Tender Loving Hair Susan Marquez 54 • <strong>October</strong>/<strong>November</strong> <strong>2016</strong>
Brandon resident Lisa McFadden is on an unlikely mission to make women with cancer look and feel better. “This isn’t something I set out to do in life,” laughs Lisa McFadden of <strong>Rankin</strong> County. “I really kind of fought it. But obviously, it’s a God-thing that I’m supposed to be doing.” McFadden grew up in the hair salon business, working with her mom and dad at the Kirkland Hair Studio, a salon they’ve owned in downtown Jackson for many years. “About 15 years ago, my dad really wanted me to work with all the ladies who came in with thinning hair or hair loss,” she recalled. “I began learning more about hair loss in women and saw that what I was doing was making a difference in how those ladies felt about themselves.” One day, a distraught mother called McFadden about her daughter who had been diagnosed with malignant melanoma in her brain. The patient was a young mother who had just given birth to her second child. “She suffered from a headache that wouldn’t go away, and all along she thought it was from the anesthesia that was administered before childbirth. But the medical staff realized it was something more and they sent her for tests and the cancer was discovered.” That young mother was Whitney Luckett, who came into the salon with her mother that day ten years ago to consult with McFadden. “It was about 4:00 in the afternoon, and Whitney was really in a bad way. Her hair was already thinning due the chemo drugs she was getting, and she was very self-conscious. I helped her pick out a wig in a catalog and I ordered it next-day delivery.” Luckett and her mother returned to the salon the next day and tried on the wig. “It looked amazing on her,” said McFadden. “Her mother called Whitney’s husband, who worked just down the street, to come see it. When he got there he said, ‘That’s your hair!’ Whitney asked him to take her to eat at the Mayflower, something she would have been too embarrassed to do the day before.” While McFadden had never worked with cancer patients before, that experience was an “aha” moment for the hairdresser. “I knew I had to help other women with cancer, because I saw the difference it made in Whitney’s life. It also gave me a renewed appreciation for other women who suffer from permanent hair loss.” McFadden embraced fully the idea of helping cancer patients and began visiting hospitals and cancer centers in the area. In doing so, she learned that what most women with cancer want is to look like themselves. “That gives them a better sense of wellness and when they look good, they feel better and they have more of a fight in them. Every doctor I’ve spoken with has told me that.” She began teaching the “Look Good, Feel Better” class at Women’s Hospital and St. Dominic’s, but after a while she became frustrated with that. “The class was focused on makeup, but what I saw was that women were more concerned with their hair, or lack of it. I began learning what wigs were out there, and which wigs were better suited to certain people. For example, some chemo drugs have hormones in them, and that makes the patients hot. Add that to living through a Mississippi summer, and a lot of wigs are just too tight and too hot for people to feel comfortable wearing. I’ve found wigs that are lighter and breathe more.” Budget is often an issue for some cancer patients, so McFadden works to get the best wig possible for the money. “If you spend $200 on something that’s hot and itchy, you simply won’t wear it. But if you can find something that looks great and is comfortable for $400, that might be worth it to you. However, that may be too much for some people, so we do the best we can with the budget they have.” The longer she’s involved in this work, the more McFadden has learned. “I found a product recently that women can use to keep their eyelashes and eyebrows from falling out during chemo. You can put a wig on a head with no hair, but when there are no eyelashes or eyebrows, the person just doesn’t look the same.” A certain kind of chemo will often cause patients’ nails to come off the nail beds. “My husband found a product that helps with that, and many have come in showing me their nails, which are stronger than ever.” Learning about the different chemo drugs used in treatment and the effects they can have on the body has been essential for McFadden to continue the work she does. “I work closely with the doctors and nurses, and I help counsel my clients when they have questions. I know I can always call one of the nurses or doctors when there’s a question about something I’m not sure about.” It’s been a rewarding journey for McFadden, and she says she is very focused now on the often uncertain journey cancer patients are on. “This work has been the biggest blessing to me. I owe this all to Whitney, who lived to see her baby’s second birthday before she passed away. I think of her often, and how she unknowingly led me to the work I’m doing today.” n <strong>Hometown</strong> <strong>Rankin</strong> • 55