Hiett’s hair, or lack thereof, does not define her beauty
She stays busy with school and cheer, friends and family, and may appear to be just like any other 16-year-old girl, but Alison Hiett, a junior Blackhawk cheerleader, is not just “any other 16-year-old girl.”
“I just like to hype people up. I like to make sure that people know that the thing they’re being insecure about doesn’t exist,” Alison said, smiling with a twinkle in her eyes that belied the common misconception that joy or happiness are the result of external circumstances. Hiett is bald.
No, she doesn’t have cancer.
No, she isn’t making a political statement.
That statement was put on a T-shirt for her by her grandmother not long after she began losing her hair because so many people assumed she had lost her hair from chemotherapy.
The week after Mother’s Day 2015, Alison noticed a bald spot on the back of her head. She said she didn’t say anything to her parents for a couple of weeks, then told her mother who didn’t believe her.
“I took Nicholas (her younger brother) and got him to look at it. He agreed … she looked and started freaking out,” Alison said teasingly.
The daughter of Chasity and Lee Hiett, Alison is the oldest of three children. She shows the maturity of a firstborn and tries to alleviate her parents’ stress and concerns for her.
“It was a long time ago,” she recalled. “I was pretty much unfazed by it.
“It was kind of them, their stress was kind of on me,” she said, noting that her parents were more concerned about it than she was.
“We googled it that night,” Lee said, adding that the first doctor to whom they took her tried to say it was the result of Alison pulling her hair out from nervousness.
Chasity said the doctor referred them to a dermatologist who diagnosed Alopecia Areata.
Alison said she continued attending cheer practice all summer and by the time school had started, most of her friends knew about it. As more and more clumps of hair fell out, she and her parents decided to shave her head.
“There was no use in keeping it. We bought a wig but I’ve only worn it twice,” she laughed. “I’m sure my head is too big now.”