Keeping a Promise - Celebrating New Yorkers who make a difference
Famous hair stylist Rodolfo Valentin made a promise to his dying mother to help women who lose their hair to cancer. Society hair stylist makes fancy, free wigs for women undergoing chemotherapy.
- New York, NY (1888PressRelease) March 05, 2011 - When Melissa Gonzalez was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma three years ago, her advocates at the nonprofit Cancer Care told her there was someone she need to see. It was not a doctor or a nurse or a medical researcher. It was society hairdresser Rodolfo Valentin. The Madison Avenue hair stylist, a favorite with the ladies who lunch, had a program to provide top quality, custom made hairpieces for lower-income women who were about to undergo chemotherapy or radiation. These were no ordinary wigs, they were made from real human hair, bought off young mountain girls in Europe, each strand expertly colored and woven into a polyurethane cap perfectly molded to the patient's skull.
It does not look like a wig, it does not feel like a wig, said Gonzalez, 30, an accountant from Huntington, L.I., who is now in remission. "I wore it to my 10-year high school reunion and my best friend's wedding and no one knew." " I am not vain but you do not realize how important it is until you are looking in the mirror and see yourself bald." Rodolfo Valentin charges his well-heeled but follicle-challenged clients over $ 4,000 or more for such a "hair prosthetic," but Gonzalez and scores of other cancer patients who cannot afford those lofty prices did not have to pay a dime. That is because of a promise the coiffeur made to his mother, Sofia, years ago when she was dying of breast cancer, her glamorous platinum locks destroyed by radiation. "She said, Rodolfo, you have to promise me you will create the perfect hairpiece for people with cancer," Valentin said: " I promise you I will dedicate my life to this."
Rodolfo Valentin, a towering figure with shoulder length, jet-black hair and flair for dramatic clothing, was born in Buenos Aires and quit school to become a hairdresser at the age of 17. He apprenticed with top Argentine stylist and then went to work for the famed Alexandre de Paris, who tamed Jackie Kennedy's tresses. While he was making a name for himself in Europe, he got the call that his mother was sick and he flew home to be with her as she went through surgery and radiation. "My mother was a very beautiful woman. She looked like a movie star", he said. "One day she was very depressed and Rodolfo told her to do not be depressed, they can reconstruct the breasts," to what she answered that "it is not my breast, it is my hair. My friend reminds me every morning I have cancer."...the "friend" was the mirror.
Five years ago, Rodolfo Valentin formalized his charity by pledging to give one prosthetic away each month to a cancer patient who earn less than $ 30,000 a year. He is also campaigning to get insurance companies to cover more of the cost of prosthetics for cancer patients and gives a discount to any woman who comes in with a copy of a current mammogram. Most of his cancer clients are referred to him by oncologists who have heard about his Sofia's hair for health foundation, although survivors also spread the word.
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