My daughter Naya is only eight, but I swear she’s got more heart than most adults I know. About two years ago, after watching a video about kids with cancer, she got it in her head that she wanted to donate her hair. No prompting, no pushing—just pure Naya.

She told me, “Some kids lose their hair and can’t buy wigs. I wanna help.” And that was that.

She’s been growing it ever since. Through tangles, summer heat, bad hair days, and other kids making fun of her “witch hair,” she never once changed her mind.

A couple months ago, we hit the mark—12 inches. We made a little celebration of it. Took pictures, bought a silly headband for after the cut, and I reached out to the nonprofit myself to make sure we followed all their guidelines.

The appointment was supposed to be next week.

But then… something happened at school.

I picked Naya up on Friday and saw she was wearing her hoodie way up, even though it was warm out. She kept her head down in the car. I thought maybe she was just tired or had a rough day.

But when we got home, she finally pulled the hood down.

Her hair was gone. Like… almost completely gone. Uneven, hacked off in patches. I couldn’t even process it at first. She just looked at me and said, “Ms. Trent said it was a distraction during class.”

I thought maybe she was joking. Or exaggerating. But nope. There was a note in her folder—some vague excuse about “addressing hygiene” and “classroom decorum.”

I’m not even sure what to do next.

I stood in my living room, trying to hold it together while I stared at Naya’s jagged, uneven haircut. One side stuck out more than the other, as if someone had simply grabbed a chunk of hair and hacked it off in a hurry. My heart pounded in my chest, a mix of anger and heartbreak. This was the hair that she had cared for so diligently, all because she wanted to help kids with cancer have a wig of their own.