Chelseas Story

My name is Chelsea. I am a daughter, a sister, a wife, a therapist, a friend, and someone who had cancer. I am a survivor. I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in January 2011. At the time I was 26 and getting married in less than three months. After you hear, “You have cancer”, you go numb. When you come back to what is now your ‘reality’ a million questions start to arise, and with these questions come emotions, one being fear.

 It all started while flying to a different wedding, and the plane experiencing bad turbulence. As I braced myself, I put my hand over my chest and heart and felt a lump on the left side of my neck above my collarbone. Immediately, it did not feel right but I chalked the lump up to allergies and moved on. A few months later the lump was still there, so I went to my doctor. It turned out to be cancer and my entire world flipped upside down.

I remember thinking, “Why me? How can this be happening?” After the immediate shock subsided, I thought of my hair. How can I get married if I lose my hair? How can I face my world and be myself without my hair? Fighting cancer and going through treatments are challenging, but losing your hair adds another level of stress. When you are sick, you know you are sick, but sometimes you can hide it, maybe even fake it. When you start to lose your hair, it’s difficult to hide the fact that you are sick. You have a daily reminder every time you look in the mirror. That was one of the hardest parts for me.

I remember wishing I was “stronger” and did not care about my hair loss. That is much easier said than done. Your hair is part of you and I was not ready to part with it. I could not even drag myself to the wig shop. That is where my amazing girlfriends came into play. They went to a local wig shop, picked out an incredible wig & did the research on wig care that I was purposely avoiding.

My friends also started thinking of a way to raise money in order to help pay for my wig and other hair accessories (as these items tend to be pricey), which eventually evolved into Wigged Out. What started as a kind gesture of helping a friend sick with cancer and grieving her hair loss has evolved into something much greater. Focusing on helping others to be able to feel like themselves, at least when they look in the mirror.

Wigged Out is a simple concept. We help people who have lost their hair find and acquire the perfect wig and hair accessories. Our goal is to help others as my friends helped me, and take away some of the overwhelming stress that comes with hair loss. We hope to make this part of the process easy, simple, and maybe even fun. We won’t stop until we “wig-out” as many as we can and empower everyone to fight the good fight, while feeling a little bit more like themselves.