not being stared at.
And then just listen. You don’t need to fix it or have the answer. You’re not there to recommend a treatment, you’re there so they know they’re not carrying it on their own. That’s the whole job.
You’ve experienced the emotional side of hair loss first hand. How does it affect someone’s confidence and sense of identity?
For me it was like slowly not recognising myself. I was in my 20s, building my life, meeting people, working out who I was, and I’d look in the mirror and feel older than I actually was. People talk about it as a vanity thing, but it isn’t. It’s identity. It changes how you present yourself to the world, and it can even change what you feel entitled to go after.
When I had SMP myself, the biggest thing it gave back wasn’t the look, it was the mental space. I’d spent years with hair loss running in the background of every thought, and suddenly that noise switched off. That’s the part people don’t expect.
Because I’ve been where my clients are, they tend to feel understood straight away, and that’s when the real conversations start. Over those 12 or 13 hours, men tell me things that can be genuinely saddening, that they haven’t let their partner see them without a hat, that they’ve turned down nights out, sidestepped dating, avoided being in the family photos, even held back at work. These aren’t shallow worries. When something affects how you see yourself to that degree, it quietly steers a lot of your life. And most of them are saying it out loud for the very first time, to me, in that chair.
What changes do you see in people and their confidence when they finally do talk about it and seek help?
Honestly, you can often see it before the treatment is even finished. People sit differently. They hold their head up. They smile more. Quite a few get emotional, and I never take that lightly – it’s usually years of something they’ve been holding finally being set down.
The line I hear more than any other is, 'I wish I’d done this years ago.' And I don’t think they only mean the SMP. I think they mean the talking, the relief of finally admitting it mattered, and finding out the world didn’t judge them for it.
Once someone lets that guard down, the confidence tends to spread into everything else. That’s the bit I love. The hairline is the visible change. The way they carry themselves afterwards is the real one.
You’ve launched a new initiative, Hats Off, Gloucestershire, this month. Where did the idea come from, and what are you hoping to achieve?
It came straight from seeing men arriving in a cap, telling me hardly anyone ever sees them without it. That hat is such a perfect symbol. It’s something we literally hide under, and something we hide behind. So Hats Off is simply an invitation to take it off for a moment – to talk about hair loss, about confidence, about how we’re actually doing underneath it all.
What I’m hoping to achieve is bigger than my clinic. I want to get men in Gloucestershire talking to each other, to the people who love them, before things quietly build up. This matters to me because men’s mental health still isn’t understood well enough. Around three in four suicides in the UK are men, and it remains the biggest killer of men under 50. Losing your hair is never the whole story, but anything that chips away at your confidence can feed that silence, and I’ve seen up close how much it can weigh on someone.
I’m a former firefighter, my instinct has always been to show up for people. This is the same instinct, pointed at my own community. I support Andy’s Man Club, which runs free peer-support groups for men, and I volunteer with Look Good Feel Better helping people going through cancer.
Headstrong isn’t a mental health service and I’d never pretend otherwise — but for some men, it's a starting point, the first place they've felt able to open up. If Hats Off makes that first conversation a little easier for even a handful of people, it’s done its job. It’s also why we’re launching now, ahead of World Suicide Prevention Day next month.
How can people across Gloucestershire get involved during Hair Loss Awareness Month and beyond?
Start with the smallest thing, because it’s the one that matters most: check in on someone. Message the mate who’s gone quiet. Ask your dad, your brother, your partner how they’re really doing, and then actually listen. You don’t need to mention hair at all, you just need to open the door.
If it’s you that’s been struggling, come and have a chat. No pressure, no obligation, no sales pitch, just a genuine, honest conversation about what’s going on and what your options are. Even if Headstrong isn’t the right fit for you, I’ll happily point you in the right direction. Sometimes just understanding what’s happening takes away half the worry.
Beyond that: follow the campaign, share it, and help us make it louder. Support Andy’s Man Club if you can. And if you’re brave enough, take your hat off and post a photo. Every person who does makes it that bit easier for the next man to do the same. That’s the whole idea. Hats off, Gloucestershire. Let’s talk.
To book a no-pressure consultation with Russ, visit headstrongclinic.co.uk/contact.
