From the time she got married in September 2021, Kenya Appling had looked forward to having a child.
That dream was crushed four months after her wedding when Appling, 42, was diagnosed with uterine cancer and, at the advice of her doctor, underwent a hysterectomy, as well as chemotherapy and radiation.
“It was really devastating. I could not come to terms with it for a while,” she said of the diagnosis. “Immediately after surgery, I kind of locked myself off. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I did not want to be around anyone, even though I knew that I needed help, because I couldn’t do a lot of things on my own. It was really heartbreaking.”
Appling, who says her doctor told her she did not have any established risk factors before her diagnosis, believes the cancer was caused by harmful ingredients in the chemical hair straighteners she had used monthly since childhood.
She is among thousands of Black women who have sued L’Oréal, Revlon and other makers of chemical hair straighteners, alleging the companies’ products caused them irreparable harm and serious injury.
Chief among those injuries for many of them is the devastating loss of the ability to have children.
“I still have moments to this day where I wonder what it would have been like just to be pregnant, just to feel the kick of a baby,” Appling said. “And I’ll forever have those moments for the rest of my life.”
Studies associate relaxers with higher cancer risk
Concern about the health risks associated with chemical hair straighteners has grown over the last year since the National Institutes of Health released a study that found that women who used them frequently were more than twice as likely to develop uterine cancer as those who did not. Chemicals in the hair products, like parabens and phthalates, disrupt the hormone-regulating endocrine system, researchers said.
A similar study released this month by researchers at Boston University found that postmenopausal Black women who reported long-term use of chemical hair relaxers were at increased risk of uterine cancer.