The “Gorilla Glue Lady” Saga Is So A lot Deeper Than a Viral TikTok

On February 4, Louisiana-based TikToker Tessica Brown posted a video exhibiting the world that her hair had been caught in the identical, slicked-down ponytail type for a month. Her hair, virtually like an motion determine’s, was fused fully to her scalp after she substituted a can of Gorilla Glue Spray for her regular Obtained 2b Glued Blasting Freezing Spray — an precise hairspray — to complete off the smooth type. At that time, Brown says she’d washed her hair 15 instances and it completely would not budge. Her edges, which as many Black ladies can attest are fast to return undone on the most minimal disruption, confirmed no signal of loosening, at the same time as she rubbed her palms over the world. Her carefully-sculpted swoops had been frozen in time, an disagreeable reminder of the error she had made.

Within the video, Brown’s giant, spherical eyes are closely lined and her mile-long lashes curve up and out to the facet — her make-up is harking back to the ’60s glamour Diana Ross exuded. It is clear that she is a lady who invests in her look. “Stiff the place?” she asks, invoking that now-viral web meme of a younger lady enjoying in a bob wig. “My hair,” she responds, her voice swelling with matter-of-fact exasperation. 

Brown posted a second video of her making use of shampoo to her hair and wiping it off with a washcloth for instance the dire straits she’s in. “You wipe it off and nothing occurs. That is the life I am residing at this level,” she explains, her voice breaking as she holds again tears. Her anxiousness is palpable and was actually felt by people watching alongside on the web. “The stress that that is inflicting ME,” a remark beneath her second video reads. “It has been Four hours and I am extra involved about this than my precise job,” one other individual wrote. Chance the Rapper took to Twitter to precise his concern for Brown. “After I watched the video the second time it was onerous to snort trigger I might inform shorty genuinely did not know she had put one of many worlds strongest adhesives in her shit,” he wrote. “I hope she recovers effectively.”

By Friday, February 5, Brown supplied us with an replace: “I put coconut and tea tree oil on it and put a plastic on it,” in hopes that the pure treatment could be sufficient to interrupt down the very man-made chemical substances that had her follicles and strands in a vise. No luck. On Sunday, Brown posted a video montage of her being attended to by an ER nurse, which lower to her sister, clad in plastic gloves, making use of acetone on a cotton swab to her hair. Brown later stated that the nurse advised her the method of getting the hair unstuck would take at the least 20 hours — with that info, Brown stated that she most well-liked to do it at residence, fairly than take up a hospital mattress. So, she went again to her home with a silo of acetone and saline resolution.

I watched Brown wince in a YouTube video as her sister, explaining that among the cotton had already gotten caught in her hair, utilized the acetone. I had flashbacks of my days getting relaxers, feeling that more-intense-than-usual burn of its chemical substances on my scalp. The sort of burn you recognize will go away a crumbly scab later. Her face contorting in ache is identical face that I made when, after washing out stated relaxer and sitting underneath the hooded dryer for an hour or extra, the stylist, armed with a spherical brush and a blow-dryer, got here means too shut on warmth that was means too excessive, proper on that tender, freshly chemically-burned space.