August 2012

We were in the hospital a week that first time. I missed home so much. The thing is, as soon as we got home I got a fever and that meant we had to go back to the hospital. I was real mad about that. I didn’t want to be in a hospital room again and I didn’t want to be hooked up to a pole. I cried the whole way.

That time in the hospital I wasn’t even allowed to leave my room. The nurse said my counts were real low so I was in something called isolation. COUNTS are something in your body that make you strong. Some counts make blood and some counts fight germs but I didn’t have either. All the nurses had to wear a mask to protect me from their germs. I also had to get blood. That sounded gross to me but it wasn’t really. It was just a bag like chemo and it hung on the pole.

One morning when I woke up in the hospital there was lots of hair on my pillow. I was kinda confused and then I realized it was mine. It was coming out from the back of my head that had been laying on the pillow. I thought that was kinda funny but I could tell mommy had been crying about it so I didn’t say it. When we came home from the hospital mommy handed me the scissors and said I could cut off all my hair if I wanted. She said that I could let cancer take my hair away or I could do it myself. Lots of it had already fallen out so I thought we probably should. I was nervous the first couple cuts but then I started laughing. When I was all done I showed mommy and daddy and they both smiled. Except I could tell they had been crying before I walked in. Daddy got out the shaver next and shaved the rest of it off to make it the same all over. I watched in the mirror and just smiled the whole time. I thought it was kinda fun.

I didn’t mind not having hair…until that weekend. I was gonna being in a wedding and I wanted to be real pretty like everyone else. I was sad that I couldn’t do something fancy with my hair. On the day of my friend Annie’s wedding I wore a fancy white dress that matched hers and a veil. The veil covered up my head so I don’t think anybody could really tell that I didn’t have hair. By the end of the night the veil was real itchy. I really wanted to take it off, but I didn’t want people to see that I didn’t have hair. Finally the itching was so bad that I took it off anyway. Everyone did stare at me. A lot. But they all seemed to think I was real pretty. They said I was the most beautiful girl even without my hair. I couldn’t wait to be a real bride. That night I dreamed about being a bride in my own fancy wedding dress. And I had hair.