'I'm not brave, they are': Imogen, 7, from Paston to donate hair to Little Princess Trust on day after eighth birthday

“Daddy, I’m going to have my hair cut off for the little girls so they can smile again,” these are the words of Imogen Dance.

The seven-year-old – who has always shied away from her hairdresser mum cutting an inch off her hair – is now having her long locks cut off for charity.

Imogen, from Crabtree, asked her mum, Jade-Alice Neal, one day about a picture of a poorly girl breathing, using the aid of chemotherapy tubes.

“Mummy, why has she got no hair?” Imogen asked Jade-Alice.

Jade explained to Imogen that the tubes were something the little girl needed because of the cancer she was fighting.

“She said ‘mummy, children should not have cancer’ and I said ‘they shouldn’t but it’s something we can’t help’. This young girl is left with no hair because of the chemotherapy she’s experiencing.”

After researching how they could help – Imogen saw lots of little girls donating their hair.

Jade-Alice told the Peterborough Telegraph: “She turned round and said ‘mum I have loads of hair, I can give it away’.”

“At this point I looked at her and I started tearing up.”

Imogen, who has not often let her mum cut her hair since she was a tot, has now asked for a chic bob cut.

“I asked ‘are you sure?” Jade-Alice said. “And, she said ‘yes’, she was so stuck with the idea that she told her nanny, granddads, aunties and my partner.

“She went up to my partner and he cried. She said ‘daddy I’m going to cut my hair for the little girl so she can smile again.’

“And as soon as I heard that and looked over to my husband and said ‘wow Imogen you’re brave’ and she said’ I’m not brave they’re brave’.”

The average cost of making a wig at the Little Princess Trust is £550 while the additional fitting and styling costs mean the average sum of providing one wig is £700.

Real hair wigs have been given to children, free of charge, since 2005 when the charity was started in memory of Hannah Tarplee.

Awareness of The Little Princess Trust’s free wig provision service has grown – and it is now providing about 2,000 wigs every year.

Each Little Princess Trust wig is hand-knotted in a process that can take up to 60 hours.

The wigs are available to anyone in the UK and Ireland up to the age of 24 who has lost their hair through cancer treatment or to other conditions.

Imogen has so-far raised £264 [at the time of writing] and is having her hair cut on 9 July, one day after her eighth birthday so she has one more birthday with her long hair.

Jade-Alice said of Crabtree: Everyone hears the bad about that place but no one hears the good things that are happening. There’s a young girl who lives in the area and she’s something quite special.”

Click on her JustGiving page to donate and hit her £500 milestone.