Did thinning hair prompt Will to pop the question? AP
Women go to great lengths to look their best before those wedding day photos (Boot camps, insane dieting, beauty treatments galore), but perhaps men are just as sensitive about their wedding day looks? Particularly if they happen to be royalty?
In The New York Times this weekend is an article entitled "Baldness: Put A Crown On It," which posits that Prince William may have decided to "put a ring on it" before he lost any more hair. Nowadays, there is pressure on both women and men to look a certain way - in part thanks to social trends like women's increasing financial independence and men's growing concerns about body image.
The paper reports that while men will allow themselves to gain a pound or two or have a few wrinkles, baldness can be particularly traumatising, especially for those in their 20s. Dr. Alice Trisdorfer, a psychologist in Philadelphia, tells the paper she once had a patient so consumed by his thinning hair that he "would count the number of hairs lost on his pillow and how many he found in the shower drain."
A receding hairline tends to go hand in hand with receding confidence levels, the article reports. Low self-esteem in balding men effects all aspects of their lives, including their choice of spouse. "Guys believe they don't have much time left as they continue to lose their hair," Spencer Kobren, host of "The Bald Truth," tells the paper. "They kind of grab the person closest to them who they find relatively attractive at the time. Emotionally it's too difficult for them to go out there and try to court the girl of their dreams if they are feeling emotionally insecure about themselves."
We're sure that Prince Will has nothing to worry. Kate is his uni sweetheart who has been by his side through thick and thin, so to speak... Plus, not many men get to hide a bad hair day (or several) with a crown.