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Wig helps breast cancer survivor grow confidence: Susan Thomas talks about her experience with wigs. Georgea Kovanis/Detroit Free Press
Susan Thomas opened Susan's Special Needs, a Pleasant Ridge boutique born from her own experiences in 2000. The store carries wigs, prosthetic breasts, bras, hats, headscarves, seat belt pads, everything a woman undergoing breast cancer treatment might need — including emotional support. / Kathleen Galligan/Detroit Free Press
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Susan Thomas wasn’t sure what was worse — that her wig looked like dog fur or that it kept sliding off her head.
But this she did know: The wig, the best she could find in 1992 when she lost her hair from the chemotherapy that was part of her treatment for breast cancer, made her look like a cancer patient.
■ Related Special Section: Surviving Cancer
And people treated her differently once they knew she was sick. Instead of seeing Susan walking toward them, they saw cancer coming their way. “I had a neighbor who had a new baby,” said Thomas, who was 39 when she was diagnosed. “She wouldn’t let me hold the baby because she thought I was contagious.”
That sort of reaction, that sort of thinking can be devastating to a cancer patient.
“It makes us feel like we’re not worthy,” said Thomas, a former oncology nurse. Believing you look bad — or unlike yourself — can make you feel like you’re losing everything. That instead of getting the best of cancer, cancer is getting the best of you. That instead of beating cancer to its core, cancer is beating you — and taking away your identity with it.”
So she decided to try to change that.
A new path
At 63, Thomas, who lives in Birmingham, is cancer-free. She and her husband, 68-year-old David Thomas, own Susan’s Special Needs, a Pleasant Ridge boutique born from Susan Thomas’ experiences.
The store carries wigs, prosthetic breasts, bras, hats, headscarves, seat belt pads, everything a woman undergoing breast cancer treatment might need — including emotional support.
“As soon as I walked in the shop, I knew I was in the place for me,” said Natasha Robinette, a 42-year-old radiologist who lives on Grosse Ile and showed up at Susan’s when she first needed wigs to cover bald spots on her scalp, the result of cancer surgery.
Upon receiving her first great wig, Robinette rolled down the car windows on the drivehome
so her hair could blow in the breeze. “That, to me, was the feeling of feeling like a woman again,” Robinette said.
so her hair could blow in the breeze. “That, to me, was the feeling of feeling like a woman again,” Robinette said.
“With Susan’s efforts, work and support, I feel complete, whole and beautiful again,” Robinette said.
The store is set up more like a salon — with individual consultation rooms and beauty parlor chairs — than a place that sells medical supplies.
It doesn’t smell like sick. It doesn’t smell like despair.
Wigs in the store range from $250-$3,000. The wig fitters at Susan’s Special Needs are meticulous; they and Thomas won’t let a woman out of the door unless they think she looks fantastic — no matter how many times a wig or prosthesis needs to be adjusted.
Thomas tells the women what they can expect from treatments, what soaps might irritate their skin, what camisoles can disguise postsurgical drainage tubes. She is at once fashion consultant, cheerleader, nurse and educator.
, cheerleader, nurse and educator.
Thomas has been known to ask clients who are nervous about what is ahead of them: “Will it help you if I show you my scar?”
And when they say yes, she unbuttons her blouse and shows them.
“I share with them who I am and what we can do to make their journey easier. We can guide them through the process of talking about hair loss and what we can do to make that journey easier,” she said.
Carol Schroeder, who had a double mastectomy in September found Susan’s Special Needs after trying other stores that sell prostheses. “The thing is, people have to remember, I’ve never done it before. Otherwise, sometimes you talk to people who’ve been in the business for a long time they don’t take time to tell you or be patient enough with you.”
for a long time they don’t take time to tell you or be patient enough with you.”
But Thomas, said Schroeder, who is 66 and lives in Sterling Heights, “was very reassuring. She talks about making sure you get the right fit for what you need. ... I would I describe her as a patient, gentle perfectionist. She just answers all your questions.”
A shocking biopsy
Susan Thomas was in the shower, doing her routine self-exam when she felt a lump in her left breast.
As a nurse who worked with cancer patients, she knew she needed to see a doctor.
As a woman, a wife, a mother of two young girls facing the potentialof a life-altering diagnosis, Thomas chose to believe the doctor when he said the lump was probably just a cyst and she should simply monitor it.
of a life-altering diagnosis, Thomas chose to believe the doctor when he said the lump was probably just a cyst and she should simply monitor it.
Within six months, the lump had gotten larger. In May 1992, a biopsy came back: cancer.
“We were all shocked,” said Thomas, who was 39 at the time. “I do not have a family history of breast cancer. I was young. I didn’t know anybody else who was diagnosed with breast cancer.”
Thomas had surgery, followed by chemotherapy.
When her hair began falling out in clumps, she and her husband checked into the Townsend Hotel in Birmingham, ran a bath, got in the tub and pulled out the rest of her hair. They went to dinner.
“He poured me a glass of champagne and said ‘Here’s to the future.’ He took me down to the Rugby Grill and I put on my wig for the first time. It looked awful. It wasn’t fitted to my head. It moved. I was sitting here, I got a new outfit. I sat there and thought, ‘Oh my God, this is awful! I can’t walk around looking like this!’ ”
The more she thought about the situation, about what was available for women undergoing breast cancer treatment, the more disgusted she became.
“This is ridiculous,” David Thomas said, finally. “We’re changing this!” They started a wholesale business in 1993, transitioned into retail in 2000.
Along the way, Susan Thomas has made many friends and lost many of those friends to cancer.
“The emotional purge and support I receive at Susan’s explains the smile on my face as I’m leaving,” said Robinette, who visited the shop last weekend for a wig fitting. “These things have no price tag. They are not on Susan’s website or product inventory list.”
Said Thomas: “I love what I do. It’s just not a business. It’s more my ministry. This is more to me than selling a wig. This is hoping to change the journey.
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