Episode Transcript
[00:00:03] Speaker A: Welcome to the Healer's Corner podcast with your hosts, Melissa Wiles and Maria Cerna.
Hello.
Hello, Tom. I'm glad you could join us.
[00:00:19] Speaker B: I'm delighted. I'm really honored to be asked to be a part of the program tonight.
I look forward to sharing a few stories with your audience and with you today about weeks for Kids. So I'm. I'm fascinated by this whole process.
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Well, I. I love the fact that we have such an awesome charity, like, local to the Cleveland area, right? Because Cleveland gets a bad rap. Our sports teams always choke out, you know, our lake is always on fire, you know, And I'm like, but look, we have cool stuff and good stuff too.
Weeks for kids.
And I. I was so, like, fingers crossed. I was telling Maria when the opportunity came down to pick a charity and really put it out there as, like, hey, charity, help charity. I'm like, I hope they're willing to come on and that we can help in any way we can for such a. An awesome charity. So when I sent the email, I'm like, pretty, pretty please, can somebody come talk about weeks for kids with us for an hour on a Tuesday?
[00:01:24] Speaker B: Well, one of us would have found time. Jeffrey's down in the. In Florida right now, and trying to work his schedule out was impossible. So I always. I feel I substitute for him. When you don't get the dynamic founder, you get the older implementer. The implementer. I'm the implementer. I implement the programs and make them run. So.
But we all. We all work together, so you could have had almost. There were others that probably could have fit in, too, but I was available. So I was very happy to be a part of this tonight with you and tell you a little bit about the charity Wigs for Kids.
It's a national charity, which is something not everybody understands.
Our headquarters is in Cleveland, but we serve the whole country and the country of Canada.
So we are a large geographic area that we manage from Westlake, Ohio. Our mission, which is probably the way to open the door. Our mission is to help children live their lives right, and look themselves.
So remember what I just said? Live their lives. And that's important to understand because most people think about the whole thing is about appearance, a hairpiece, and making them have a nice hairpiece. And it's all about appearance and beauty. But we start by saying, live their lives okay, and look there themselves. And that's because that was the key to the founding of the organization.
That was what it was all about.
Jeffrey got into this as a family member because he had a niece who had a need, and his niece had leukemia, and she was going through chemo, and she was a gymnast, and she wanted to compete in a gymnastics event, and no hairpiece would stay on her head to be able to do the various gymnastics program that she wanted to compete in.
And so he designed this hairpiece that we use that our children get for free, that it would stay.
And then came the night of the. Of the contest, the night of the competition, and he and his wife Zena, were in the front row with Laura's family, and she went through a routine, and then she jumped off the horse, flipped into the air, and landed on her feet, and the hairpiece was firmly on her head. And at that moment, Wigs for Kids was born. Because he said if he could do it for one, he could do it for more.
So Wigs for Kids starts with living their life. Laura was living her life as a gymnast, and he wanted her to be encouraged for that and to grow as she did and to have confidence that she could compete and never fear that her appearance would anyway, take away from living her life. So it's living your life and looking yourself. And so that's the mission, and that's what we try to live by every day, is to remember that even when we are dealing with children with cancer that are inpatient care, we have to wait for those various treatments to be over so that we can then work with them, that we want them to continue to live their lives to the best of their ability.
So that was over 40 years ago.
It's probably 45 now that Jeffrey and Zena have been working at this, and we add more children, as I'll tell you, a little bit, all the time. And we've added more illnesses besides cancer.
That was really the bedrock of the organization at the very beginning. It was focused on children with cancer, and living their lives was critical, because if you go back 40 years and you look at cancer treatment for children, you can understand that the life expectancy of children was not high.
So we had to think about that as treatments changed, as we got more children with more illnesses. But the bedrock, the beginning, was cancer children.
So we started with the children, and we started with their parents, and we began to work with University Hospital and then Cleveland Clinic, Children's Hospital, and then Nationwide, which Riverside Hospital in Columbus approached Jeffrey and then Cincinnati's children and reached out. So he had to find stylists to help him in those areas.
So we. We stretched out over Ohio, and from there, it really, you know, took off to across the country. But at first it was, it was a very slow process because nobody understood what we were trying to do.
The idea of a hairpiece, free hairpiece was not something that was in the treatment plan.
And so Jeffrey had to show the medical people how that could change the nature of a child's emotions and their parents emotions and how looking themselves was important.
And so by going to the hospitals, meeting with the parents, talking to the children, testing different ideas, selecting color rings, looking at different colors to match children's skin tone, all of those things were part of that very early process that he and his wife went through where he literally made those first children almost part of his family.
And if you met some of them, they think they were part of his family. They think him as a relative because they really, really, really came to depend on him to help them, to bolster them, to pray with them, to be with them. And so those first years when things were not always great for his business, he was devoting time to these children. Even in difficult times, difficult times never stopped him. He kept right on going and meeting the needs of children.
What, what, what would you like to know about that early year, those early years when he was going from hospital to hospital teaching people how to do this? Is there something you would like to know more about that, that somebody like me, who's lived with it for over 30 years, kind of take for granted?
[00:08:23] Speaker A: Oh, first of all, how did he stay awake, not only running his own business, but then running this charity?
Maria, do you have. Because I, I know a bit more on wigs for kids because I've done charity work with them before. So do you have any questions about that early part of how do you
[00:08:45] Speaker C: get well, when the child comes in?
What process do you do to make them feel comfortable that this is or are they really. They have the information when they come in that they're ready to go with this. I mean, that is a change that they're going to go through.
[00:09:05] Speaker B: It is a huge change. And it's actually, I'm glad you asked because it's an area we're working on right now.
When you had Jeffrey and Zena and they worked with the kids locally and they met with people in Columbus and Cincinnati, and every year they would have a seminar in Cleveland on hair loss and a part of that seminar would be a full day on wigs for kids. And we would have families go over and meet the stylist and all of that took place. These are in the early years where he was able to do Hands on with the stylist. He was able to show the stylist how to approach a family, how to talk to a family. In fact, recently he did a series of videos on where he was talking to grandparents that had a little girl there, and he talked to them about how they felt. And the grandfather was talking about how angry he was about how this little girl lost her beautiful hair and how difficult it was for him to see that loss. And yet she was handling it much better than he was as far as facing the reality, getting her hair pieced. And then when she got it, she just went, you know, bananas, just loved it. She just went crazy. And it made him so happy that to watch her blossom like that. So working with the children and the parents one on one, he was able to set a standard and show the stylist how to do it. And he did that for a long time.
As the. As it grew, we got into videos, and now he does his training through videos.
So the stylist actually, that's a part of the certification process. They actually watch his videos about how to style and how to talk to a family, etc. But we think we have to strengthen that one because we have a higher turnover of stylus. I think for a long time, when we had salons that were stable in neighborhood salons that the owner owned and operated, that there was more of a continuity.
There was the same people were there all the time, and the kids got used to going to. Recently we had a visit with Tori, now Tori's mom, I should say. But if you ever go to our website, the little girl on the homepage is Tori. And Tori started with us when she was five and she worked with Jeffrey, Paul and so and his wife, and she's now going to graduate from high school.
And her mom was telling us the story about how they only have had two stylists in this whole time, Jeffrey and then a stylist that took over and has been working with them for the last few years, Melissa. And the little girl, though she's a little girl, she's grown up, she was totally dependent on them for how to style, how to look, how to do, how to even handle makeup, all of those things. So that's all part of helping that stylist work with that child and understand what's going to happen and what the trauma is that the child and the family are going through.
So we are trying more and more to be advocates for the illnesses, cancer, alopecia, trichomania, and help styles to understand those. In fact, Our newsletters in May are going to be about lupus and we're going to stress that because that's a newer disease that we're working with now.
And we've just recently associated with the regional director of alopecia here for Ohio.
And so we're going to see if we can get some educational programming for our parents through the National Alopecia association and through Pfizer.
So that's really an integral part of what we do as a part of just not just getting the hairpiece, but supporting the family as they are coping with the illnesses. And that's all from Jeffrey. Doing it in the hospitals and talking to the families and, and talking to the medical professionals and getting them to understand how a hairpiece can change everything. See, today that's all pretty much taken for granted today. Social workers that know about our program understand it. They understand it's going to make a difference and they support it. They want to, want to help. They help the parents sign up for the program online.
So today it's a little different. But in those days, they were really working hard to build a base so that people would understand that. Does that make sense to you? Do you kind of get an idea?
[00:13:53] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:13:54] Speaker B: Yeah. Because that's something that Bell was telling us about, was about the importance of educating the stylist. Mrs. Bell is Tori's mom and she's been with us for. Tori was five, so we're talking about a 19 year old. So she's been with us all these years and she's dealt with this every year, a new hairpiece.
And she talked to us about how important it is to help the stylist prepare for the two times they're going to meet the child.
So we're working on that and we're, we're aware of it and we're, it's, it's a, it's a serious matter for us.
[00:14:33] Speaker A: I think that's one thing that, that's wonderful about Wigs for Kids. Everybody involved, including the stylists, who are not like in your building, they are truly a part of Wigs for Kids because they want to help, that they have these big hearts. It's not about being able to raise a banner. It's not an ego, it's not a money grab or anything because that's a very important part. Right. The parents pay nothing for these hair pieces for their kids.
[00:15:04] Speaker B: That's right.
And nothing for the services that the stylists supply. I mean, we give them the free products and hairpiece. We'll get to that. But the stylist is the one that gives time and talent.
And so it's critical that everybody understand that sometimes the parents think that the stylists work for us.
So they think that this is like a social worker in an institution. And then they don't always have the full appreciation and respect for that stylist.
So that's something we have to work on, is to help the parent understand this is a professional volunteer that's welcoming you into their business, into their salon, and they're going to counsel you, they're going to help you, they're going to guide you, and they're going to show tremendous respect and help for the child.
Some of our stylists go way, way beyond anything we would ask for. We have one stylist in Reno that when they do a hairpiece, and we'll talk about that in a second, about styling. When they actually get the hairpiece and they're going to style it, they have characters come and participate. They make it into a party.
They have a banner. They, they do, they show. It's a, it's a big event and the children just love it. They're the, they're the, you know, the honor. They're the honoree. And this is a big event for a child getting their first hairpiece, for sure.
And so it's, they, these stylists go way beyond just even doing the styling. They, they make it into a, a pageant almost.
And so there are stylists that do those kind of things. So they're dedicated. But the one thing I would stress that you just touched on is when we, we say to stylists, when they sign up, why did you sign up? And 99.9% say, I want to help children.
They don't say, I want to promote my business. They don't want to say, I want to be a hair replacement professional and show what I can do. I don't want to show off my talents.
They want to help children. And I would tell you that a far majority of them have had an experience with one of our illnesses in their own lives or within their family.
And so that'll also oftentimes be shared. Maybe not right away, but at some point they will share that.
That's why they are there, because they understand.
So that's this national network of stylists. And this afternoon we had a stylist down in New Mexico getting trained and going through certification. We had no in New Mexico. We lost the stylus. We had in, in the one town area there we had. We had do. I shouldn't say none. We have one in Albuquerque, but she's overwhelmed. And so we were looking for another one because the child was four or five hours away from Albuquerque. And so we were looking for somebody. We were. And this young lady said, I'll do it. And so we were. They were working with her and encouraging her, and she was so excited to. That she's going to be able to meet this family and she. She's going to help these. The family. And it's a local area. You know, I think the family's still going to drive an hour. But they, but the stylist was going through the training today and getting ready and asking all questions, you know, want to know, make sure that she's prepared, make sure she knows exactly what she's supposed to do.
So it isn't just, oh, send me the kit, tell me how to measure. It's more, how can I help?
And that's what makes us work. That's what makes it work. Because without them, we could not do this. We could not afford to be paying services all over the country for measurements and for styling. So it would not work. So the formula Jeffrey and Zena created 40 years ago is still working.
[00:19:07] Speaker A: It's amazing that it's 40 years in and it just keeps getting better and stronger and more and more kids being. Being helped.
So a family finds out about wigs for kids.
Like, what is the process the family goes through, from meeting their stylist to that wonderful moment where the. The kid gets to put on that hairpiece for the first time? Like, what should a family expect in the order of operations there?
[00:19:38] Speaker B: Well, it's, it's very interesting because you. The.
There is. There's phases to our process, and one of the things that we have to help a family understand is it is a process, because if you are a mom with a child with cancer and that child's going into chemotherapy, you want the hairpiece tomorrow, right now. But we can't go into the hospital and do the measurements.
We can't. We couldn't possibly style a hairpiece that way.
So we have to explain to the parent, and that's at the very beginning, they go to the website and they fill out a form, an online form. And one of the most awful misunderstandings that we have to correct is they think we're Amazon. They think they're going to fill out the form, push, submit, and there's going to be a hairpiece. That's what they would like. And I understand that. We understand that. So the first thing that happens is we have an interview with them, they ask them to set a time on a calendar, then we call them so they set the time that meets their need. And then we call and talk to them and talk about the program and what's going to happen and what we need to get from them for qualification.
Because the next step is we're a 501C3. And for us to have that status, we meet the needs of certain children.
Not everybody, but certain children. Children that have hair loss due to illness.
Now that sounds simple.
Children right under the age of. Or 18 and under. Okay. Children that have hair loss. We need to see a picture. Do they have hair loss? Okay. And due to illness. And we need a diagnosis that says they have an illness that creates the hair loss. So those criteria are how we do eligibility and we explain to the, to the guardian.
And that's also important. We need a guardian that's somebody who's going to walk through the process with the child. Okay. Hopefully through the whole process.
And sometimes we have grandmothers and sometimes we have sisters. We don't always have parents for a child. We have guardians and we have forms for that. So we can. A child can have a temporary guardian for our process and then they handle the whole process, from the form all the way to the styling.
And it works.
But it's important that we have a legal guardian that's going to be representing a child because we're working with children and we have to be, we have to protect children. We have to know the person we're talking to is qualified to be their guardian and, and be their caregiver.
So we start, that's how it starts, getting the right information about the guardian and right information about the child, which is eligibility.
And we ask them to take those forms, their birth certificate, the diagnosis for medical form, the pictures, and put them through a portal. And why would we have to put them through a portal? For security. HIPAA requires that medical forms that are being transferred and given have to be protected.
And so they come through a portal. So we check them all off and know that we have what we need. So that's step one, eligibility.
Once we have eligibility, now we have to have a team.
And that's what we were talking about before. We have to have a stylist to work with them.
And so we have a staff member that does nothing but that a staff member takes a look at the family, where do they live and where do we have a certified service provider.
And then we reach out and if we don't have one, we have to recruit one. And we talk to the family and say, do you know one in your community that we can train?
And we put together a stylist with the family, and that's not always next door.
That's not always even in the same town.
So sometimes families have to drive, like I said, over an hour. And we don't want kids with cancer to have to do that. So we're always looking for stylists. That's why I said recruiting stylists. If volunteers want to help us help find stylists in their community, that's a fantastic gift of time and talent on a volunteer site to help us find stylists to help our children.
So now we get a stylist. We make sure that they understand.
We send updates on how to work with the children if they need. That links to the updates so that they're comfortable and ready. Now, once we have the match, then it's time to tell mom, okay, make your appointment. So we do an outreach and tell mom, make your appointment. We have to ask mom to please wait for us to have a stylist and everybody in place to do it. Because what happens is we tell mom we have a stylist, and the next thing we know, mom is calling the stylist. Well, she doesn't have the measurement packet. She doesn't understand what the next step is supposed to be. And the stylist has to say, wait a minute, wait a minute, hold it. You have. There's a process, and the process is wigs for kids is going to tell you, make your appointment, get that measured, you know, tell us. And then we send a kit to the family that they take to the stylist for the measurements. And it has in it caps for the size.
You know, we have to know what the size is. So we have caps. We have a color ring for the color of the hair.
Right. We have a form that has to be filled out so we can order this hairpiece.
And we have instructions. We have a measuring tape, and we send that out as a kit. So mom now has the tools that she needs to go see a stylist. So we're not asking a stylist to have these available, et cetera, because the kits cost money.
So we provide the kit, and they take it to the stylist, and the stylist measures the child, talks to the child, gets to know the child a little bit.
For some children, that's the first time they've ever been in a salon for Some parents having a cancer child or a trike child with immune syndrome go into a public place like that is scary.
So spouse will make sure that it's in a protected area and all that so that they're not. They feel comfortable about that process that's going to be done. The measurements. So, so they do the measurements, they pack up the kit and they send that back to us. And so that's step one or step two or three. But step in the process because now we know what color, we know what size, and we're going to now order the hairpiece. And now comes the hardest part of the process.
Waiting.
Because now we send the measurements to the manufacturer and the manufacturer is going to make the hairpiece.
And that can take up to eight or 10 weeks.
And sometimes during COVID and other times it's even longer. And for a little child that's waiting every day, is it coming? Is it coming? And a mother that's hearing that, it's very difficult. And we know that. We know we push as hard as possible to get those through the manufacturing process so that we can get it back to the child. We're talking to a new manufacturer now for cancer patients to see if we can shorten the wait time and see if we can make something work there. So we're always on the lookout for how to improve our process, how to make it better for the parents, and how to. How to have a quality natural hair hairpiece for these children. This is real hair. This is natural hair. This is not synthetic. This is natural hair. And it's put into that hairpiece one strand at a time.
So we're. That's the manufacturing process. So we now the manufacturer makes the hairpiece. They send it to us.
We have an order coming in this next week. We just got the today. It usually takes about a week from the time they're ready to release. So we have another set coming, and within a week that'll all be out to the families. Because why? Because they've been waiting eight weeks.
We have to call the family and say, where are you? Are you on vacation? Are you. Is the child in the hospital?
What. You know, where. What's the status of the family? So we can send the hairpiece to the family, have them sign for the hairpiece so we know they got it. We don't need hairpieces lost. They cost money. Their value is over $2,000 per hairpiece. And so we have to be very protect that. So that's how we send them out.
And then we contact the stylist and say, guess what? The hairpiece has been sent out, the parents know it's out and there's a child coming to get styled. So we let the stylist know and the parents make the styling appointment and they let us know. And then after the appointment we call mom, how did it go? We call the stylist, how did it go? Because we want to learn, we want to learn from the stylist and mom, how, how can we improve this? We're always looking for feedback.
Not just do we want the child to smile and tell us all about it, but we want to know how to make the process better. And by having them share that with us. It's great. But the moment of truth, the moment of joy is when we get a picture or we get a video or we get a zoom and we see the child get the hairpiece and put it on their head for the first time.
And look here.
And when you see that radiant smile, when you see the twinkle in their eyes, when you see the tears in their parents eyes, you know you've been doing a good job. You know one more child is feeling good about themselves, is going to be able to live their lives and, and look themselves. And that means we did our job. So that's the process, that's what the parents go through. And they go through each pair of that with a staff member. So they always have a staff member to rely on, to talk to, to text and ask questions of as they go through the process.
So it isn't like we send them a set of instructions, say fill out the blanks and you're on your own. We are always in touch with them at each step of the way.
So that, that's the process part,
[00:30:22] Speaker C: what you said. Children from the age of 18 and under, what is the youngest that you have had as a client?
[00:30:32] Speaker B: Well, the youngest I think is two. And we had a two or three year old at one of our dinners a year ago and little girl ran around with the hairpiece in her hand and threw it every which way. And some of our guests were offended because this $2,000 hairpiece was not being used properly. But the mother said, no, I want her to get used to it. Now this was a child with alopecia.
So that means that she's going to have that disease for life and so she's going to have to learn how to take care of herself with a hairpiece. So mom got her hairpiece and she puts it on and takes it off. And that would be our young but the group that is, let me see here, from 0 to 5, that's 17% of the number of children we're serving right now.
So let's say just 20% are 5 and under. Okay. The bulk of our kids are 11 to 16.
And it kind of breaks out, it's funny, from 6 to 10 is about the same as 11 to 15.
So 70% are that group that's there. And then the ballots are 16 to 18 or 19.
So that, that's a smaller group that, that are in there. So that's that middle school group. That middle school group. But there's a couple of points here, I think, that are helpful. One, a couple of years ago, I did a focus group with our recipients that are older, had aged out. And so we did a monthly focus group. And I listened to them and their moms tell me about the process, tell me what happened. And one of the things I noticed in the very beginning was everyone's story started the same way.
When I was seven.
When I was seven.
So I finally asked our oldest, the one that has been, has hung on the lung, Annie, who's now a mom with kids of her own. She's a marketing executive.
She's on our board.
I said, annie, tell me about this being seven. Because all these kids are. They start when they're seven. She said, of course. What do you mean?
So she told the story of how she hated wigs for kids, how she hated Jeffrey Paul, how she wanted her hair back.
She didn't want a new wig, she wanted it to grow back.
She wanted her hair. She had alopecia she wasn't going to get. She was mad. And she talked about how Jeffrey and Xena made all the difference in the world by talking to her, working with her, showing how to take care of that hairpiece, made her life a whole new existence. But at age 7. So I was telling some. So a psychologist about it. The psychologist looked at me and said, tom, now you've been around people and worked with people for your whole life, and you've worked with kids since you were a kid.
What is it about age seven, you don't know? I said, well, I'm. I don't know. There's something I'm missing. They said, you sure are, Tom. Age 7, they become an individual. They begin to see themselves as unique and different.
That's age seven. And so at age seven is when they see themselves as different from the other kids. And that's when the hair, loss of hair begins to hit. And that's the reaction and we heard kids say, I thought God hated me. I thought my mother hated me because she couldn't fix it.
All that at age 7. So think about families that are going through that with a 7, 8 or 9 year old trying to cope with that, you know, trying to help them get this hairpiece and do that. So that's, that's what happens. So that's the younger ones.
The, the other story I can tell is, is about teenagers.
And this just happened within the last five years.
A lady showed up at Jeffrey's salon and she said, I heard there's a thing. No, she came to Jeffrey and she said, I heard that you can fix kids.
Jeffrey said, I'm sorry.
Now she's in his lobby. Well, what's, what do you mean? She said, my son lost all his hair.
Can you, can you fix it? And Jeffrey said, I'm sure I can.
Let's sit down and talk about it. So she brought the boy over and he talked to the boy. The boy's a senior in high school, and mom is freaking out because she wants a hairpiece on this kid for his senior picture. And what had happened was after the school year started, think about this.
He got up one morning and his beautiful blonde hair was on his pillow and the hair had started to fall out.
And then very shortly, it was all gone.
And mom was, was beside herself. So Jeffrey says to her, not only can I help you, but there's a thing called wigs for kids. And they're going to get him a hairpiece for free. And we're going to style it and we're going to get it and you're going to have it for senior pictures. But it's a process and we have to go through it together.
So when we have the dinner that summer, mom came, she told this story. She told the story about not knowing what to do. And then somebody told her about this guy, Jeffrey Paul. And she went to his salon on the west side. They live on the east side of Cleveland. And she showed up out of the blue and he worked with her. And so Vincent got a beautiful blonde hairpiece and he wore it for graduation. And the pictures of graduation are radiant. But I mean, he was a senior with his beautiful blond hair. And mom was just beside herself and thanking us for what we did. So we have little ones, 7 year olds. We're trying to help, you know, be individuals and not be bullied and not be made fun of. And we even have teachers who put the styrofoam hairpiece in the classroom. So if it gets itchy or gets too warm, the child can take it off and put it on there and still be accepted by everybody. Recently we had a teacher that was when the hairpiece got there and style, she told the family, don't, don't. The child's not coming in. Okay, right away.
So they started the class and then she went out in the hall and she brought the little girl in and she said, this is your classmate. Okay. Now she was wearing her hairpiece and all. She looked entirely different.
And so the teacher told the class about her illness and about the hairpiece and why it was so important.
And the class broke into applause. They cheered her. And you know, there's no problem with her walking around that classroom with that hairpiece. Nobody's picking on her or making fun of her. So teachers often are very critical to our success as well in helping the children.
So we worry about the bullying and with online it's, it's catastrophic. And so try very hard to talk to the stylist, talk to the parents, talk, make sure that they are there to lift that child up.
And the disease that is reaching now for us, and it's one we're going to have to think about coping with, is, I call it trich.
I'll see if I can say it right. Trichotone mania, trichotilia mania. It is a immune syndrome. It's a mental illness. It's hair pulling.
So if I just say it's the hair pulling disease, people know what I'm talking about. So children begin to pull their hair up.
And last year it was only 6% of our population. A few years ago it was only 3.
Now it's 12% of our population and it's predominantly in the middle school.
And it's all about stress, it's all about how people are treated. I think, I'm not the doctor, but I know that it's growing and that disease is the hardest for parents to work with. Now, I would say cancer should be the hardest because you could lose a child.
But trich causes parents to ask, where did it come from? Why is it here? And members of the family say, tell the kid to stop doing that. As if the parent can stop it or control it. See, if you tell your family your child has leukemia, they don't tell you, go cure it.
If you tell your family that the child has alopecia and is going to be bald for life, they don't say, well, you know, find some salve and put it on their bald head so they have hair they don't say things like that. But trike family members say to parents, tell them to stop pulling that hair. Tell them to stop. Because it's a behavior.
So it's. So these are the kind of things that are going on in the background that we. We have to be aware of because we're dealing with very emotional people and talking to them and taking them through this process.
So that's. That's why there's a need. That's why there's a need.
The need has grown over the last few years tremendously.
A few years ago, we were. We were servicing about 500 kids, little under 5, around 500.
And then in 24, in July, something happened. We don't know what happened. And the number of kids that month went from 30 the month before to 70 in one month. And it never really went down much. So that year we, at 74, we went to over 700 kids. So it went up about 200 kids. And it was all in the fourth quarter.
Last year, we went from 700 to 11.
Almost 1,200 kids in one year.
So growth in need has been a serious concern for us because we need to raise money to pay the bills. And so we're on a constant campaign for not only hair donation, but also for contributions, because in order to handle 25, we had to use some of our reserve funds to meet the needs of the children. Because we have a commitment. When that child comes to us with alopecia or cancer, that's a commitment that they're going to get a new hairpiece every year.
So that means we're going to be with them for many, many years.
So that $2,000 commitment can be multiplied by 10 years or it can be multiplied by more than that. So we have to know that we have to have reserve funds. We have to be able to handle that commitment to those families.
So they don't all come every year, because our hairpiece isn't all for everybody. It's a straight. It's straight hair. It can be curled. It can be. The stylist can handle that, but it's a full cap. So if they have partial hair loss, a lot of times we aren't able to give them what they need, but we try, and the stylist can make it work. If they work with the family on partial hair loss, Jeffrey will tell any stylist, partial hair loss is no excuse for us not being to be able to help a child with our full cap system. And he'll show them how to do that.
So we work with that and he helps stylist with that. And so we are constantly working with that. But that's a big, big issue because if we take a thousand kids, $2,000 per hairpiece, you can guess how much money the budget has to be. So that's the cash side. So we are, we say, because people give us ponytails.
And that's the other side of our activity. Every, every day, mail comes through the, our office in Westlake from all over the world. From all over the world. We have a group in Greece that sends about four times a year a gigantic box of, of ponytails that they collect and put together in the plastic bags. And they're so proud of it. They, they, you know, they're very proud that they can help the Americans with their beautiful Greek hair. And we are happy, we are happy to have that. But we get them from all over the world and they come in, we hope, in the length of over 12 inches.
Closer to 14. 12 to 14, because that's what we need to do a little girl's hairpiece.
We used to be able to do eight, but the manufacturing process doesn't work that way. So we need 12 to 14 to be able to do a little girl's hairpiece. And so, and 90% of our of our children are girls.
So we can use shorter hair for boys, but we only have a small number of them. So girls need, and we try to give them a 14 inch hairpiece. We have 12, 14 hair pieces and sometimes longer, but predominantly 14 inches. And that comes from our hair donations.
So a part of why we can do it at this number, because we've been working around this number for a long time. We were at 17 or whatever and then it went to 1800. Now it's closer to $2000 to, to do the whole, to do the hairpiece. And we put products in the bag in the box that goes with it, shampoo, conditioner, detangler, and we give them a styrofoam head and we give them a chin strap, we give them a brush, give them a towel to use. So all of that's in the box with that gift of a hairpiece. All of that's for free.
And so we send that out to the families. And so to do that, we have these hair donors that send that in, that comes into our headquarters over in Westlake. Then we have to sort them because we have to see how long they are. And we sort them generally we sort them for by length first.
And we often look for chemically treated Hair, because chemically treated hair will not work with the manufacturer. When they go to process that hairpiece. Chemically treated hair disappears.
So you can't have that.
So people that give us chemically treated hair are not helping us. And we try to stress that to people. We need to have the length 12 to 14 and no chemically treated hair. And men are fabulous. We're really trying to get men. Men love to do this.
And so we're really encouraging men and children.
Children that have 15 or 16 inches, really. We just had a little boy who gave his third time, and he told the story about how the kids in his school made fun of him, but he don't care. He's going to do it again. He's going to do it again. This is my third time. I think he's in fifth grade. I'm going to do it again. I love doing this.
So children are great hair donors.
Men love to make it into an occasion, practically. They have beautiful hair. Oh, my goodness, goodness. And. And they make it into an occasion, and they send us videos of them having it cut and the ponytails being created. Yesterday I talked to a man, want to make sure he had the right length. He said. He said, you know, I think it's not quite 12 inches. He said, should I wait? I said, yes. He said, okay, I've waited two years. I can wait longer. I want to make sure it works. I said, okay. He said, I'll make sure, you know, I. Your head. You said 12, but I think I'm going to grow it to 14 just to make sure. I said, yes, sir. That's what I'm asking you to do. He said, I got the rubber bands to make the little ponytails, but I. I want to make sure. So that's the kind of emotion. So when people donate, it's an event.
They're giving part of their body.
They are contributing to the life of a child.
It's not just a free haircut.
It's not just, oh, I thought I would. I have this long hair. So let me give it to him. Today we had a beautiful picture of a mom of one of our recipients who grew her hair out and. And recently donated it in honor of her daughter. And so the stylist made a whole collage of mom, the donation, little girl, the whole thing. Send it to us. It'll be up on our website one of these days. But you know, and think about that. The stylist made it into an event for the donor and the little girl that had been with her. You know, and they, and the colors are so close, I couldn't believe mom's hair color and the, the hairpiece color and, and so, and this. But the stylist made that. She made that moment happen and then shared it with us and made it for us, made our day bright and shiny today, the, this day when they, she shared it through social media.
So that's, that's all part of what we do every day. But the hair donor is critical, absolutely critical, because that's how we keep the cost of the hairpiece down, is by getting those ponytails in. So they, we measure them out, then we have to send them to the manufacturer. And then, then after that, you know, we have a, we have a hairpiece manufactured.
So one of the disappointments of hair donors is they would like to meet the child that got their ponytail.
Well, unfortunately, it takes 20 to 30 ponytails to make up hairpiece, and the manufacturer can't tell us which one of the ponytails came from who.
So on our website, we had on the very front page, Meet our Kids.
And it's a button right on the front page and it talks about meeting our children. And it takes you to a gallery of children who tell their stories.
So we have a picture of the child. They tell about their, their hobbies, tells about what they do and how they do it.
So every donor can see the value of the donation if they just go to our website, go to the homepage, click the button, Meet our Children now, if they want to learn a story, a big story, they can go to our community stories. And in there they'll meet stylists, hair donors and recipients, all of which will tell them the story of why they did what they did and how they benefited from it. So our community stories that are on the, on the little button on the website, you click community Stories, it'll take you to a menu of stories. And the recipient stories are there. Those are longer, Those are. The meet us is just a picture and some basic information.
And the children, the Meet our stories of recipients actually are stories that the children and their parents tell us, and it's a whole story about it. We have, we have a little girl that's going to be highlighted in one of our newsletters that's going to, that went to prom with her hairpiece. And that's, that's a, she told that story about getting her hair piece and having her pictures taken and graduating and going to prom with her hairpiece. So the stories are unbelievable. As far as somebody asked me, do these hair pieces make A difference. And I say yes, go to our website.
Let the children tell you.
You know what? Why should I tell you? Why should Jeffrey tell you? The children can tell you how it makes a difference, right? With the, with the hot going to, you know, playing sports, being in music, playing an instrument, being in an orchestra, being on a stage in theater.
You know, all these things that kids do and we take for granted. For a child that feels like left out, that's isolated, that's afraid that somebody's going to bully them, they don't participate, but they get a hairpiece and they feel confident and then they begin to participate and then they actually can take the hairpiece off and put it back on and take it off and feel confident because they are confident. They are a unique person and they are in total control of when to wear the hairpiece, when that. And they take care of their hair pieces.
They, they learn how to, you know, properly handle them, how to keep them clean. It's all a process that children and their families go through. And, and they learn how to do that. And doing it builds confidence that they are unique, but they are a part of the community.
The stylists help us with that. The teachers help us with that. Our staff does that. We're always about, what did I say at the very beginning? Living their lives.
Living their lives. Lives. Our goal is for them to live their lives and look themselves and our. But looking themselves is what we can do, but living their lives is what they do. And that's what we try to really, really stress is we want to be there to help them live their lives.
[00:51:41] Speaker A: That's, it's, it's amazing.
Try not to tear up a little bit with some of the stories of these little, of these little ones.
So we're getting close to the, the end of our hour, so I want to spend time talking of how people can help. Like, how can they donate? How can they.
You've touched a little bit on like ponytail length. No. Chemically treated. Where do they send it? How do they find a stylist maybe in their area to cut it for them? How can if. If they don't have hair to do donate? You know, like my boyfriend shaved head, tattooed head. But maybe he wants to donate money. Like how. What are the different.
[00:52:24] Speaker B: Thank you. I didn't mean to skip that, but we have a website and you go to the website and it says hair donation and all the qualifications for hair donation, and there's a form you fill out and say, I'm going to be a hair donor. And then you get a code that you put with your ponytail so that when it comes in, we can scan it and send you recognition that we got the ponytail.
So it's up on the website are all the instructions about how to make a ponytail gift. And there's a button that takes you to a map for hair donor specialists and hair donors. We've been, I've been talking about the stylists that take care of the children, but we have over 1500 people across the country that cut ponytails and great clips. The franchise Sit still kids, fantastic Sams and pigtails and crew cuts, those are all franchises that work with us to help collect ponytails and get ponytails for our kids.
So they can go to the map and find a hair donor specialist and that's the one who will measure it, talk to them, put the little rubber bands on, make sure they put them in the plastic bag correctly and put it in the envelope and the address is there for them and they send it in. And so like I said, every day, eight, ten bins of mail show up with donations. So it's not hard. It's not hard, but you probably best to do it through one of our hair donor specialists or great clip salon that knows how to do it so that it gets to us properly.
So that's how they do the hair donation. Their donation is, look on the website, get the credentialing, see what the it is, then talk to a hair donor specialist and make sure you make your appointment. And as far as for the, I'm going to say they're all free, but there might be some because of nature of things. They may be some kind of a minor charge, but they the majority, 99%, it's a free hairpiece and a free haircut. And so we want to make sure that haircut is done right.
And our volunteer, our professional volunteer hair donor specialists do that every day.
So that's how the hair part goes. Now at the same website is a donate button. And so click the donate button and it comes up and you can make a cash donation. You can make a monthly donation through our sponsor child program where you actually sign up for monthly donation and you do that.
And that's at our there, that's at the, at the donation. The thing that I didn't touch on as the time is running is the people who do fundraising all over the country for us. So that's another whole gang of people.
We had a stylist that did a golf outing out in California last year that got rained out and they did it in December and still had it. And the volunteers came and the golf club opened and they did the golf outing for us. We have cut a thons all over the country. We're going to have a cutthon in Columbus later this in the spring where Pelotonia, they have a Huntington bank sponsors that. And they're going to have a kids ride and we're going to be there with our materials. People are going to pledge a ponytail. They're going to pledge money for our program. And then later we're going to have a cut a thon sponsored by that organization where people will come and have their hair cut. In Beechwood here in Ohio, we're going to. We're going to be a kindness day. And Kindness day is sponsored by largest pediatric practice, Shelly Sunders practice over on the east side. They do Kindness day every year and we've been with them from the beginning. And we do a big cut a thon there where people come and the Girl Scouts are going to help us this year and they're going to donate their hair and get a badge because we have a Girl Scout badge if you donate a ponytail. And so they're going to be there. We have a car show in Cincinnati. We have a beautiful gala. They just had it a week ago in New Jersey. The salon does a beautiful, beautiful evening. And last year we had a recipient there for the style show and all of that. They raised over $8,000. We have a guy who does a bar crawl down in Texas. Yeah, Texas. And he did about eight or nine thousand dollars. We have a group that's virtual Second Life. They were with us for almost 20 years and they do a hair fair every year and they raise between 10 and 20,000 every year. And that's all done through a virtual world where they do that. We have a swim. We have a fishing contest in Lake Erie that's sponsored by a man whose son fell into a fire. And we did a hairpiece for the family because he had burns.
And they every year have a fishing contest. And there they rise 10 to 15, 20,000 every year with their contest up in Lake Erie. So there are groups all over the country that help raise money for us. Firemen, soccer coaches, stylists who do cut a thons.
Groups like seniors and have a senior community that does a program.
We even had a prison that did a. A cut a thon. And these prisoners with no money found a way to put together a few hundred dollars to send with the ponytails that the stylist cut Inside the prison, women's prison. They. They did a Cut a Thon inside the prison. They videoed it, the whole bit, and supported wigs for kids. And then they raised some money amongst the prisoners. We have no money. They found a way to give us money. So these are the groups all over the country that support us. And so that if you contact us, say you want to be a fundraiser, we'll work with you, we'll get you up on our website, we'll get you the materials you need, hats, T shirts, whatever. And then the last point I would make is in the next few weeks, Ohio State is well known across the world, but we have a club at Ohio State, and we also have a club at the University of Georgia. And these college kids raise money. And the college kids are going to have a bar crawl here in another few weeks. And they'll be celebrating their spring semester and for the seniors, their last bed by celebrating us.
And they'll wear their wigs for kids T shirts and they'll have a wonderful evening and they'll do that and they'll raise money. So we have college clubs that raise money for us.
So all of these things happen. A few weeks ago at the University of Pennsylvania, they have thon where they raise money for cancer research. But they do a cut a thon, a gigantic cut a thon. And they've been doing this for probably 30 years with Jeffrey. And they do a Cut a Thon and they send us the ponytails. They have seven stylists. They're cutting on stage as a part of the thon. And the thon is a gigantic dance a thon that takes place at the University of Pennsylvania every winter. And so they include us in that. So that's how people help us. That's how people volunteer. They use their skills to help us. They bring to the table their interest. Car shows, beauty pageants, Cut a thons, bake sales. You know, he had a high school girl that called up one a couple years ago from New York and said, I want to do a Cut a Thon, but I don't know anything about it. So we try to explain to her. She worked on it all summer, and then in the right before she went back to school, she raised over $10,000 on a cut a thon in her neighborhood, in her community.
A little high school kid that said, I want to make a difference.
And so we gave her the materials, but she did it. I know her parents helped her, but I mean, she did it. No professional fundraiser showed up. She got the People to come. She got the money raised. She went and got sponsors, and she did it. So people that are dedicated and want to help us, they find ways to raise money. So fundraising is critical for us, and the more of it, the better. And we like people to do it in a way that's best for them.
[01:01:14] Speaker A: So I just wanted to put out. So we've done a couple events where we've done, like, gallery reads and the funds, you know, we were. For you guys.
And then we have a couple deity statues in the store, Ganesha, Buddha and Lakshmi. And people, like, just started leaving them money. And I'm like, huh, okay, so what. What we do with that, other than the oil that I. I have to buy to oil these body with statues? You know, we buy the oil and then everything else, at the end of the year, we send you guys a check, you know, so for our local people, if. If you ever wonder what we do with all of those ones, fives, quarters, you know, we. You take it down to Wigs for kids, and hopefully here soon we'll have another.
And I say another because we lost one in the fire that we had. And it's just funny because in a video, I think it was like, Google, they were like, remember this? And it was like the melted plastic box that had, like, encapsulated the money in it. And I'm like, well, how do I get that out?
You know? And I'm like, it was pretty perfectly sealed.
And then for a while, you guys were getting so much help, you. You ran out of the change boxes. But I think you might have one to come.
[01:02:38] Speaker B: Yes.
[01:02:39] Speaker A: You know, for us. So now I'm feeling inspired, and I want to throw Maria under the bus. Like, Maria, we should do a mediumship event again, and maybe we can do it at the golf club. And you're one of the readers for it.
[01:02:54] Speaker C: No, I'm. I'm all for that. You know, I always would like to donate whatever skills that I can, and the reading and doing energy work is something that I am proficient in.
I've done donations before in other avenues for other people, but this is something that. Yeah, I'm for it. Melissa, if we. You want to do it? Let's go.
[01:03:19] Speaker B: These are kids.
Yeah. You're going to use your skills and talents.
Yeah, your. Your skills and your talents and this store by collecting the money and. And telling people that you're helping kids with it. So, I mean, that's what people do, is they use their skills and talents to help us. And we appreciate everything that People do, because I talk about this all the time. Time, talent, and treasure. But people give their time. That's the most valuable gift that you can give anybody is your time. And these stylists to give time to our families, the stylists to do the ponytail cuts, the style, the people that raise money and give time.
Now, we never minimize that. Time is the most important gift a person can give. And the second most important is their talent, their skills, and their interest. Sharing their interest as you do through the store, and then helping by doing that, helping our children. And then our children know there are people out there. I may not have made that clear enough.
One of the things that all of this is about as I talk about living their lives, is these people that are doing all this, we keep sharing that with the families because this tells the children they're not alone.
There's a community out there that cares about them, that there are people, whether they're harvesting ponytails or. Or measuring or raising money or donating ponytails, These people care about them, and it makes all the difference in the world.
So you're part of that family. You're part of my community that care about our kids.
And we appreciate every minute of it.
[01:05:04] Speaker A: Yeah, we. We definitely need to get another event in on the books for this.
[01:05:12] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:05:13] Speaker A: So that'll be some off live hours talk and maybe in the store on Saturday, because I think I see you this Saturday in person, Maria. Yeah, you do.
But, you know, and. And I love the fact that I can literally say, hey, if you think that maybe it's not on the. I'm like, you can literally go right up the street to their office and go talk to. To them.
Like, it's. It's legit. They're right here. So for. For people in the Cleveland area, you know, they are able to talk with you guys. And then people.
[01:05:49] Speaker B: Do people. Do people come and stop by? We. I had a person drive from the state of New York to make a hair donation one Saturday of. Of one, you know, one hair donation. Mom. This was a child that was doing it. So she brought the child. They drove down from, I think Syracuse to personally give us this ponytail. I'm only thankful I was there that day because we're not open on Saturday.
And so I happened to be there when they drove up the driveway and they gave me the ponytail. I got a chance to talk to the child and. But I mean, think about that. They were so serious. They wanted to, you know, they wanted the child to experience giving the gift.
So you can do that, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[01:06:37] Speaker A: It's, it's, it's amazing. And that's why, you know, between, you know, military veterans and Wigs for Kids, like, those are my go to, you know, charities and I'm like, these are some of our most, I don't know, words fail me. But, but communities that need, you know, love and attention, you know, and love and support.
[01:07:00] Speaker B: You are absolutely right.
[01:07:02] Speaker A: So, so I, I'm so grateful that you were able to join us and, and able to come in and talk about Wakes for Kids. I don't know, Maria, if you had any last questions for him here about Wakes for Kids or him and his show.
[01:07:20] Speaker C: Tom actually answered a lot. I, I was very, I knew, knew about wigsaw kids, but I didn't know the details of it. And thank you for that.
I believe children are a priceless commodity. They are our future and we should be there for them as a community, as a parent, as a grandparent, as a family.
[01:07:45] Speaker B: Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Because that's important. And we're in a world where not always people prize children and understand the. Particularly children with disabilities and having hair loss is, in effect, disability and trike is a mental illness. So these are children that are suffering. And by the way, they don't like me to use that word. They don't like that at all. All. But they are. And so by giving us this opportunity tonight to share our story with whoever sees this blog over a period of time, it is a miracle. It's a wonderful opportunity for us to talk to a new community or another community and maybe a community that is going to see it in a month or whenever, you know, see it again.
And that's okay because each time we are able to share, we hope that we reach another person who will understand the value of a child.
And you two ladies have done that tonight. You valued a child and 1100 of them last year, over 1100 last year are benefiting because people cared. And right now we're on track to hit another thousand this year.
We had 94 last month in February, and right now I think we have about 40 in March. We're not even in the middle of the month.
So the need goes on. The number of kids are there and the need is there. And so anything you can do to help us, we appreciate all of it. Thank you very much.
[01:09:28] Speaker A: Thank you.
Yes, thank you. And thank you everyone for joining. And Please, please visit wigsforkids.org if you feel so inclined to help them out in any way, shape or form.
[01:09:43] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[01:09:44] Speaker A: And I. We forgot to cover. Real quick. Can stylists who want to join in the. In the styling and working with the families, there's ways on the website for them to find out.
[01:09:55] Speaker B: Right to the website. The. The stylist program. Both programs are there. The form are there. And that'll get them started.
They can call, they go to the way. The best is to go through the website because then all the information is right there. And then if they have a question, the phone number, everything's right there. Or they can text us all that. So, yeah, I would tell people to go to the website, the stylist programs, and see what the crew, what goes on and then contact us. That's the best.
[01:10:26] Speaker A: All right, well, thank you for joining and thank you, Tom, for coming on and speaking on Wigs for Kids. And we hope everybody has a great night, a great week, and we will see everybody on the next episode.
[01:10:43] Speaker B: Okay.
We'll look forward to it.
[01:10:47] Speaker A: Thank you.
[01:10:48] Speaker B: It was a pleasure.
[01:10:49] Speaker C: Thank you.
[01:10:54] Speaker A: Thank you for listening to the Healer's Corner podcast. Join us again soon.
