Creating a Disney princess with cancer

Hello, my name is Shaina Wolinsky. I am 16 years and a student at Beachwood High School in Beachwood Ohio. I am writing this letter to propose a new idea. As we all know Disney princesses are something that young girls look up to. Very frequently do I hear the phrase “ I want to grow up and be a princess.” As a young girl I watched every princess movie ever to be produced and even 16 years old Disney princess remain to be one of my favorite memories of Disney tales. I loved the dresses and shoes and the animals and the beautiful hair they all had. That’s right all of them had hair not a single one of them did not have hair. I recently thought about this when one of my best friends was diagnosed with cancer and lost all of her hair. I was in her hospital room while she was receiving chemotherapy and sure enough we were watching Disney princesses movies. As we were leaving the hospital I noticed another girl she looked to be no older than 4 or 5 years old receiving chemotherapy who had also lost her hair who ironically was watching Snow White. She was crying and saying things like “ Snow white is so pretty she does not have cancer and she has hair and I am not pretty because I have cancer and I don’t have any hair.” I had never met or seen this girl and I instantly crying. I was saying to myself “ 4 year olds should not be worried about how they look it’s not a problem they need to worry about yet.” The young girls are beautiful and since young girls look up to princesses as role models why can’t there be a princess like them. One who is suffering from cancer and loosing hair. I’m sure that if they had a princess they could relate to that it would make the cancer process so much easier for them. According to http://www.cancer.gov/ they say “that In the United States in 2007, approximately 10,400 children under age 15 were diagnosed with cancer and about 1,545 children will die from the disease (1). Although this makes cancer the leading cause of death by disease among U.S. children 1 to 14 years of age, cancer is still relatively rare in this age group. On average, 1 to 2 children develop the disease each year for every 10,000 children in the United States” Let’s just say that half of those patients are young girls. So that would be 5,200 girls suffering. That’s 5,200 young beautiful girls with no one to relate to and 5,200 girls with no role models or princesses to aspire to and to relate to. That’s 5,200 to many, it is not fair that they are going fighting this terrible disease it really is not. I am trying to make it my personal mission to help them in any way I can. That is why I am proposing a new idea. What if a new princess with a new story was crated? One with cancer and one who loses her hair and yet still keeps positive and teaches a lesson. To these 5,200 girls this could change their outlook on cancer and call themselves beautiful like they are. The princess would go through a cancer journey one similar to real life cancer situations. For those 5,200 plus girls this could change their lives and make this terrible experience something positive. I want to portray the message to them that cancer is beautiful and nothing to be ashamed of. I think that if they had someone to look up to and inspire them then they would be more willing to accept themselves. I would love to help in this process because I feel very passionate about it. I hope that you will take this into consideration because it could really change the lives of many girls.