Crazy Hair Day at elementary school can be an absolute pain for parents. Trying to color thick curls, staining your fingers in the process and finding glitter in your car for a week straight…These are just some of the realities for parents.
But for one young girl, seven-year-old , Crazy Hair Day this week was a little different from others.
You see, Wride was recently diagnosed with alopecia areata—an autoimmune disease that causes hair loss—and went from having shoulder-length brown hair to being completely bald in just three weeks.
So for Crazy Hair Day, this incredible little girl decided to celebrate "Crazy Head Day," and decorate her head with jeweled stickers.
The result was completely inspiring.
Wride's mom, Daniella, has been documenting her daughter's journey on . She posts amazing updates, each complete with Gianessa's bright smile and positive attitude.
Daniella spoke to about the decision behind this year's Crazy Hair Day look, and her daughter's diagnosis, which she think was triggered by stress.
“We had a stressful year, with both my husband and me out of work," she said. We also had moved from Tennessee to Utah to live with my husband’s parents, and six weeks after we arrived, my mother-in-law passed away.”
But Gianessa has embraced her new look and seems to be the happiest little girl we've ever seen.
"Last year, I styled her hair into a unicorn horn,” Daniella said.
“This year, we decided to decorate her head with stickers. She looked in the mirror and said, ‘Mom, this is awesome!'"
Gianessa's look was a hit. She won the class award for best look and her school has officially changed the title of 'Crazy Hair Day' to 'Crazy Head Day'. We can totally get behind this.
We can totally get behind this.
This was last year's look.
Daniella's Instagram page has become her place to speak candidly about her daughter's condition, and has sparked comments of support from other moms going through something similar.
When Gianessa's hair started to fall out, Daniella shared a series of photos of the progression, noting that while it was hard to watch as a mother, Gianessa was showing extraordinary strength.
A few weeks after Gianessa's hair fell out completely, her eyebrows and eyelashes started to go too. This was particularly hard on Daniella, who remembered her daughter's long lashes as a baby.
"I remember holding her as a baby and looking down at her and envying her long, lushes lashes," she wrote in one especially moving update.
"Flash forward to today and you think you're dealing with it. Then you look a little closer and realise it's just getting worse. She's losing her eyebrows and eyelashes now. Freaking rollercoaster of emotion."
We think both Daniella and Gianessa are incredibly strong, and we absolutely LOVE their idea.
We can't wait to see more 'Crazy Head Days' in Gianessa's future.
instant happy in your
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