Two Local Families Donate More Than 10 Feet Of Their ‘Beautiful Lengths’

By John Voket

One recent afternoon at A New Beginning, an Aveda Wellness Salon and Day Spa in Stony Hill, two Newtown families joined together to illustrate the lengths they are willing to go to help medical patients who have lost their hair feel more beautiful. The five youths and one adult have already donated almost 11 feet of hair among them, with their donations currently going to the Pantene Beautiful Lengths program.

According to A New Beginning spokesperson Helen Brickfield, who arranged the meeting, the salon collects appropriate shocks of hair year-round to donate to the effort.

“What Pantene doesn’t take, we send to Locks of Love, which either uses the hair or sells it with proceeds going back to cancer causes,” Ms Brickfield said.

On the day of their visit, sisters Dylana Coperine, Anneliese, and Grace Hermes accompanied their mom, Kirsten Hermes. Each of the three siblings, ages 17, 13, and 7, had previously each donated a length of hair following their mother’s cancer treatments.

And now that she is recovered, Kirsten Hermes went with her daughters to the salon to begin donating her hair to the Beautiful Lengths program as well.

Joining them were Christine Kirkman, whose daughters Victoria, 14, and Diana, 12, both began donating hair to Locks of Love when they turned 5 years old.

“I heard about the program and told Victoria about it and she was happy to start doing it,” said Ms Kirkman of her older daughter. “But then when Diana saw her older sister, she wanted to start donating her hair, too.”

The two Kirkman sisters were living in Maryland during the time they each made their first three donations to Locks of Love. But when they moved to Newtown ,they heard about the Beautiful Lengths program and decided to donate to that program instead.

The Pantene program permits donors to give up their hair a little more quickly than the Lengths of Love effort, Ms Kirkman explained.

“With Beautiful Lengths, the girls can donate as little as eight inches, and so far they have given up more than 110 inches between them,” she said.

Diana said her last donation was in March, while Victoria donated in June, just in time for a short hairstyle that is more suitable for the hot Connecticut summer.

“Victoria’s hair grows so fast, she did her first donation the summer before kindergarten, and she was ready to do another during the spring when she was in first grade,” Ms Kirkman recalled. She even brought along photos of each girl taken after their first donations.

Both of the Kirkman girls told The Newtown Bee they still enjoy donating their hair so cancer patients can have a hairpiece, and both plan to continue donating into the foreseeable future.

The effort by Ms Hermes daughters was even more personal because she lost her hair during cancer treatment, and she couldn’t wait to join Dylana, Anneliese, and Grace once her own hair grew back long enough to donate.

“They were all first-timers when I was recovering, and I’m here today because my own hair has grown back long enough to donate for the first time,” Ms Hermes said. All four also plan to continue donating to the Beautiful Lengths program.

Locks of Love is a public nonprofit organization that provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children in the United States and Canada under age 21 suffering from long-term medical hair loss from any diagnosis.

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 provided through this program help to restore self-esteem and confidence, enabling recipients to face the world and their peers.

Learn more at locksoflove.org.

Pantene Beautiful Lengths helps women fighting cancer receive free, real-hair wigs. Many of the women recipients through this program say that putting on a wig makes them feel like themselves again.

Beautiful Lengths is a partnership between Pantene and the American Cancer Society, the largest nonprofit health organization committed to saving lives from every cancer and improving the quality of life for people facing the disease.

Every year at the Newtown Relay For Life, A New Beginning volunteers sponsor a donation booth where relay participants and visitors can make donations of hair to the cause. To date, Pantene has donated 24,000 free real-hair wigs to the American Cancer Society’s wig banks, which distribute wigs to cancer patients across the country.

Learn more at pantene.com, or call A New Beginning to see about making a donation of hair locally at 203-743-9795.