Libby Brand's long, straight, shiny brown hair could have been the envy of her seventh-grade cohorts. Instead, she used it as an act of charity and love.
At 2:10 p.m. Friday at DeLong Middle School, students filled the cafeteria to watch Libby get her head shaved in support of her friend Brianna Daniels, a DeLong sixth-grader who has battled cancer for the past year.
Sitting on a low, metal stool, a green cape in front of her, Libby's face glowed with a smile as a stylist gathered the girl's hair into small ponytails.
The stylist lifted a razor and one by one, strands of Libby's hair were buzzed off while students, faculty and family shouted words of encouragement.
After the final strands of hair were shaved off, Libby stood, then flew into the arms of Brianna for a hug.
"She's so brave," Brianna said. "She's such a good friend."
DeLong teachers Marcus Larsen, Dustin Hayes, and Cory Bixby also shaved their heads for St. Baldrick's, as did some of Libby's fellow students. Libby said she was anxious about the haircut but felt good once her locks were shorn.
"I'm like so happy, kind of overwhelmed," she said.
The head-shaving event was put on with the help of St. Baldrick's Foundation, where the event's proceeds will go. St. Baldrick's Foundation started 10 years ago and funds childhood cancer research. The organization currently funds more childhood cancer research than any organization except the U.S. government.
Libby heard about St. Baldrick's when she was in fifth grade and two of her classmates shaved their heads to raise money for the foundation.
"When you have a St. Baldrick's event, you shave your head and you collect pledges and use that money to donate," said Libby, who is also donating her shorn hair to Locks of Love, a program that uses donations to make wigs for cancer patients. "I didn't do it in fifth grade, but when Bri was diagnosed with cancer I decided that this was something that I want to do."
Libby and Brianna live across the street from one another and have been friends for five years. Brianna was excited to learn about her friend's decision to shave her head.
"I think it's awesome that she's raising money for cancer research," Brianna said.
So far, Libby has raised $1,205, significantly more than her original goal of $500. Fellow DeLong seventh-graders Lizzy Brandenberg and Liz Eilen, two of Libby's friends, took donation pledges, set up the barbers and promoted the event.
Friday wasn't the first display of support for Brianna the community has shown. Her friends raked leaves and sold bracelets last fall to raise money, and one friend and her family grew pumpkins to sell back in October.
Life-changing event
Brianna's experience with cancer started about a year ago with a bump on her ankle. The bump got bigger but was misdiagnosed several times as a benign cyst.
"It was really hurting me," she said, "I couldn't play soccer, I couldn't fit it in my shoe, I had to cut the back of my shoe off."
The family finally visited the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., where a doctor reworked the pathology and discovered the bump was a cancer called pleomorphic undifferentiated sarcoma, a soft-tissue sarcoma.
"Suddenly our world turned upside down," said Brianna's mother, Anita Norha. "She had 16 hour surgery two days after she found out it was cancer."
The surgery took three-fourths of Brianna's Achilles tendon and several skin grafts from her thigh. Doctors concluded Brianna's cancer was an aggressive type and she had to undergo chemotherapy and radiation beginning last August.
Brianna's first chemotherapy session was on the day she would have started sixth grade. She missed 4 ½ months of school but worked diligently to keep up with her school work.
"We kept up conceptually, we home-schooled her and she had a tutor come in as well, so we worked hard to make sure all the concepts would be covered," Norha said.
During months of chemotherapy, Brianna spent five hours per day with her parents: two hours to travel to Rochester, one hour of treatment, and then a two-hour drive back home.
She could have stayed at the Ronald McDonald House near the hospital, but Brianna wanted the comforts of home, including sleeping in her own bed and seeing friends at school when her health allowed her to. Brianna's first full week back at school following her treatment was two weeks ago.
"All my friends are like, ‘You're done now, when can you come back to school full-time?'" Daniels said, "It's like oh my gosh, life is so fast. It's really fast. I used to just be able to lie on the couch. Even though I would have rather been at school, it was just so much slower. I could go at my own pace."
During treatment, her family's dining room was converted into her room, complete with a hospital bed. The family received more that 400 cards from the community offering support and sympathy, many of which still cover the dining room walls.
Bouncing back
An active child by nature, Brianna began playing soccer at age 5 and hopes to play again.
"She was known as the gazelle, really fast," her mother said. "She's always been the fast soccer kid, not the cancer kid."
If a return to playing for the Chippewa Valley Wave soccer team doesn't happen, Brianna has other plans.
"I asked for kayaks from the Make a Wish Foundation, so if it doesn't work out, I can get new hobbies, too," Daniels said.
Brianna finished chemotherapy two months ago and already is making leaps of improvement. She began walking without the help of crutches just last month. Last week her eyebrows and eyelashes grew back.
"She looks so much healthier," Brianna's mother said.
Brianna is hoping for a normal summer, and after that, a normal life.
Even with their daughter recovering Norha and Scott Daniels said the experience has changed the family's outlook.
"It gave a lot of perspective to all of us, just not to worry about all of the stuff we used to worry about," Norha said. "And love. Focus on love."