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Spring Haircut? Donate to Locks of Love!

Cutting Those Long Tresses Can Help a Child Smile

Feb 25, 2009 Jan Peterson

Children who are living with hair loss, experience emotional and social issues. Locks of Love is an organization that helps them regain confidence and hope.

Know a Rapunzel who is considering cutting her long hair? Be sure she knows about Locks of Love, a non-profit organization that began operations in 1998. This organization provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children under 18 in the U.S. and Canada. These children suffer long term hair loss for various reasons, most often due to alopecia which has no known cause or cure and affects 4.7 million people in the U.S.

Locks of Love Hair Prosthetics

Custom hair prosthetics are made for each child with donated human hair (80% by other children). The hairpiece fits by a vacuum seal design with no need for tape or glue. Only the child can remove it, which provides security that the hairpiece won’t come off accidentally. Also, it does not have to be removed for the child to shower or swim.

It takes four to six months and six to ten “ponytails” of hair to make ONE hairpiece, which would retail between $3,500 and $6,000. Each strand of hair is hand injected into the silicone base up to 150,000 times and can be styled as the child wishes.

The hairpieces may be free of charge or on a sliding scale according to the family's situation. Applications can be accessed on the Locks of Love website. Each case is considered by review of the medical history, family financial situation and details of the child. A child can be nominated for the services of Locks of Love wherein the organization will contact the family.

Donating Hair to Locks of Love

Donated hair can be from men, women, all ages, all races, all hair colors & most hair types. Note: grey will not be used in hairpieces but will be sold to offset cost of manufacturing. The hair is evaluated for its usefulness according to these guidelines:

Must be clean and dry
Must be in ponytail or braid
Pony tail must be minimum 10 inches tip to tip when hair is pulled straight (no maximum length)
Hair that is colored or permed can not be heavily damaged
Layered hair is acceptable as long as the longest layer is 10 inches
If hair was cut years ago, it must have been kept in a ponytail or braid

Some hair is not acceptable:

Dreadlocks
Hair that is heavily chemically treated and damaged (bleached)
Hair swept off the floor
Synthetic hair

All monetary donations are tax-deductible, but hair donations are not.

How to Cut Hair for Locks of Love

Once that "New Do" is picked out and the decision to donate has been made, anyone can cut the hair. Locks of Love has partnered with Nexxus for the program and Nexxus has a video on its website showing the following steps involved with cutting the hair.

Gather hair into a ponytail at nape of neck and secure with an elastic band
Measure to make sure hair is 10 inches tip to tip
Cut ABOVE the elastic
Place hair into plastic bag and place bag into padded envelope, along with donation form from website.
If name and address is provided, the donation will be acknowledged.
Send package to Locks of Love

The Locks of Love website is full of additional information and wonderful pictures of the children who have benefited from the generosity of hair donors.

It is a satisfying experience for the individuals who generously donate a part of themselves for this cause. Instead of their hair lying all over the salon floor, destined for the trash, it becomes a heartfelt gift to a child that will help them go on with their lives.

The copyright of the article Spring Haircut? Donate to Locks of Love! in General Medicine is owned by Jan Peterson. Permission to republish Spring Haircut? Donate to Locks of Love! in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.