New Miss Delaware Says Bald Is Beautiful

The 21 year old pageant winner suffers from alopecia areata, a condition that causes hair loss

June 2010

Like many beauty queens, Kayla Martell is beautiful, blue-eyed and out to support a good cause.

Martell, the newly crowned Miss Delaware 2010, also is completely bald. The 21-year-old pageant winner suffers from alopecia areata, a condition that causes hair loss and afflicts 4.7 million Americans, according to the National Alopecia Areata Foundation.

Sporting a blond wig, Martell beat out 15 other women -- all with full heads of hair -- to take Hair Loss the Miss Delaware crown this month.

She says it is precisely because of her alopecia that she wanted to compete. "I knew that I had to be on Miss America's stage, and I had to get there somehow," she said in an interview on CBS' "The Early Show" today.

For Martell, the fifth time was a charm. She had entered the pageant four times, twice without a wig. Martell said she'd probably be a more effective beauty queen without the hairpiece. "I think I can be a better Miss Delaware and a better Miss America by taking the wig off," she said.

Martell began to lose her hair when she was only 10, but that didn't stop her from dreaming about walking the stage with other beauty queens. "I was very confident because of the family I had," she said. Her alopecia didn't hold her back. "People are sometimes stunned and uncomfortable that I'm taking it off, but this is who I am."

On her blog, Martell says her dream is to bring about awareness of alopecia. "I know in my heart that every girl is a beauty queen, whether she has hair or not!"

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