May 1, 2008

Andrea Winters loses 11 inches

Andrea Winters lost 11 inches of her hair last weekend, but it was for a great cause. Andrea had her hair cut for Locks of Love, an organization that provides wigs and hairpieces to children that have lost their hair for medical reasons including those undergoing chemotherapy to treat cancer.

Andrea Winters smiles shyly as Katie Ashford shapes her hair into a “new short do.” Photos by Carol Rosen

Andrea, 8, who attends Los Alamitos, has been growing her hair for 18 months to get it long enough to donate. The minimum amount is 10 inches.

The second grader decided to donate her hair for two reasons. One, a friend of hers, Natalie Johnson, who is in third grade at Los Alamitos donated her hair last year and Andrea thought it was a great idea. The second reason is that her grandmother Dina Weiner is a cancer survivor. Last year when Weiner was going through chemotherapy she wore a scarf.

Weiner was in town from New Jersey to watch her granddaughter cut her hair and said she was “tickled that Andrea understands her hair can make another child feel better even though she is sick.”

“It doesn’t feel any different,” Andrea said with a shy smile as Katie Ashford, who has been cutting hair for 21 years, shaped a new short cut for Andrea. “It’s the first time I’ve done it and I’ll probably do it again,” she said. Ashford is a third-generation Almaden resident.

Andrea and her grandmother, Dina Weiner, put their shorn heads together after the youngster donated 11 inches of hair to Locks of Love. Weiner is a cancer survivor whose hair disappeared while she was undergoing chemotherapy.

Andrea’s teacher, Lynn Adams, plans to educate her second grade class on Locks of Love and what it does. Once Andrea had her ponytail whisked off, the teacher planned to explain the process and will probably entice other young ladies into shoring their locks to help others.

Locks of Love is a public nonprofit organization that provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children under age 18 suffering from long-term medical hair loss from any diagnosis. We meet a unique need for children by using donated hair to create the highest quality hair prosthetics. Most of the children helped by Locks of Love have lost their hair due to a medical condition called alopecia areata, which has no known cause or cure. The prostheses help to restore the children’s self-esteem and confidence, enabling them to face the world and their peers.

The group has a mission is to return a sense of self, confidence and normalcy to children suffering from hair loss by using donated ponytails to provide the highest quality hair prosthetics to financially disadvantaged children. The children receive hair prostheses free of charge or on a sliding scale, based on financial need.

—By Carol Rosen