Tanieka Randall is our DOZ Show Preferred Guest for this issue of DOZ Magazine. She is an entrepreneur, bestselling author, international inspirational speaker, and cancer survivor. She is the creator of the revolutionary natural hair care line, Tees Hair Secret. In 2011, she was diagnosed with cancer and exposure to chemotherapy left her completely bald and feeling depressed. But she didn’t give up; she began to research ways to regrow her hair and having regrown her hair, she created Tees Hair Secret.
Tanieka’s products have helped women all over the globe to grow healthy hair without using harsh chemicals, and she teaches women how to achieve their healthy hair goals by becoming more knowledgeable and active in their hair care. Her ultimate goal is to help millions of women discover their potential and confidently walk in their God-given purpose. In this interview, Tanieka shares her incredible story of battles and victories and purpose birth in adversity.
As you read, be inspired for more.
Please share with us your journey from the time you were diagnosed with cancer to the time that you became cancer-free.
Well, what happened was, it’s crazy because when I was diagnosed with cancer, I was in my last two weeks of nursing school. I remember going to the doctor before I was diagnosed; I just knew something was off. I remember going to the doctor and telling the doctor that I just don’t feel right, I feel that something’s wrong, I feel like I’m hyperventilating all the time, I can feel my heart racing, and I feel weak. And I noticed that I ate some food, I had food poisoning, well, me and my kids did, but it seemed like it took longer for me to get better than they did. They were sick for a couple of days, but me, it took two weeks for me to get over that stomach bug, so I went to the doctor, and he told me, oh, it’s just school stress, you’re anxious, and it’s just stress from nursing school. And I’m like okay. But a week later, I was feeling worse, and my wrists were hurting, and I couldn’t even bend my hand, and my joints and my feet were swelling up. So, I went and got a second opinion, and I told him, something doesn’t feel right, my doctor told me it was nothing, but he didn’t even do lab work, he didn’t do anything, he just listened to me talk. And then, this doctor did all the things that my doctor should have done; he ran the lab tests, he did all the diagnostic tests that my doctor who I’d been seeing for years, didn’t do. And he sent me home. And it wasn’t even two hours after leaving that he called me and said, Tanieka, we have your results, and you need to go to the ER like right now. And so, when I went to the ER, they did a bone marrow biopsy, they never gave me blood though even though he kept saying that I was anaemic and that they needed to give me blood, but they didn’t give me blood, they did the bone marrow biopsy, and that was a Friday. And I stayed in the hospital all day Friday, the whole weekend until the next Tuesday morning. And that Tuesday morning, that’s when they came in and said, all your results are back, and it shows that you have leukaemia. And the kind of leukaemia that I had it was very aggressive, it moves fast; it attacks and breaks down your body fast, and it can kill you really fast. I had to rush to another hospital for chemo that same night. They did tell me that if I had let this go for another two weeks, I would have been dead. So, we started chemo that same night. And thank God, that was April 19th, when my chemo started and I spent that whole summer, basically from April 19th, my last round of chemo was August I spent that whole summer in hospital. The first time I was in the hospital for five weeks before I was able to go home, I stayed home a week, and then I went back for another month. So, it was just like back and forth, getting chemo. But in all of that time, because I am a woman of faith, if I wasn’t in my books studying because I was still determined to finish school, I was reading my Bible or reading up on scripture and doing all of that stuff to help get me through.
By the time you were cancer-free, you had lost your hair due to the rounds of chemotherapy that you were exposed to. As a woman, what was it like not to have your hair?
Oh my God, that was really hard for me, especially, because I was like a self-professed hair fanatic. I was obsessed with my hair, maybe a little too much, and so I was always worried about my hair and even as a young child, I always had long hair that was like halfway down my back or more. But as a teen, I started messing over my hair and messing it up, frying it, dying it, but before I got diagnosed, I was actually back on track for that last year making my hair healthy again, and so my hair was like halfway down my back, natural, no perm. And so when I got diagnosed, I remember one time talking to my mum and I remember her saying, oh, you know, I know how it feels. Because I was complaining and upset that my hair was falling off, and she was like, I know how it feels I know what you’re going through and I remember I got angry and I was like, you don’t know. No, you don’t know, because it’s not your hair falling off. I felt it hurt me more that I was going bald then knowing that I had cancer. Because I always told people, no matter what, God is going to take care of me, I’m going to get through cancer, but God’s not worried about my hair, like my hair’s falling out. I was really hurt that I was losing my hair. I was really sad and depressed about that, not even about having cancer but losing my hair was a big thing for me.
You began to research ways to regrow your hair, and that led you to create Sweet Soaps and Suds LLC developing Tees Hair Secret your natural hair care brand. Please share with us that journey and tell us, why did you feel the need to create your own hair products, were there no products on the market that could meet your need?
Even before being diagnosed, I really was like on a mission to find stuff for my hair because there are hair products out there, but it never works how exactly I needed it to be. I always felt there could be something better, so I was always mixing up the shea butter and the different oils, trying to find out oils that worked for hair, but I was also doing all kinds of crazy stuff too, but when I got diagnosed I really started paying attention to the ingredients that are inside some of the commercial products, and I realised that I didn’t want to use some of those products on my hair just looking into how they were made and how some people say some of these things can cause cancer and all of that. I didn’t want to use them no more. So, I started going to the more natural route with just the butter and the oils, but I never knew it could become something. And so, in 2014, I actually was watching the news segment, and in the news segment, they were talking about how to make a natural shampoo bar to help with hair growth, and I was like, oh, let me figure out how to make this for my mum because my mum had been complaining about her hair. I am such a creative person, I always like making stuff, so I went from making that one shampoo bar to also making body scrubs, and different soaps and everything and I posted it on Facebook. When I posted it on Facebook, people were like, oh my God, are you selling this? And even though I wasn’t, I said, oh yeah I am, and that was actually the start of all this because people actually asked for it and I was like, oh I guess I need to make more of this stuff. And people were like, okay we love all of this, but we need hair products, and I had this oil that I did make years ago when I was going through chemo, and I was like, you know what? I have this hair oil that I’ve been using. And so, I introduced that to my audience, and then I started learning how to make the conditioners and the shampoos and the daily moisturisers, and that’s how Tees Hair Secret was created. And the crazy thing about that is like six months before I created my brand, I remember telling my husband, I think I would like to have a haircare business, but I don’t think I would be able to make those products. And I remember telling him that I would have to private label them, you know, get somebody else to make them and then I’ll just slap my name on it. And I remember telling that to him, and God is so awesome because even though I had already spoken away from it, like I wasn’t able to, He showed me that, you know, I didn’t intentionally go out to create it, but He put me into making it by me starting to do something for somebody else to show me that it was in me to create my own products, I didn’t have to go the private label route.
What impact have your products had since creation?
Oh wow. The impact has been really good. I have customers not only in the US but also I have customers that have purchased my products in different parts of Africa, in the UK, and on many different continents I have people that purchase the product, and I get really good feedback from them, a lot of ladies always tell me not only are the products helping them with growing out their hair, but a lot of us struggle with hair dryness and breaking, so the products also help with that – to keep their hair moisturised and strengthened at the same time. And I try to encourage ladies, to be healthy as far as eating goes and their diets; I also talk to people about that too.
Where can people get them to buy?
My products are available online right now at teeshairsecret.com, and I’m also on Instagram, it’s the same name, Teeshairsecret and there’s a link in my bio that will bring them right to that website, and I’m also on Facebook under the same name.
As a woman who is a cancer survivor, what advice do you have for any woman who may be diagnosed with cancer?
Well my advice is, if you’re a woman of faith like I am, and I’m also an Oncology RN and what I’ve noticed is that it seems like the patients that have faith and have something that they’re holding onto and relying on, I feel that those are the patients that do better. So, I feel like, if you have faith, please don’t let what you see on the outside, don’t let what you’re being told by the doctor, shake your faith. Hold on to that faith, pray about it and talk to God about it and let Him truly be that comfort and know that it’s not always the end and though I know that everybody does not survive cancer but a lot of people do and no matter what the outside feels don’t let that determine how you’re feeling day-to-day. We’re all going to have our moments, we’re all going to have those times when we’re going to feel down and cry, but don’t stay there, don’t stay feeling sad, having pity or feeling sorry for yourself, because, at the end of the day, we can’t control what happens in the end, but just try to be the best that you can be while you’re going through. And I promise that when you try to keep a better positive attitude, it helps you out in so many ways versus feeling down and just staying stuck in that darkness.
