Now don't laugh at this, but black women have curly, crazy, wild eyelashes! Maybe not all, but the two I worked on sure do. I just never really thought about it and have never noticed, but it makes sense. Curly, curly hair. Curly, curly lashes! I was not able to give Kenishia the lovely, full lashes I so wanted to give her today. As a matter of fact, after having applied only ten lashes to each eye in ONE OUR, I had to tell her it was a "no-go." She should have had about 30 lashes per eye by then! I now know that I need to understand the condition of my clients' lashes BEFORE they come to me. Kenishia's were crazy curly. But I'm not talking straight-up curly. They went sideways and over and under each other and in every direction you can imagine. I found very few lashes that were straight enough for the extension to even adhere to and, when I did, the ones next to it were curling over and getting in the way. I couldn't even keep them seperated. I found it to be an almost impossible task. I didn't charge her anything. She was very sweet about the whole process and said she understood completely, but I still felt bad that she had traveled so far to come see me. We talked about things she could do to help, and I suggested she might be a better candidate for lash perming. Her lashes are actually quite long, but no one can tell because they're so curly and unruly! I failed my task today but gained valuable insight. Unless I can find a way to tame them first, I believe women with lashes like Kenishia's would benefit more from perming and tinting their lashes instead of having extensions applied.
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