As we age, hair increasingly grows in places which we don’t want it to. Hair also changes colour. We go grey, some people’s hair goes white. We also lose hair in places that, perhaps we would rather not. On our head, our hair thins, some people go bald.
I want to talk about a subtle and natural hair loss which is relevant to my work as a permanent makeup technician – brow hair loss. This is something which can affect a variety of people.
Why do we lose eyebrow hair?
People struggling to manage stress are prone to lose brow hair. A temporary condition known as telogen effluvium (TE) is an abnormal loss of hair which is occurs when they experience an alteration to their normal cycle of hair growth.
Eyebrow maintenance such as over-tweezing, waxing and/or ‘threading’ your brows often causes scarring to your follicles which inhibits or prevents regrowth. Severe weight loss, excessive touching (of your brows), hormonal changes and auto immune disease can cause irregular brow hair loss as well.
In a previous blog, I discussed the loss of Hair due to chemotherapy and alopecia; click here to read Hair Loss & Permanent Makeup Blog
Some of my clients have mentioned to me that they believe that the autumn and winter seasons brings about slight brow hair loss then they experience in the summer. I have studied this theory at length, and whilst there are many people who feel that this is true – I cannot find any medical proof to back it up.
The Solution
Lost eyebrow almost certainly will not grow back. However permanent makeup (tattooing) is a common way to resolve a ‘lack of brows’. We have published numerous blogs discussing and explaining this treatment which you may have read.
A pleasing but, not a guaranteed side affect of eyebrow tattooing is that during the healing cycle – some people experience brow hair regrowth! Trauma to the skin (caused by the needle implanting pigment to create your beautiful new brows) stimulates the area into repairing itself and with that, new hair follicles!
It seems that something in the healing process can reprogram our stem cells in the skin to start making new follicles. Essentially this process is like rebooting a computer except the new command is sent out through genetics!
This results in new follicles which behave like follicles should do – they sprout hair.
However it is extremely uncommon that everyone will experience this. Therefore I obviously would encourage clients to research permanent makeup as a reliable treatment to replace lost hair either in full or patches. The natural appearance of hairstrokes or the subtle ‘powder’ or ‘shading’ which we tattoo into your skin offers the perfect replacement.
