My Mom has been fighting cancer for over 20 years. Not as a patient, but as physician, actively working to defeat pediatric cancer. There is nothing that she loves more than helping a child grow up to lead a normal, healthy life after cancer. This has always been a source of great pride for me—she has always been a hero, fighting cancer every day. That, I think, is why I was so shocked and saddened—she was already valiantly fighting cancer. She is still fighting her twenty-year battle, but she has a new fight, too—her own breast cancer.
My Mom is anything but vain, but losing her hair to chemotherapy--that bothered her. Hair is very personal. It is an expression and extension of self. Perhaps most importantly to her, the lack thereof is a symbol of illness. My Mom does not like to stand out or be the focus of attention. It is easier to blend in with hair. It is easier for her to do her job with hair. I feel the same way—my hair helps make me feel like me.
I am one hundred miles away at school. I can’t help get her to appointments. I can’t help her around the house. I can’t help her on a day-to-day basis at all. But, I can do one thing. She doesn’t have to be bald alone. We can be bald together, even when we’re apart. Because even though I can’t help her physically, I can help her remember that she’s not alone in this fight. Nothing, most certainly not my hair, is more important to me than my Mom.
I guess it’s obvious now—I’m going to ditch my hair in favor of the style my Mom will be donning. But, remember the part where she’s been fighting a battle against cancer for twenty years? That’s important, too. The bald head—that’s for her personal battle. The part where I ask you to donate to St. Baldrick’s Foundation in support of my bald head and, most importantly, in her honor—that’s for the pediatric cancer battle she’s still wholly invested in.
The point of this all: My Mom means a lot to me, and fighting pediatric cancer means a lot to my Mom. So, in shaving my hair for my Mom, I’m asking for donations to support a cause that my Mom is very passionate about: St. Baldrick’s Foundation. St. Baldrick’s has raised over $117 million for pediatric cancer—all donations in support of “shavees” like me who are happy (and, admittedly, nervous) to lose their hair, often in honor of a loved one fighting cancer, with the goal of helping to win the fight against pediatric cancer.