Find A Youth Mentor

Hi I’m Janitha! I am from Tulsa, Oklahoma but I currently reside in Dallas, TX. I am an elementary school music teacher and have had the pleasure of teaching for the past 6 years! I enjoy all things music but a few of my other hobbies are reading, running, and thrifting! My journey with Alopecia begins at the age of 2 right before entering into elementary. My mother told me that my hair began to fall out in clumps all over my head and that they took me to the doctor where I was diagnosed with having Alopecia. Because I was so young my parents decided against the steroids to possibility regrow my hair. My parents decided to start me out with wearing wigs which they quickly learned would not work for me after I returned home one day after school with the wig in my backpack. I made the bravest decision and decided to not hide my bald head and went to school without wigs. The constant scrutiny and name calling left me feeling alone growing up. I didn’t believe there were others like me because I never saw them growing up. Over the years I became comfortable in my skin and with my features to the point that I forget that I am bald. At times I still struggle with the trauma from my childhood but I truly believe it has shaped me into the amazing person I am today. I was thrilled to find out about this mentoring program because I know that this program would have done wonders for me as a child growing up with Alopecia. I would be honored to be your mentor and help you navigate through all the ups and downs of having Alopecia. I look forward to hearing from you soon!

Hi! I was born and raised in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and despite my lifelong denial that I would go to college in Central PA, I ended up here anyway. I am currently a senior at Bucknell University studying International Relations and Spanish. In my free time, I’m on the Division I Women’s Rowing Team here, and I LOVE to watch ice hockey (Go Caps!). I was diagnosed with alopecia areata when I was young, but only lost patches of my hair or eyebrows. However, during my freshman year of college, I lost all my hair in a three-week span. However, that hasn’t deterred me from things like being a collegiate athlete or studying abroad in Spain for four months. After trying every treatment in the book, I decided to stop about a year ago, until I recently started taking Xeljanz, and miraculously, my hair is coming back (for now at least!). Alopecia has taught me so much about myself and I really believe it’s made me incredibly strong because of it. I have had the support of my awesome teammates, family, and friends to help me. Over the past three years, I’ve learned to embrace my alopecia as something that has given, instead of taken away from me. My first NAAF conference was in Summer 2016 in D.C., and it was an awesome experience! I love talking to anyone and everyone and look forward to helping however I can. I can talk with you about treatment, wigs, and living a super active life with alopecia. Or, we can talk about why the Caps are the best hockey team in the world, books, travelling, future plans, or anything else!