Stunning hair makeover highlights debilitating effect of depression
When a 16-year-old girl dealing with severe depression walked into Kayley Olsson's salon with unruly hair, it left her heartbroken.
The girl's story encouraged Olsson, from Iowa (US) to post a powerful message on Facebook to highlight people's struggle with mental health issues.
In the Facebook post, Olsson writes, "Today I had one of the hardest experiences with my client."
She revealed the girl, who has been battling depression for years, has been left beaten. "She got to the point where she felt so down and so worthless she couldn't even brush her hair, she told me she only got up to use the restroom," Olsson said.
The only reason the girl, who remains anonymous, showed up to get her hair done was because he was starting school and had to get her picture taken.
At first, Olsson revealed the suffering teen wanted them to chop it all off because she couldn't "deal with the pain of combing it out".
"MENTAL HEALTH is a thing, it effects people all around the world and of all ages!" Olsson stressed. Adding, "A CHILD should NEVER feel so worthless to not even want to brush their hair."
After a combined total of 13 hours, Olsson and her team were able to transform her hair, which made the "beautiful girl smile".
The young girl's parting words to Olsson: "I will actually smile for my school’s pictures today, you made me feel like me again."
Olsson received a lot of love from Facebook users for helping the teen. "You did a brilliant job and just being there for her and listening to her would of made a difference," said one user.
Another wrote: "Sometimes it just takes one act of kindness to push all the bad away inside the head of someone who suffers for mental illness.”
Many others also wished the young girl well with whatever challenges she is facing. "Sending prayers for this young lady to overcome whatever it may be that's hurting her so deeply," an individual said.
The Facebook post has been 126,000 times and shared 56,808.
Read Olsson's entire post here:
