Must've Been A More Frequent Dilemma In The Hippie Days

If a suicidal person is admitted to our acute, locked psychiatric ward, we generally take away any potentially dangerous objects (long ropes, scissors, pens, lighters, shards of glass, nunchuks, etc.) and hold on to the items until discharge. Then we give them back. This plan doesn’t work so well, though, for people with very long tresses, who might (have) tried to strangle themselves with their own hair (sometimes while attached to their heads, sometimes not.) It doesn’t really meet with people’s approval to say, “Welcome to Green Acres—we’re just going to shave your head now. Oh, don’t worry, you’ll get all the hair back when you’re discharged.”

It is a conundrum.