After Tessica Brown put her hair in jeopardy just over a week ago by using Gorilla Glue instead of hairspray, another TikTok user Avani Reyes follows in her footsteps.
Avani Reyes, 20, blew up on TikTok over the weekend by jumping on an insane and dangerous challenge inspired by Tessica Brown. Since the first video Reyes uploaded with more than four million views and counting, she has also brought forward daily updates including a trip to the emergency room and at home remedies to try to tackle the issue.
While it comes as no surprise to viewers that her hair is in fact solid, Reyes tries her best to comb and simply move the hair to see just how much it has held up. From this video, she’s received numerous comments and backlash. This includes one of the top comments on the video from @dpomoda with 63.3 thousand likes stating “we don’t feel sorry for you ????”.
Another major aspect of backlash that Reyes has received is due to Brown receiving money and payouts through GoFundMe to help her solve her hair crisis- and not many people are willing to shell out money for Reyes.
@fhcookies: “You thought we were finna donate?”
@krystynastars: “IF YALL DONATE MONEY I will lose my faith in humanity”
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@jrk4fh: “who giving you money? not us sis <3”
The Emergency Room
After this video hit the ground running, Reyes has posted daily videos with updates including her trip to the emergency room in an attempt to get herself out of a sticky situation. In the first of five videos about the trip to the emergency room, Reyes starts to show concern about the situation- escalating to a panic attack in her second video.
“God, Y’all I’m on my way to the hospital right now, my scalp is burning,” Reyes says in the video. “I have no idea what to do. I tried washing it, it doesn’t come off.”
As the five videos covering the trip to and from the emergency room continue, Reyes becomes more panicked as she realizes and learns that the emergency room can’t fix her hair situation. In her sixth video after Reyes leaves with a somewhat-solution, she is still upset.
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“So I just got out of the hospital and they did nothing for me. Guys, look at my hair.”
Reyes continues with that the only suggestion given was that she “should apply either olive oil/tea tree oil or coconut oil on your hair to attempt to remove the glue. Or, you can shave your hair.”
At Home Remedies-Trial and Error
The next video Reyes posts after the visit to the emergency room shows her in the shower appearing to shampoo her hair while the song Gorilla by Bruno Mars plays in the background as a tribute to her situation.
After this, a new video with how her hair looks and results of this attempt come forward.
“It did not come out. I used coconut oil for like half an hour, and then I just washed my hair, and there’s still Gorilla Glue on my head.” Overall, her hair looks slightly different from the original video but still remains a solid slab of pink hair on her head.
“Guess I gotta go bald!”
More Backlash
After the first round of trying to remove the glue at home, Reyes reaches out to her followers and viewers to help out via GoFundMe. “I’m thinking about starting a GoFundMe page. Maybe just so people can help with my Gorilla Glue situation, and I might get surgery.”
This came off as not surprising to many viewers, who claimed it was all a part of the plan from the beginning to get money.
@shadad.karim: “You literally did that on purpose to get money”
@.0hh4ly: “no one donate this person did it for attention and we all learned from the gorilla glue lady and it’s common sense not to put gorilla glue in your hair”
@sammi_bonnani: “People who donate to the GoFundMe ????????????”.
More backlash continues after this video, with her next one just before a shower where she says that putting the glue in her hair was an accident and that it wasn’t intentional. Viewers thought otherwise, saying that she knew what she was doing and just was seeking money like Brown was donated after her incident. Many other viewers began commenting ways to possibly help loosen the glue from her hair, including mineral oil or just shaving it off.
Reyes also continues to receive backlash with continuing videos of her attempting to brush the matted hair, including a makeup video in which Gorilla by Bruno Mars plays again.
Making Money, Splitting Ends
Despite the overall backlash, Reyes’ GoFundMe still thrives- including one user, @.lmfaohannah who claimed to have donated $3000. Enough money was raised for Reyes to fly to L.A. for surgery, which she was overall excited about. Fans weren’t thrilled, as many thought she didn’t deserve the money because of her actions.
@k11_kayla98: Gofundme was made for people who actually need help, stop taking advantage of people to get money and sort it out yourself!”
@zane_keratario_the_fosky: Whoever donated you just wasted money. She did this to herself. She just wanted money.”
Reyes also continues to attempt to go about her normal life despite this situation- including one video with her making iced coffee, and another where her friend is helping her try to scrub the glue off.
What We Can Expect
With 18 videos currently available of her progress over the past few days, it’s easy to assume that Reyes will continue to update us as she flies to L.A. for surgery- or a vacation as some users have been saying.
We expect that she will most likely give updates on TikTok which is a huge platform for her right now with just shy of 500k followers and over a million views per video since this all started.
