Losing My Long Locks

When most of us think of cancer, we immediately wonder about hair. Huh? Yes, hair. Everyone wants to know if the person is going to loss their hair.

I learned how naive I really was when I started this journey. I thought everyone lost theirs. But actually, it has to do with only a couple of chemo drugs that cause it. Granted, they are very common ones. But it opened my eyes to the fact that their are many, many people walking amongst us that are going through cancer without us even knowing because they still have their hair.

For me, I am one of the lucky ones....I lost my hair.

Lucky, or as I like to refer to it...blessed. The lessons I have learned through this one small part of my journey have been life changing. Don't get me wrong, I did NOT want to loss my hair. I have gone through life with hair down to my behind. I have had short hair only once and hated it. So losing my hair brought about very high anxiety just thinking about it. Also, the fact that I had only about 3-4 weeks to prepare for it didn't help. (It usually happens after the first treatment or 2.)

Along with my own feelings, I was concerned for my 6 year old daughter. She was bound to have some issues with the whole experience. How does one go about doing all this if front of watchful eyes? Thankfully, with the advice of a good friend, I was able to 'tackle' this challenge with a little bit of 'style'.

I chose to have my kids be a part of the whole thing from the start. We were upfront about what was going to happen and why. We told them that losing my hair was a blessing. It meant that the 'big medicine' (what we called my chemo) was doing it's job. I was blessed with many wigs. They are all styles, lengths and colors. I have had a blast having a different look everyday. I can go from being a brunette to a blonde to a red head. How fun!

The funny thing is that I wanted to go about this obstacle with some dignity and grace (mostly for Tala's sake). But in the end, God is teaching me one of the biggest lessons of my life.

"Before his downfall a man's heart is proud, but humility comes before honor."

- Proverbs 18:12

Cancer is showing me how proud my heart truly is. And it is my downfall. I am thankful that I have been given this opportunity to change my prideful ways. Having clumps of hair fall out and see it all over is a lesson in humility if I have ever seen one. It would be easy for God to 'remove' the hair issue from cancer. What I mean is that He could make it so none of us has to loss our hair while going through this. But He hasn't. Maybe because they go hand in hand to aide us in learning how to honor Him.

They both together allow us to see our downfall, learn to surrender our pride and with true humility, learn to honor Him with everything that is left....a heart ready to receive Him with no reservations.

Yes, losing my hair has been, by far, one of the toughest things I have had to go through emotionally. But I will forever be grateful for this unique opportunity to learn the true meaning of humility.