'Youngest UT grad' donating 'cap-wigs' to cancer patients
For Natasha Verma, there's really nothing she can't handle. She graduated from UT at just 17-years-old, making her the University's youngest grad.
She knew journalism was in her future.
“I interned at Fox, that was my first TV internship ever,” Verma said.
After FOX 7, Verma got her Masters from Columbia, produced a feature-length documentary called “Hardy” -- now she's a morning reporter at NBC in Boston. “I get up at 2 in the morning. I woke up and I felt this shooting pain down my left arm, it was kind of like a nerve type of pain,” she said.
She thought it was just a gym injury...her doctor prescribed pain meds.
“When I was off them, I still felt that pain and I still felt that lump. it hadn't shrunk and both of my grandparents had Cancer, one of them did pass away on my dad's side so it was an understandable concern,” she said.
Verma went to another doctor she says nearly dismissed her concerns.
But she insisted on an ultrasound. “He did and he came back into the examination room and the color was just drained from his face and at the point he's like 'you may have Lymphoma.'"
Six chemo treatments later, she's doing much better.
“I’m in remission and when I looked at my last scan it looks like I don't have Cancer so right now it looks really good and I still have a scan pending but my oncologist is very positive and confident that that scan is going to show negative as well,” Verma said.
But one of the chemo side-effects she's still dealing with is hair loss. “What I’m wearing is a wig so right now I just have a buzzcut, so hair is actually coming back,” Verma said.
During her treatments, Natasha says she would just put a baseball cap on over her wig.
“I wore that all for five months and then I realized you know it would be so cool to make something that's a cap with hair attached to it that doesn't have the wig on top so it's soft to your scalp, it's already ready to wear you just throw it on,” she said.
Through the Verma Foundation, Natasha is creating custom “cap wigs” of 100% human hair.
Through fundraising and financial donations, the caps will be given free of charge to women and children facing Cancer after filling out an application on the foundation's website.
“A lot of women have to fork over $2,000 to get a wig that looks good,” Verma said.
Verma says orders are being processed now and they've been inundated with requests which is a good problem to have. “It’s so much more than just hair, it's giving a patient confidence, beauty, support and strength to continue with that treatment,” Verma said.