Heart Felt Pillow Project
NEW – Heartfelt pillow project – Bilateral mastectomy pillow
The heartfelt pillow project has expanded to include pillows to support women undergoing a bilateral mastectomy. These pillows lay across the chest and tuck under both arms to offer padding across all incision sites (over both sides of the chest and both under arms). They also help lift both arms away from the sides and keeps drainage tubes away from the skin without having to juggle multiple pillows, making it more comfortable to rest your hands on your body while you’re sleeping without worrying about bumping a tender incision. Because the pillows hug around your body, they are useful to add some padding when touching / hugging loved ones, especially children, who sometimes need a reminder to be careful.
The bilateral mastectomy pillow project was started by a 42-year-old breast cancer survivor and her community. After seven tough months of chemo, lumpectomy, sentinel node biopsy, and radiation she wanted to find a way to give back and to support those women just beginning their own journeys. Surprised by her own surgical recovery time, she focused on helping others going through even harder surgeries. Her first pillow was made for a dear friend, who found the pillow useful and comforting during recovery – the bilateral mastectomy pillow project was born! She reached out to her community once again who responded with fabric, stuffing, and their time to help get this program going, and with your help, we can keep it going!
The bilateral mastectomy pillow is based on a simple design by Create to Donate. A PDF adaptation of the pattern can be found
Heart-Shaped Pillow – The Original
This program was started by one of our volunteers over 25 years ago. After her own surgery, she realized that she needed something to support her arm and to keep the tubes away from her skin to ensure that she had the optimum comfort during her recovery. Being a seamstress, she thought I should really make something for myself to make this easier for me and she decided to create a heart shaped pillow they could easily be placed under your arm to protect your skin and alleviate some of the pain from the mastectomy.
Go forward 27 years, and our volunteer is still spearheading this project and we still have over a dozen volunteers who are cutting, sewing, and stuffing the pillows for the newly diagnosed.
Breast Cancer Action Ottawa then delivers these pillows to the different mastectomy and specialty shops in the Ottawa area to give out when a newly diagnosed person comes to their shop to receive a post-surgical camisole that is funded by the Kelly project and Kelly’s boutique. Please note, that only Kelly’s boutique provides gifted post-surgical camas camisoles. You can check out that program on our website by visiting here
We are always looking for volunteers to help us with this project as the demand is quite high in the Ottawa area and its vicinity.
Please open the PDF for instructions on how to sew the pillows and the pattern that you would need to create them.
Should you have any questions please call the office at 6137365921.
