As a mother of a little girl, there are a few things I feared for my little sweetie. Some things with greater consequence than others, and some things just plain vain. One of the things I LOVE about having a daughter is dressing her. I LOVE shopping, choosing outfits, making bows, and I especially LOVE styling her hair. Sadie is my real life doll. No need to buy the baby that cries, pees, poops, etc. I've got her for real!
Well, recently, one of my greatest fears for my sweet little girl, happened. This actually happened about a month ago and it's taken me this long to actually write about it. So here's the scoop...
One day, I went down to the kitchen, got Sadie her breakfast and turned on her show for her. Then I headed upstairs to check email and work on a few photos. (Yes, I let Sadie hang out and watch TV in the mornings...no judging perfect mommies out there...)
Well, I'm sitting at my computer just working away, when Sadie walks in and says, "Mom, look how pretty I am."
"Yes, Sadie you are very pretty," I told her without even looking at her. (yes, I am a horrible mother..again...no judgements please.)
Then Sadie said, "Mommy!! Look at me and see how pretty!"
I turned around and at first didn't notice anything. And then after further examination, much to my dismay, I noticed HALF of Sadies hair was GONE. That's right, G-O-N-E. (And this is where those of you who are awesome Mommies out there can just stop reading and ignore my horrible reaction.)
I RAN down the stairs into the kitchen and found LOCKS and LOCKS of hair strung all over the kitchen floor. Then I headed over to the garbage can where I found LOCKS and LOCKS of hair. I started screaming, crying, sobbing, and asking Sadie, "WHY???? WHY???? WHY would you do this Sadie?"
I would be lying if I didn't have MAJOR flashbacks of this....
I just kept crying and crying...
Sadie tried to tell me that she got the scissors out to cut her fruit snack open and then she was just watching TV and wasn't paying attention to the scissors cutting off her beautiful, took 4 years to grow out, silky, shiny, curly, HAIR.
At this point I was so upset, I couldn't even look at her. I sent her to her room and I went to mine. Lots of thoughts were racing through my head. The thoughts of the moment when I lost my own hair. How much I hated having no hair for a year. How much I hated wearing hats and wigs not because I wanted to, but because I HAD to. I thought of the many mornings waking up and looking in the mirror and crying because I just wanted to be me again. I thought of the time that I finally was brave enough to go without my wig when my hair was 2 inches long and while paying for something at the store was asked to show my id. The clerk so carelessly exclaimed, "WHY oh WHY would you cut off all that beautiful hair?" Not wanting to let cancer control me I politely told the clerk I was trying out a new summer cut.
Then I started thinking about Sadie. What if she had to go through what I did? The thought is unbearable! Thinking of your child going through so much is more than heartbreaking. I can't imagine my own mother who had to watch me. I then prayed with all my might that Sadie would never have to do that.
So after a good hour or more of constant crying, I went into Sadie's room to survey the actual damage. Her hair was parted on the right and luckily I hadn't done her hair yet, so the cuts she made were pretty uneven. She basically cut at ear level from the front all the way around to the middle of the back of her head.
No I did not take any photos.
I'm sure a lot of you moms out there would have grabbed the camera and moved on with your day. I was paralyzed. I kept crying. I showed Sadie in the mirror what she had done. She said, "We can get some tape mom and it will be fine." I tried to explain that we could not get any tape, but that it would eventually be fine.
We went downstairs and cleaned up all the hair. I collected a few locks and saved them in a baggie. I then wet her hair down, did my best to slick it into a pony tail and let her watch her show.
The rest of the day I could barely function. I'm not sure why all these old feelings and emotions surfaced from my chemo days, but no matter what I did to supress them, they continued to come out and I cried and cried.
Not my favorite day.
The next day I woke up feeling much better and able to look at Sadie and figure out what we were going to do with the hair she had left. I got the scissors out and started evening out her hair. I ended up having to cut a good 3-4 inches just to get things to look remotely normal. Sadie and I both have hair that grows at snail speed. It's taken me 7 years to grow my hair out since I lost it. And I'm still 3 inches short. And poor Sadie has inherited this. Anyway, I finished the haircut and now you can't really tell that there are pieces only 1 inch long around her ear, unless you are looking really carefully.
Several weeks after all of this, I finally broke out the camera and took pictures. Here they are.
So why is hair such a big deal? It's just hair! It grows back, right? Right. And that's what every doctor, nurse and friend told me. Somehow those words didn't really help. I knew it would grow back, but it didn't change the fact that I still had to live without it for so long. I felt like the ugly cat on Friends that Rachel buys that has no fur. She had a difficult time finally selling it....no one wanted the ugly thing!
I think our hair is so much of our identity. When you are describing a person, that's one of the first things you describe....she's got short blond hair, or she's the brunette.
I learned a lot from Sadie with this experience. Within moments of the entire ordeal, Sadie was back to normal, playing as usual, like nothing had happened. And really, did it change who she was? No. Did her hair make her any less pretty? No. Did I love her any less? No. (angry maybe...) The answers are all no. Who we are is not defined by our outward appearance, but by who we are on the inside. So you don't have hair, or it doesn't look normal, or it's short, or long, really, it's ok. You are who you are because of the things you do, the people you love, the people that love you, and the choices you make.
I love my sweet Sadie. Short hair or long.
