This past Friday (Sept. 5), a young lad from the Shawville area donated his recently trimmed mane and a whopping $1,650 cheque to the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO). 

Five-year-old Irving Rusenstrom is starting kindergarten this year and had never had a haircut before in his life, explained his mother Tara Taylor. She added he had some inspiration from his big brother, who had his cut at the Relay for Life.

 “Well, he’s never had a haircut before and so we’ve always just talked about doing a haircut before he starts school,” she said. “Despite taking a lot of flack over the years for the length of his hair and you know, having long hair as a boy, this is what he decided to do and actually his older brother Pierce did the same thing when he was five.”

Taylor said they didn’t have a connection to the hospital, they just wanted to make his haircut meaningful and said that staff told her the donation would go towards the hospital’s oncology unit. She shared the link on social media mid-summer and in just a few weeks blew past their initial fundraising goal of $1,000. She said that people had been giving Irving a hard time about the locks trailing down to his mid-back for a while and it was a perfect opportunity for those who made comments to put their money where their mouths were. 

“We kind of looked at it like, he’s taken a lot of flack so if anyone wants to support his haircut, now is your time to back up the words you’ve been using all these years,” she said. 

Taylor said the foundation staff were wonderful with her son when they went down on Sept. 5. 

“They like to present the child with a photo and a little gift and the large cheque, just to make it an experience for them I think,” she said. “They were fantastic. I mean, he’s five so I’m not sure what all he understood.  [ . . . ] He was just so excited about the whole experience because everyone’s made it such a big deal for him, you know?”

Taylor added that the link to donate is still open on the CHEO foundation’s website.