PRAIRE VILLAGE, Kan. — When Whitney Mayer learned she was expecting in 2017, she could not have been happier. Then, her doctor told her she had Acute Myeloid Leukemia, which required chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant.
Mayer beat the cancer and her baby survived, but she was left feeling incomplete.
"I had lost all of my hair," she told 41 Action News. "You don't realize until you don't have hair. I had no face hair, no eyelashes, no eyebrows."
Wanting to do something for herself, Mayer started researching eyebrow tattoos. She eventually met Kaety Bowers, alicensed cosmetologist and tattoo artist who specializes in paramedical tattoos.
"Paramedical tattoos are tattoos that are used to bring dignity back to people," Bowers said.
These specialized tattoos are often used to camouflage scars and discolorations, or bring back something that is missing, like tattooing areolas after a mastectomy, eyebrows after chemotherapy or fingernails after an accident.
Bowers specializes in eyebrows and hairlines, which often helps those who have lost their hair because of cancer or never had hair due to Alopecia, or spot baldness.
"They've lost their hair, they've lost their eyebrows and eyelashes and you can give them a little piece of that,” Bowers said. “It makes them feel beautiful.”
Mayer said she thinks the service is priceless, and hopes this option becomes more known for cancer survivors.
"Just putting eyebrows on your face all of the sudden, I was like, 'Oh my god, I feel alive,'" she said.
While insurance will cover prosthetics and reconstructive surgeries, permanent hair or eyebrow tattoos are not covered. Bowers provides these services to medical patients at a discounted rate and sometimes for free – all because of her grandmother who passed away from colon cancer 10 years ago.
"Giving someone that kind of gift... it's a small thing," she said.
