Where there’s a wig, there’s a way
PUEBLO, Colo. — At the Dorcy Cancer Resource Center, battling cancer is a community effort.
Janice Medrano, a regular resource center volunteer at St. Mary-Corwin Hospital in Pueblo, is using her victory over the disease to encourage others.
“Just helping them a little makes them feel special, and they leave here knowing that they can do it. I did it, and they can do it too,” said Medrano.
Medrano was first diagnosed with cancer nine years ago, after which she faced a surgery and radiation treatment. Her mother had previously undergone cancer treatment, giving Medrano a preview of how grueling the process can be.
“After treatment, you just go,” Medrano said. “And you always try to remain positive because that gets you through the day, even when you don’t want to.”
Now on the other side of her treatment, Medrano is passing this encouragement to patients undergoing chemotherapy in the St. Mary-Corwin Hospital cancer treatment program. Located inside the hospital, the Dorcy Cancer Resource Center is easily accessible to patients looking for an escape from the trials of treatment.
Immediately upon entering the cozy, one-room resource center, patients are surrounded by a wealth of homemade items, including wigs, lap blankets and blinged-out baseball caps.
“Everything in here is donated,” Medrano said. She pulled a few crocheted beanies from a drawer, one of which resembles a head full of hair curlers. “Our lap blankets and beanies have been coming from the Sangre de Cristo Arts Center. They also do our pillows.”
Medrano walked over to a pyramid of pink and purple wigs mounted prominently on some hand-painted wig stands.
“We have what I call a wild section of wigs with pinks and purples, so [patients] can try them on — the reds — something that they’ve never done before,” Medrano said.
“Sometimes [patients] are ashamed to be out in public, and they hide. But these make them feel good about themselves,” Medrano said of the colorful hair pieces. “And if you feel good about yourself, then you’re able to keep going and be strong."
“It makes you feel good, it does. Just the fact that you look a little bit more normal again,” said Nadine, a cancer patient at St. Mary-Corwin Hospital who visited the Resource Center a couple of times during her first six weeks of chemotherapy. “It gives you a sense of empowerment, I guess. It makes you feel better about yourself.”
Nadine sat before a standing mirror, while Medrano prepared a short brown wig.
“How many more treatments do you need to get?” asked Medrano.
“Six,” answered Nadine, who slipped the wig over her bare head. “This is cute,” she said, immediately taken with the new hairstyle.
“Your self-esteem is raised a lot by a little thing like a wig or a scarf that you can take home with you,” Medrano explained. “It’s something small, but you can carry it with you and know that somebody cared and made it for them.”
While the cancer treatment program at St. Mary-Corwin Hospital offers patients advanced, comprehensive radiation and chemo/immunotherapies, Medrano highlighted the feelings of isolation that often emerge throughout the difficult process.
“A lot of my friends that I was doing treatment with, you know, lost their lives to cancer,” said Medrano. She has helped visitors of the Resource Center who eventually found chemotherapy to be too much and stopped. Medrano described a patient who recently made this decision.
“One day, she said, ‘You’re not going to see me in here anymore,’” Madrano recalled.
“It’s just a frightening experience,” said Nadine. “But I really enjoy coming here. It’s like a big family. It just makes you feel so much better, and so much more secure, knowing that there’s people here that you can turn to and that can help you with these things.”
A number of brightly-colored paper cutouts — hand written words of encouragement from Pueblo Community College cosmetology students — sat in a bucket on the front counter. One read, “You are beautiful,” with two hearts on the side; another says, “I wish I could see this on you” with a heart and smiley face.
“Sometimes it’s just words of encouragement,” says Medrano, who smiled while reading some of the notes. “Even if you sit by someone that’s having a hard time… you just hold their hand, and you don’t even have to say anything. Just be there for them. And that’s all they need: someone to be there for them.”
Medrano and the other volunteers at the Dorcy Cancer Resource Center have done more than “be there.” In addition to offering three free items to any patient interested in considering a new hairdo or some new headwear, the resource center also offers a host of classes, activities and experiences selected and shared to boost positivity and relieve stress.
“We host a virtual integrative therapy program that’s offered across our cancer network,” said Brenda Biggerstaff, an oncology counselor and program manager at the Cancer Center. “It offers things like yoga, tai chi, zumba. And we pick those classes based off of evidence-based research that shows them to be helpful to oncology patients.”
“I participate in the acupuncture, tai chi, meditation, even rock painting and things like that. I learn these and pass them on to them. And if I can do it, so can they,” Medrano said with a laugh.
The clinic also offers Accu-Wellness programs and meditation programs, all free and available to the community.
Medrano combed a small blonde wigs, one of many featured in a large wig display centered on the back wall. Painted above the display were the words, “Be Joyful in hope, Patient in affliction, Faithful in prayer."
“I like volunteering, and especially here at the Cancer Center, because women are so vulnerable at certain stages in their life when they’re going through cancer,” Medrano said. “So it makes me really happy that I can provide a bit of service for them.”
Yet Medrano stressed that anyone, whether they are doctors, volunteers, family members or simple do-gooders, can help a cancer patient fight for their lives, just by being there.
“You’re taking the time to recognize them in a way that they didn’t think they could be recognized,” Medrano said. “That will help them be strong and keep going.”
As for her own battle? If she is faced with a second bout of cancer, Medrano has a smile and an answer for that too. “If that ever happens, I’ll deal with it. The same way I did the first time.”
Those interested in visiting the Dorcy Cancer Resource Center, participating in one of the Resource Center’s classes, or donating items, can contact Brenda Biggerstaff at 719-557-4548 or BrendaBiggerstaff@centura.org.