EYELASH TRANSPLANTS?

by Mariane Holbrook 

I need $8,000.

“Not a problem,” you say. “What do you need it for?”

“For eyelash transplants,” I respond.

“You’re nuts,” you say.

Well, it makes as much sense as my shelling out $11,200 to my dentist who, using his trusty little chain saw, sawed off part of my lower jawbone, plugged in his hydraulic drill (or whatever you do with a hydraulic drill) and bore three holes in my lower jaw into which he screwed 3 foot long titanium thingies. Then he sutured me up and took all my money at gun point.

But the real reason I need new eyelashes at my age of ummm well 40, give or take a few dozen years, is because I never had long eyelashes and I want some. Being lazy, I am hoping for effortless beautification. My son has eyelashes long enough to sweep a gym floor but he got them from some other gene pool than mine.

"Longer, thicker lashes are a ubiquitous sign of beauty,” said Dr Alan Bauman, a leading proponent of eyelash transplants who stands to make a killing off the procedure.

Well, if there’s one thing I need to worry about, it’s my ubiquitous sign of beauty.

The procedure, as I understand it, is something like this: a small incision is made at the back of the scalp to remove 30 or 40 hair follicles, which are carefully sewn one by one on to the patient's eyelids. Only light sedation and local anesthetics are used and the cost is around $4000 an eye.

Is that a bargain or is that a bargain?

But I have a few questions. If Dr. Bauman removes 40 hair follicles from the back of my scalp and transplants them onto my eyelids, that means the eyelashes will keep on growing at the same rate as my regular hair, right? So how long can I let them grow before they need to be cut by an eyelash stylist? Since my hair is a little naturally curly, will the stylist have teeny-weeny hair straighteners which do one lash at a time? I don’t want half-frizzy and half straight eye lashes!

Another worry is that my hair is sorta, kinda, a little bit naturally gray. Ok, so I lied. If it weren’t for Lady Clairol I’d never leave the house. So when I get my hair dyed, do I have to dye my new eyelashes, too? Will there be a little eyelash dye kit available to match the rest of my dyed hair? I can’t have half gray eyelashes and half brown. People might gawk. (more than usual)

Another thing, the average lifespan of an eyelash is 150 days. Does that mean I have to shell out another $8,000 every 150 days to replace all those lashes that went down the shower drain?

There is no way to say this delicately but believe it or not, most of us have squiggly, microscopic worm-like mites living in the roots of our eyelashes. The mites have tiny claws, and needlelike mouthparts for eating skin cells. Their bodies are layered with scales, which help them anchor themselves in the follicle and the mite's digestive system results in so little waste that the mite doesn't even have an excretory opening.

Well, thank goodness! But that’s really TMI (too much information)!

So, do I want to expose my innocent hairs from the back of my scalp to the worm-like mites that are living in my eyelash roots? Compassion, even for a hair, has to kick in here somewhere!

You ‘spose there’s a better way to spend $8,000 I don’t even have?