“Everything has been about the hair, from the very beginning. I had the thickest, most beautiful hair, and it was a big part of what made me feel like me. I’ve always loved looking put together and feminine. When I was diagnosed with breast cancer at 35, one of my first thoughts was that I didn’t want to let cancer take those things from me. I didn’t want to look like a patient.
I was desperate to avoid chemo. I opted for a double mastectomy with reconstruction and I hoped that would be it. When there were complications in the surgery preventing them from doing the reconstruction the same day, I was devastated. I woke up completely flat and it was the worst moment of my life.
Then, shortly after the eventual reconstruction, I learned I was going to need chemo after all. Immediately, preserving my hair became my top priority. I did cold capping. I did everything I could think of. But unfortunately it was out of my control.
When my hair finally did come out in the shower, it was like a horror movie. There was hair everywhere. I remember crawling around on the floor, crying hysterically. I’d lost my breasts, my eyebrows, my lashes, and now my hair. I felt like I lost my identity.
I have very few pictures from that time. It was unfathomable to me that I’d ever want to remember what I looked like.
As my hair slowly started to grow back in, it was my mom who convinced me to take photos. I hated the idea at first, but soon discovered the pictures helped me see progress that had been invisible to me. In time, I began sharing the photos. Just to a few close friends in the beginning, then more broadly on social media. My friends started calling me their Chia Pet because of how fast it was coming in.
I’m finally at the point where I can look in the mirror and not detest my hair. I think it actually looks cute. It was a hard road to get where I am, and sometimes it feels like the finish line keeps shifting. My hope is, by sharing my journey thus far, I can help others not feel as alone and hopeless as I did.
I wasn’t the first woman in my immediate family to face a breast cancer diagnosis. I wasn’t even the second.
My mom got her diagnosis in 2018. Less than a year later, my sister was screened just after breastfeeding and they found a lump. That lump ended up being benign, but in 2023, an MRI revealed three new tumours that weren’t. The biomarkers were the same as our mom’s, even though we don’t have any of the known breast cancer genes.
If it weren’t for my mom and sister, I wouldn’t have been so insistent with my doctor about getting a mammogram and ultrasound. I wasn’t worried, exactly. I just felt like it was the responsible thing to do. I was only 35.
During my ultrasound, I could feel the technician going over the same spot again and again. Then she excused herself from the room and the radiologist himself walked in. I knew that meant bad news. I burst out crying right there on the table.
It was so hard to tell my mom, because I knew it would break her heart. It had been less than five years since she survived breast cancer, and now both her daughters were facing it at the same time. It was a nightmare. I needed to beat cancer for her sake as much as my own.
I knew I was going to need a mastectomy, so I made it my job while I was waiting for surgery to speak with as many people as possible who had gone through mastectomies and other breast cancer treatments. I wanted to understand the options they’d been offered and how they’d made their treatment decisions.
By the time my treatment began, I felt well-prepared. I knew what my reconstruction options looked like. I knew all the techniques to try and limit my hair loss if I needed chemo. I knew I could freeze my eggs if treatment was going to threaten my fertility. And I knew I was fortunate my cancer had been caught relatively early. That it probably wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t insisted on screening. Despite my preparation, though, every step still ended up being much harder than I’d expected.
Today, I’m in good health. My mom is doing well. My sister is doing well. I’m very grateful for where we’ve ended up.”
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