Wig maker who beat cancer gives others head start to recovery
ACANCER survivor and wig maker has pledged to help fellow patients as part of a new Cancer Research UK campaign.
Maria Lawal, who lives with her husband and 18-month-old son in Rochdale, was diagnosed with osteosarcoma in 2008 aged 15 after a scan found a tumour on her left leg.
Born in Nigeria, Maria is now fit and healthy and runs a business making wigs for chemotherapy patients.
Now, the 28-year-old is urging people across Greater Manchester to give regularly to Cancer Research UK to help fund long term research projects that could drive new breakthroughs. She said: “If it wasn’t for the research I wouldn’t be here today. I set myself up as a regular giver to Cancer Research UK as soon as I was earning my own money so that I could give something back.
“I like helping in my own little way, it feels good, and I know I am helping someone else like me have a new lease of life.
“I can’t physically make a wig for everyone in the world, as much as I would love to, but I think of regular giving as my way of doing something for everyone.”
Maria was a young athlete in training when a ‘muscle strain’ in her leg lead to a life-changing cancer diagnosis.
She went from playing sport most days after school to scheduling her life around surgery and chemotherapy sessions, after being diagnosed with osteosarcoma - a form of bone cancer.
Following her own experience Maria set up a business making wigs in a wide variety of colours for women and girls like her who had lost their hair due to cancer treatments.
The entrepreneur also began offering makeup tutorials for women whose skin had been affected during chemotherapy and recently she even wrote her first children’s book. “I was so shocked when they told 15-year-old me that I had cancer,” she said.
“I was the first person in my family to have cancer and I couldn’t understand why it had happened to me when I was young and so fit and healthy.
“Battling through this hard time at such a young age tested my family and me so much.
“I still wear my wigs; I love having a choice of colour each day.
“I started making them so that women and girls like me felt they had a better choice and to help them to feel good inside and out.
“I wanted girls to look in the mirror and feel like themselves and not like a cancer patient in a wig.”
Maria added that she owes her life to improved treatments and is determined to help more people like her survive.
She said: “If I had been diagnosed with cancer twenty years ago, the outcome might not have been the same for me and that’s down to research.
“Thanks to research I have been able to grow up and get married and have a family.
“By making a monthly donation to Cancer Research UK, people across Greater Manchester could help give hope to many more families like mine and invest in long term research that could save lives for generations to come.”
For further information about Cancer Research UK’S work or to find out how to support the charity, call 0300 123 1022 or visit www.cancerresearchuk.org.
“I like helping in my own little way.”