More on managing thinning hair

According to some health-related sites, 40% of women experience some hair loss during menopause. I'd estimate double that percentage will notice loss in the decades that follow. If you've maintained thick, healthy hair into your 50s or beyond, are you lucky! But if you always had fine hair and are now losing some, your heart sinks when you look at your brush. 

Fighting the myriad signs of aging isn't the best use of time, but we all want to look good, and hair is a very deep subject for women.

Since my initial post, I've observed hordes of women getting extensions at my new salon. My stylist says about half are mature women; the other half are 20-and-30s who want their luxuriant manes bumped up to unnaturally lush levels. I've seen so many applied that I no longer think "great hair"; I think, "$1,500 in extensions".

The problem is that extensions add volume only from mid-crown to mid-head, so if you're thinning on top or at the temples, they won't cover that. I don't have extensions, but if you do, please tell us how you like them.

I watched a soignée woman in a posh department store ladies' room casually take out a small compact that I thought was eye shadow and daub it at her hairline, near the part. She saw me staring (well, wouldn't you?) and showed me her DermMatch. 

Her bob looked just fine, but she had an area at her temple where her part revealed a receding patch, about the size of a quarter. DermaMatch is scalp makeup, designed to 'paint in' the bare scalp so it blends with the hair.  

She pulled back her bangs to show me the opposite, untouched temple hidden by her bangs– a dramatic difference. She said there was a little rub-off on her pillow but she'd changed to dark cases. Caveat: The product would not look realistic on large areas like a full part or thin crown.

She said if the bare spots grow, she will have a transplant, and is unwilling to take drugs like Propecia.

She has localized hair loss; there are other approaches for overall loss of fullness. Volumizing shampoos and conditioners are multiplying as cosmetic companies respond to boomers' dismay over hair you can see through.

You can drop double digits on fancy salon stuff, but Good Housekeeping gives top marks to two Pantene products, Pantene Pro-V Full & Thick Shampoo and Conditioner, each under $6 at most drugstores. These expanded strand diameter up to 9% and got top marks from consumers for making hair look thicker.

Dry shampoo applied at the roots to add lift from the scalp is another stylist's weapon. I like Klorane Gentle Dry Shampoo, also great for travel.

Another strategy is an optical trick: place some highlights or lowlights near the face to provide contrast, which reads like thickness. But, stylists counsel, don't carry those lights throughout the head, because if they dry out the strands, you can get breakage of that now-finer hair.

M., a pretty, 60ish woman in the beauty industry, told me that she teases to add volume. She lightly back-combs the under section only, beginning at around ear level (where one would normally add extensions) so the top layer of hair falls naturally over the teased underlayer. On the weekends, she gives it a rest by brushing it back, held by a scarf or barette.

She invited me to touch her hair; there was about half as much there as I would have guessed. M. had lightened her colour to several shades of pale blonde, because a high contrast (dark hair, white scalp in her case) makes hair look much thinner.

Helen Mirren has fine blonde hair like M.'s, and appears to have volume added either by restrained back-combing or a roller set, then relaxed by a blow-out. She could also use extensions; many actresses do.

And I hope you noticed Dame Helen's pearls.