Nashville actress Clare Bowen cuts off hair to show young girl she can still be a princess

Bowen survived kidney cancer as a child

Clare Bowen (Getty Images)

An actress who survived cancer as a child has cut her hair off to show a sick young girl that she can still be a princess without it.

Clare Bowen was diagnosed with end stage nephroblastoma, cancer of the kidney, when she was just four years old. Against all odds, Bowen’s treatment was successful and she went on to play the character of Scarlett in the popular US drama Nashville.

Bowen discussed her bleak diagnosis and remarkable recovery after cutting all of her hair off, in a Facebook post entitled: “It’s just hair”.

She described her early memories of playing with children in hospitals who, like her, were “all missing parts, some obvious like eyes or legs, others more hidden, like lungs and kidneys”.

Bowen wrote: “When I was four years old, I asked my mother: ‘Are there heaters in Heaven?’

“I had just been diagnosed with end stage nephroblastoma, after several visits to a GP who denied anything was wrong and dubbed my parents ‘paranoid.' I'd overheard the doctors telling my family that the only hope of saving me, was an experimental treatment that might kill me anyway. But without it I had maybe two weeks left. The hospital was cold. I'd never felt air conditioning before.”

Bowen was moved to chop off her long locks after hearing about another child who was upset after having to do the same.

“I was really inspired when I heard a story about a little girl who said she couldn't be a princess because she didn't have long hair. I wanted her and others like her to know that's not what makes a princess, or a warrior, or a superhero. It's not what makes you beautiful either. It's your insides that count… even if you happen to be missing half of them.”

Bowen said she cut off her hair after being given the go-ahead from ABC and Nashville’s creator, Callie Khouri.

“Every scar tells a story," she wrote. "Every baldhead, every dark circle, every prosthetic limb, and every reflection in a mirror that you might not recognise anymore. Look deeper than skin, hair, nails, and lips. You are who you are in your bones. That is where you have the potential to shine the brightest from. It is where your true beautiful self lives.”