A Baby Boomer Dreams of Arabian Horses Part 18

Part 1

Just as I was getting ready to leave the hospital for a horse show in Oregon, I noticed little wisps of hair on Lindsay's pillows. I knew it wouldn't be long and all of her hair would be gone. On the phone I called my friend, Caren who lived in Salem, and asked if she could get me an emergency appointment to get my hair cut off.

By the time I arrived in Salem, Caren had things all lined up. She had a friend who was a stylist who understood the importance of the task before her. The appointment was set up to be before I would begin to show so my hair would be gone by the same time I figured Lindsay's would have fallen out.

Caren (Lindsay's godmother) went with me. I took my cowboy hat to the appointment so we could set it on my head and figure out the line to cut that wouldn't affect my hat size. I wouldn't be able to pin the hat on if we made a mistake because I wasn't going to have that much hair left.
All three of us shed tears as the locks of hair fell to the floor. Each cut of hair was laden with the weight of that little girl laying in a hospital bed helplessly watching her hair fall out. While we laughed and giggled about the cowboy hat, it was only to keep the emotion from swallowing us up. When the deed was done, all my hair was swept up and put into a plastic bag to take back to present to Lindsay.

When I arrived back at the hospital, Lindsay was pretty bald! She had maybe a score of hairs on her entire head. The scars from her surgery seemed to be all the more prominent. I did a pretty good job of choking back the tears.
As usual I wanted Lindsay to see that things were ok. This event like the rest was no big deal. It was a fight we could win as long as we didn't quit! Loosing her hair was just a step in the process. a necessary evil to beat the cancer. It was important to not let it be devastating.

I produced my bag of hair and Lindsay began to laugh. Her bag of hair was soon produced. The nurses at the station had it tucked away and brought it in on her signal.

I insisted mine was bigger and the wrangling began. Lindsay may not have been able to talk but she was doing a great job of letting me know that she thought she had this round won. Her bag had more hair.

Now, there's no way her bag had more hair, she'd lost half of it a couple of weeks before when they shaved her head for surgery. But those two little pony tails on each side of her head that Dr Berger had saved for her had meant the world to her. The humor was pretty black that day but black humor saved us on many a day. To this day tucked away in a hall closet. we still have those two bags of hair.

To be continued.........

Part 19

Arabian horse Arabian horses horses horse childhood cancer brain tumor