Getty
Actress Meagan Good has had a love-hate relationship with her eyebrows for some time now. As she’s previously stated, the 36-year-old beauty’s ‘brows were permanently damaged by far too much primping and plucking done when she was a young adult.
“As some of you may know, eyebrows have long been a source of contention for me for over the last decade,” the star shared on Facebook back in 2015. “Not that I dont love mine,but in the late 90s-early 2000s – it was very popular for women to draw their eyebrows on as narrow as possible or in some cases tweeze them to the point of no return. I unfortunately fell victim to this trend, not being able to reverse it. After tweezing my brows, they got to a point where they didn’t grow back-at all. I was left to draw my brows with pencil & powder.”
And when drawing them on no longer felt like the way to go, Good went a step further and decided to tattoo her ‘brows on.
“The area I grew up in, there were a lot of Spanish girls, and they used to shave their eyebrows off to draw them on,” she said. “When I started doing that, they didn’t grow back. So I had to tattoo them on.”
But the end results of all the possible fixes she tried over the years still left her wanting more. So late last year, she decided to start the process for having an eyebrow transplant. She first shared the news of her intentions in October:
If you have never heard of an eyebrow transplant, here are five things you should know about the procedure:
- In the same vein as hair transplants, hair is taken from strips of skin with active follicles. Common donor hair comes from the back of the head and the upper thighs. Hair follicles are trimmed down and made to fit the desired brow shape, and from there, transplanted into one’s ‘brow area. If you’re thinking you can just take some strands from your actual hair, good luck with that. The texture of one’s eyebrows is usually quite different from what’s growing out of your head.
- Experts say it can take about four to six months for patients to see new hairs grow and noticeable results. The best results, as in, maximum fullness, can become apparent from about 10 months to a year after the procedure. And moving forward, eyebrows are not plucked using tweezers, but trimmed every few weeks.
- As far as the healing process goes, in some cases, there can be bruising as well as crusting of the skin. And when it comes to possible side effects (because there are always some) from the procedure, there have been incidents of new hair growth happening — but occurring in the wrong direction. Also, the donor site can be left with ongoing redness and in some cases, scarring.
- Eyebrow transplants are not cheap. They can cost between $4,000 and $8,000 in most U.S. cities. But in more expensive cities like New York, the range can be from $6,000 to $13,000.
- If you just want your eyebrows to be fuller, this is probably not the best option for you. It’s expensive, and there are many options in the beauty market now for products to help fill out and work with not-so-thick brows. This also isn’t an option for people with serious hair loss conditions like alopecia. But if you are someone who did too much plucking, find that your ‘brows are thinning over time, have always had very thin ‘brows, or have gone through physical accidents or hair loss that altered them, you might benefit from an eyebrow transplant.
For Good, she went through with the transplant and showed off her results on Instagram this week. Her new ‘brows are more natural and complement an already gorgeous face:
So if you’ve been painting your ‘brows on for years now and want a change, you do have another more permanent option. However, experts recommend you do you research on possible surgeons, and you ask yourself if your eyebrows need a surgical change, or can be worked with via non-surgical means.
