The thread of life connects us all.
It's delicate. Easy to break.
These women are making it a little stronger.
"If I can put that out there and it helps one person...that's all I need to do," Sandy Shull said.
Shull has her job.
"I am cutting patterns for the turbans," she said.
Donna Brozovich has her's.
"I am going through the jewelry that was donated to us," Brozovich said.
She picks them. Sally Smith sticks them. She places the decorations on a hat.
"We used to call them do-rags and we thought 'No, that doesn't sound too good'," Smith said. "So, we changed the names to Courage Caps."
You might not see it yet just how special these hats are.
You will.
Soon, you'll see what Kathy Braidich saw five years ago when she started The Turban Project. It was when she first offered to make one for a co-worker with cancer.
"I didn't even sew," Braidich said. "So, I had to learn to sew."
One. Then, another. Then, another. Word-of-mouth turned mentions into conversations. The business grew. Soon, Braidich started seeing donations and volunteers.
"It just bloomed," Braidich said.
It bloomed into what it is today; a group of women meeting once-a-month at the St. Peter and Paul Retreat Center in Newark. It's where they create Courage Caps, turbans and other head wear for cancer patients. For those people going through tough times. Devastating times.
"A doctor sat across from them and said 'You have breast cancer'," Smith said. "And, that's how they say it. There's no sugar-coating."
Their creations are in 24 hospitals and oncology centers in central Ohio. These women are making it easier for patients to heal. To hope.
Patients like Amy Widner.
Widner has been coming to Mount Carmel East since April. That's when they found it.
"I have Invasive Ductal Carcinoma of my left breast," she said.
Breast cancer.
Since then, she's gone through surgery, chemo and radiation. It's been tough. No 47-year-old wants to lose their hair.
"I still can't do the whole bald look," she said. "I wish I could."
She doesn't have to. She has them. She has a lot of them.
"I'm kind of embarrassed because I've raided them twice," Widner said laughing.
It's just a hat, you might think. No. No, it's not.
"Just knowing that I don't look sick at that moment in time that's real important," Widner said. "Because, there are a lot of days that I don't look well or feel well."
It's a feeling. A mindset. A pick-me-up. Given by volunteers who are happy to give it.
Volunteers who get it.
"It's just hearing the word," Smith said. "If they'd have told me I had the flu, or, ya know...big deal."
It's a big deal: The Big C.
It's true what they say: It affects us all.
"I had gone for my yearly mammogram and they found it," Smith said.
The embellishers. The cloth cutters.
"I can envision that day for the rest of my life when I got the phone call," Shull said.
They know what it's like to hear that news and to have that feeling.
"And, I stepped around [the mammogram machine] to see what it looked like and went 'Oh, goodness'," Trudy Wright said. "There was something there."
"I was diagnosed with breast cancer in June of last year," Brozovich said.
Not just them, but also those close to them.
"My sister-in-law was diagnosed with cancer two months after me and she passed away 16 weeks later," Brozovich said.
"My mother-in-law passed away 12 years ago with breast cancer," Braidich said.
We all know someone who's no longer here.
"My mother had lymphoma," Smith said. "And, it took her."
The faces remind us of who we've lost.
It's hard. It's emotional.
"It's very emotional," Shull said.
Shull has non-hodgkin's lymphoma. She's in remission, but her disease is not curable.
"Mine will return," she said. "Guaranteed."
Yet, here she is volunteering for others. It's because she gets it.
"And, [patients] are going to say 'Somebody thought of me, somebody cares what I'm going through'," she said.
It's why they do it. It's why they take a second to stop and remember to appreciate how they can help and why they should.
"God gives you talent," Wright said. "You use what He gives you."
"I just felt that this was where I needed to be," Brozovich said. "To help other people."
"I feel if I can help other patients that's the least I can do because I know what it feels like to be in that position," Shull said.
The thread of life connects us all. It's appreciated.
"To be able to have such beautiful things for free, it's just wonderful," Widner said.
But, it's the heart of life that always brings us together.
In five years, The Turban Project has created almost 11,000 pieces of head ware for cancer patients. You can find more information on The Turban Project, and how you can get involved, by clicking here.