The Look Good … Feel Better Program
Her Magazine
By Maureen O’Halloran Clark
May/June 2005
“Losing your hair is very traumatic. It is one of the first really hard things to go through, besides being sick.” Lori Prine, Community Specialist for the American Cancer Society, adds that cancer treatments could also cause loss of eyebrows and lashes. To counteract these side effects, the Look Good … Feel Better program was brought to Omaha in 1989. “It is a fun program for the women. And there are very few things they get to do that are fun when they are going through this experience.”
The free program is run by volunteers and attended by up to ten women. It lasts about two hours. A licensed cosmetologist gives skin care and make-up tips to use during cancer treatments and participants practice the techniques. Another volunteer talks about wig choice and care. The women then try on wigs. They also try on hats and turbans sewn by volunteers. The wigs, hats and turbans are available for those who need them. Each participant also receives a kit of donated cosmetics valued at around $300.
“She opens that up and it is like Christmas.” says Barbara Dahlbeck, the Program Coordinator for Nebraska. It is also uplifting being with other women who are going through cancer treatments. By the session’s end, they often are laughing and enjoying themselves. She notes, “Women will come so tired and dragged down. And by the time they leave, they will have restored energy.”
Another volunteer, Martha Nielsen, had been with the program four years before being diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. She then attended a session as a participant.
She reflects, “It didn’t really bother me to lose my hair, because I had spent so much time with wonderful brave women without hair.”
She herself wore a wig for a year. It looked so natural that people said about her treatments, “At least you didn’t have to lose your hair.”
During that time, she went to sessions wearing her wig. Later, she would remove it. Participants were encouraged when they saw that she had lost her hair and yet looked so good. Now that her cancer is in remission, she continues to volunteer for the program.
Holly Adams, a social worker for the Creighton Hematology/Oncology Clinic, is also the site coordinator for the program at Creighton University Medical Center. She tells patients the session will make them feel like a “queen for the day.” Through this educational format, women learn how to enhance their appearance so that the appearance-related side effects of cancer treatments don’t have to be devastating.
The Look Good … Feel Better program is a joint effort of three organizations: the American Cancer Society, the National Cosmetology Association, and The Cosmetic, Toiletry and Fragrance Association Foundation.
To register for this free program or to volunteer, call the American Cancer Society at 402-393-5800. Sessions are offered at numerous times and places. Volunteers run the sessions as hostesses, hairstylists or licensed cosmetologists. Others can sew hats, turbans or scarves.
Article text © copyright 2005 Maureen O'Halloran Clark. All rights reserved.