Keeping Cancer Victims Warm With Chemo Caps
An all-too-common result of cancer treatment is hair loss, so cancer victims can always use the warm hats that Chemo Caps delivers.
Cancer can hit you hard, so the only option is to hit it back even harder. But aggressive treatment often causes cancer patients to lose their hair, which can be a hard psychological blow on top of everything else.
A knitted cap can't replace a healthy head of hair, but it can help soothe the emotions that result from the loss -- and if nothing else, it'll keep the patient's head warm until her hair grows back in. That's why Chemo Caps volunteers have been busily knitting for seven years now.
KNITTING AGAINST CANCER
Heather Spoll learned to knit as part of her self-therapy while undergoing cancer treatment in the late 1990s, and she turned out to be a great knitter. Sadly, uterine cancer cut her life short in August 2000, at age 25.
Along with friend and fellow knitter JoAnne Turcotte, Heather's mother Ronnie initiated the Heather Spoll No Hair Day Hat Program shortly after Heather's death. Better known as Chemo Caps, the charity provides cancer patients with soft, warm caps to call their own.
The idea was to warm the heads and soothe the souls of people undergoing the rigors of chemotherapy treatment. Just the fact that people have taken the time to make them caps is great medicine for those who receive them.
DIGNITY AND WARMTH
From its birthplace in Nazareth, Pennsylvania, Chemo Caps soon spread all over the world, providing dignity and warmth to cancer patients who need it. According to JoAnne, the work also warms the hearts of the people who do the knitting, helping them through their own crises.
JoAnne, who helped teach Heather to knit, designed several of the Chemo Cap patterns. Today there are seven official patterns, and the Chemo Caps website offers Internet links to several more, including crocheting patterns.
At first, Ronnie Spoll handled all the caps that flooded into Chemo Caps HQ. Nowadays JoAnne mostly receives and distributes them, but Ronnie remains active in the charity.
CAPS ARE EASY TO MAKE!
You don't need much more than needles, time, and a single ball of yarn to make a warm topper for Chemo Caps. Go to the Chemo Caps website to get all the info you need on patterns, donations, and more.
Any yarn will do for the caps, as long as it's soft and washable. The Chemo Caps website points out that Berocco Chinchilla works very well, as it can survive many washings, maintains its shape well, and feels very comfortable on the head. Bright colors are better than somber ones, since anything that can make a cancer patient feel better helps.
