Dealing With Chemo Side Effects on My Terms!

Today, I had a brilliant, beyond brilliant idea!! Okay, truthfully it was partially my idea and partially my oncologist's idea. At today's oncology appointment, I mentioned to her that my scalp was tingling - which is a clear sign that my hair follicles are reacting to the invasion of those nasty, but necessary, toxins in my body. I said to her that I was thinking of at least just going and cutting my hair short to get jump start on the 'loss of hair' side effect. She took a look at my ponytail and said that I should see if I could donate my hair to Locks of Love. Holy cow! Why hadn't I thought of that?? See what happens when two brilliant minds come together.

What is Locks of Love? "Locks of Love is a public non-profit organization that provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children in the United States and Canada under age 21 suffering from long-term medical hair loss from any diagnosis" (Locks of Love website). Children have a harder time dealing with hair loss than adults (I assume) and as most of us know from our childhood, children can be cruel, especially when they see children that are "different". Therefore, Locks of Love tries to restore some normalcy and confidence to these children by providing hairpieces. What a fantastic organization!!

I immediately went home and checked the Locks of Love website to see if it would be possible for me to donate my hair. Providing that my hair was not bleached (it's not), not dreadlocks (gah! no!), and the ponytail/braid was a minimum of 10 inches (it was), then I could donate. Score! Not one to let grass grow under my feet, I immediately walked downtown to a salon to see if they had time to cut my hair and I lucked out and they were not busy. I gave the stylist all the pertinent information: going through cancer treatment, going to lose my hair anyway, want to donate hair to charity, etc. and she was onboard. She pulled my hair into 2 ponytails (one on each side), looked at me and said "are you sure?" I said "yes" and she cut them off. There's no going back from that.

Now I will say, I am not the biggest fan of short hair on me. I don't actually think it's a good look, but as I will be bald in a week or two anyway, it was my chance to do something good for some needy children and that makes all the difference. Right now my shorn tresses are jetting their way to Florida where Locks of Love is headquartered and I hope that they will be of some use to the organization. Anyone who has long hair and is thinking of cutting it, you might want to think about donating your hair to this worthwhile cause.