Given only a 17% chance of beating lung cancer, Kathy DeJoseph found solace in a single expression of kindness: a knitted cap.
Now, 13 years after her diagnosis, DeJoseph and a small army of volunteers are doing their part to help people fight cancer, one stitch at a time.
Together, they’ve knitted 44,000 and counting “Happy Caps” for people facing cancer – and very likely hair loss – hoping a handmade cap will mean to them what it did to DeJoseph.
A successful businesswoman, DeJoseph was starting chemotherapy when a nurse presented her with the gift of a hand-knitted cap. The cap, the nurse said, was made by the wife of a cancer patient whom DeJoseph had befriended the previous week as the two were starting down the scary chemo road.
“I never wore a hat. I’m not a hat person,” DeJoseph said. “But it struck me in a really big way that this lady had done that.”
Credit: Phil Skinner
Credit: Phil Skinner
This seemingly small expression of gratitude from a woman whom DeJoseph had never met inspired her in 2015 to learn to knit and pay it forward with “Happy Caps.”
Realizing the need was too big for her to tackle alone, she began recruiting other knitters, seamstresses and crocheters to join in this labor of love.
“It’s just had a life of its own,” DeJoseph of Acworth said. “I had caps all over my dining room, the guest room and later the basement.”
At one point, as many as 200 – mostly older women who either had cancer or lost a friend or family member to the disease – were making “Happy Caps,” including Sherry Engelken of Marietta.
“Everybody, unfortunately, has somebody with cancer,” said Engelken, one of DeJoseph’s first volunteers.
Credit: Special to The AJC
Credit: Special to The AJC
She took up making the hats after her 42-year-old niece died of breast cancer, leaving two young daughters.
Volunteers meet once, if not twice a week, in space provided by Wellstar Healthcare System. The caps take a few hours to make. They are carefully inspected before being delivered to a hospital or cancer center, mainly in the Wellstar system.
A handwritten note offering words of encouragement is attached to each cap.
“It’s therapy for us,” said Engelken, who had personally made 2,600 caps by mid-February. “You just don’t get tired of doing it.”
Bill Mayfield, DeJoseph’s cancer doctor, said Wellstar patients saw DeJoseph’s giving spirit long before they were covering their heads with her caps.
In her cancer journey, DeJoseph had been impressed by Wellstar’s STAT cancer clinic, where several cancer experts collaborate on a plan for a patient’s care and then meet with the patient and the family on the same day to discuss the options and answer questions.
DeJoseph “donated thousands of hours to the clinic and to reassuring cancer patients about their journey,” Mayfield said. “She has this heart, and she really became an indispensable part of the STAT clinic.”
Credit: Phil Skinner
Credit: Phil Skinner
Later, watching her organize the volunteers to make the “Happy Caps” was “awesome,” the doctor said.
“It was one of those: ‘Let’s-just-make-the-world-a-better-place kind of endeavors,’” he said. “The fact that she made this another of her life’s missions is remarkable. She is a force of nature.”
Candice L. Saunders, president and CEO of Wellstar, shares Mayfield’s high opinion of DeJoseph.
“Kathy is such an inspiration,” Saunders said. “The compassionate work she and the ‘Happy Caps’ volunteers do to bring comfort and cheerfulness to cancer patients is truly making a difference.”
DeJoseph is now embarking on yet another mission. At age 73, she believes it’s time she finds someone younger, likely in their 50s or 60s, to take over running “Happy Caps.”
“I don’t want it to go away,” she said.
Credit: Phil Skinner
Credit: Phil Skinner
Her doctor couldn’t agree more.
“Having someone like Kathy and the ladies she works with engage these patients, both in the clinics and through ‘Happy Caps,’ helps put some light into that dark tunnel,” Mayfield said. “They give context, and they give hope, and that’s what you need when you’ve got cancer.”
HOW TO HELP
If you would like to see Happy Caps at your cancer center, let your hospital know . Or, if you would like to start a Happy Caps group in your area, go to contact@happycaps.us or visit happycaps.us.
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