{"id":1128,"date":"2013-12-13T14:08:36","date_gmt":"2013-12-13T14:08:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/turningheadsproject.org\/?p=1128"},"modified":"2014-01-23T12:57:21","modified_gmt":"2014-01-23T20:57:21","slug":"nicole","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/turning-heads.org\/nicole\/","title":{"rendered":"Nicole"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was first diagnosed with\u00a0breast cancer 10 years ago at 31. I remember hearing that the chemo would make my hair fall out and rumor had it that it would happen EXACTLY at the 2 week mark. And that rumor was confirmed. It is actually one of the few things I do remember\u00a0from my experience 10 years ago.<\/p>\n

I was in my bathroom, had my hair in a\u00a0pony tail and took the rubber band out. I shook my hair and remember thinking…wow! My hair looks good today…and then I looked down,\u00a0grabbed the counter, and\u00a0sat down. Because while my\u00a0hair looked good, there were HUNDREDS of\u00a0hairs that had fallen to the ground when I took the pony tail out. It was disturbing, and yet the true trooper that I am, I quickly stood back up\u00a0and went to look for\u00a0a razor to shave my head. The hair was coming out on MY terms!!!<\/p>\n

Fast forward 10 years. I found\u00a0out in February that I had stage\u00a0IV metastatic breast cancer, where the cancer\u00a0had spread to my\u00a0lungs, liver, and lymph nodes. With chemo being the only option to get the cancer to go smaller, I knew what the future of my\u00a0long hair would be.\u00a0I got it cut short for my sons 1 year old party on March 30, 2013. I\u00a0only prayed for it to stay “cute” for his\u00a0birthday party pictures, and I was not let down! I have great photos of his party and\u00a0I look good in them :-)!\u00a0The next day I went and got a wig, and promptly shaved what was left of my hair off.<\/p>\n

To me, losing hair is not really a big deal in the big picture. It is such a small sacrifice to make to try to keep the cancer from growing. My son actually doesn’t like me to wear my\u00a0hair (wig), because I think\u00a0he thinks that means I am going to work. I don’t\u00a0typically\u00a0wear a wig at home, just\u00a0a\u00a0bandana\u00a0so that I don’t get cold.<\/p>\n

I would say the only thing that\u00a0was disturbing, is truly that the hair does not\u00a0hurt when it comes out. When you brush your hair, you feel the tug, and the\u00a0hair comes\u00a0out. With chemo hair loss, you don’t feel the\u00a0tug. You brush, hair comes\u00a0out. You brush again, and more comes out.\u00a0And it just keeps going. You have to stop brushing, so the hair stops coming out!!! Or do as I did, and shave your head!<\/p>\n

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