For weeks, I not so patiently waited to open my new eyelash serum. It was the first item on the Christmas list I gave my mom some time in October. I hadn’t done any research, but it was expensive, so it definitely works right? On Christmas morning I tore the wrapper to what could be my future of thick, long, luscious lashes, and popped the lid to the serum within the hour. I applied maybe too much of the clear liquid at the base of my lashes, but you can never have too much.
The days after Christmas my eyes were itchy, red, and swollen and it felt like there was constantly something in my eye. I applied the serum twice and decided the condition of my eye was not worth longer lashes. With great sorrow, I set my new serum aside and decided to go back to Vaseline. I applied Vaseline twice a day like I did the months leading up to Christmas, but my eyes remained in bad shape. I looked sickly. Maybe some makeup would have helped the sick look I wasn’t pulling off, but it was Christmas break! There was no need. It wasn’t until I went to apply mascara for the return to my junior year that I realized.
Not only were the majority of my eyelashes not there, but the ones that remained, were a third of the length they were before. I have never had long or thick lashes, but this was a whole other level. My eyes were so uncomfortable I ended up pulling out the little lashes I had left. My eyelines were officially bare. Not a single strand of hair remained. Who would have thought eyelashes bring so much to your face? The misleading hope that maybe no lashes would help the irritation was proven incorrect. My eyelids were itchy and swollen for a few more weeks.
Throughout what I like to call my “eyelash journey,” I went through a few phases to compensate for what I lost. There was the fake lashes phase where I attempted to glue false lashes to my lid instead of their intended place: on your existing lashes. It didn’t work as well as I’d hoped. With nothing to hold them in place, they would last about an hour or two before they fell off entirely. No amount of glue could hold them.
Next there was the eyeliner phase. Every day, multiple times a day, I would pencil on a line of eyeliner across my top lid. The plus side was it did provide a visible separation between my pale eyelids and my eyeball. The downside is it in no way hid the fact that I did not have any eyelashes. You think this is bad, well it got worse. Next, I tried blue eyeliner! I saw a TikTok that a colored liner could bring out the color of your eyes. A fun-colored wing may have looked cool, but I thought it would look even cooler to put the blue on my lower water line! Well it didn’t, and it also didn’t bring out my eyes.
Next was my hat phase. I wore a hat everywhere I went. I went to the grocery store wearing a hat. I practiced softball in a hat. No dress code could peel the hat off my head. My favorite hat was of course blue to match the eyeliner under my eyes.
Eventually, I went to the eye doctor and found that the serum had essentially burned off the root of my lashes. I was told to stop putting eyeliner on as it clogged the roots of my lashes and would stunt their regrowth, but Vaseline was approved. I thank him for taking the eyeliner out of my hands. The doctor also taught me that camels’ eyelashes are extra-long to keep the dust from the desert out of their eyes. I was confused as to why this related to my situation, but he said this was the same reason why I always felt something in my eye: because there probably was. Funny how that works. After five months of taking embarrassing pictures every time I noticed my lashes had grown, I finally had something to put mascara on. And just in time for prom!
Final thoughts: Thank God they grew back, I retook my license picture, and don’t use eyelash serum.