tessica brown, the gorilla glue girl

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Sixteenth Minute (of Fame)" – Episode Featuring Tessica Brown, the Gorilla Glue Girl

Introduction

In the November 19, 2024 episode of "Sixteenth Minute (of Fame)" by Cool Zone Media and iHeartPodcasts, host Jamie Loftus delves into the harrowing and viral story of Tessica Brown, famously known as the "Gorilla Glue Girl." This episode meticulously examines Tessica's accidental use of Gorilla Glue in her hair, the ensuing social media frenzy, and the profound personal and societal impacts of her sudden internet notoriety.

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1. The Incident: Tessica Brown and Gorilla Glue

The story begins in early 2021, amidst a tumultuous period marked by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and social unrest in the United States. Tessica Brown, a 40-year-old daycare provider and mother of five from Violet, Louisiana, found herself in a desperate situation when she ran out of her usual hair product, Got2B Blasting Freeze Spray. In a moment of panic, she mistakenly used Gorilla Glue spray to style her hair, leading to a dangerous and painful predicament.

Notable Quote:

Tessica Brown [06:48]: "Hey, y'all. But those of y'all that know me know my hair has been like this for about a month now. It's not by choice. No, it's not by choice."

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2. Viral TikTok and Social Media Reaction

Tessica's plight went viral when she posted a TikTok video detailing her struggle to remove the Gorilla Glue from her hair. The video, intended as a simple plea for help, quickly spiraled out of control as TikTok's enigmatic algorithm propelled it to millions of views within hours.

Notable Quotes:

Jamie Loftus [07:56]: "The Sixteenth Minute of Fame is the place where we figure that out, putting people in the context of the moment they've been frozen inside of."

Tessica Brown [16:00]: "If you ever, ever run out of Got To Be Glue spray, don't ever, ever use this."

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3. Media Attention and Public Response

The viral nature of Tessica's TikTok attracted a polarized public response. While some empathized with her situation, many others ridiculed her, leading to a barrage of negative comments and personal attacks. Mainstream media outlets swiftly picked up the story, often portraying Tessica in a negative light and failing to consider the broader context of her actions.

Notable Quote:

Candace Benbow [36:09]: "We were endeared to her because we know what it's like to be judged by the biggest mistake you've ever made and not to be given the compassion and empathy necessary to move through its implications."

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4. The Search for a Solution

Desperate to free herself from the adhesive nightmare, Tessica attempted various home remedies—rubbing alcohol, coconut oil, tea tree oil—but to no avail. Her escalating discomfort and the tightening of the glue necessitated professional medical intervention. Facing limited local options, she reached out to social media for help, inadvertently triggering the viral response.

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5. Intervention and Medical Procedure

Amid the chaos, Tessica was contacted by Gina Rodriguez, a manager with connections to high-profile personalities and professionals. Gina facilitated Tessica's connection with Dr. Michael Obeng, a seasoned plastic surgeon in Los Angeles who developed a specialized procedure to safely remove the Gorilla Glue from Tessica's hair and scalp.

Notable Quote:

Dr. Michael Obeng [10:47]: "So this guy thought he could lick the glue off."

Tessica Brown [66:54]: "They flew me out there. It took four hours for the surgery, and when I woke up, I was able to..."

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6. Post-Incident Fame and Life

Following the successful removal of the glue, Tessica's story transformed from a personal crisis into a media spectacle. She gained significant attention, leading to merchandise opportunities, appearances on popular shows like "Saturday Night Live," and even plans to launch her own hair care product line. Despite the newfound fame, Tessica emphasized her desire to maintain her personal identity and continue running her daycare business.

Notable Quotes:

Tessica Brown [45:17]: "Clout is something I will never chase. I promise you."

Jamie Loftus [44:30]: "That's Kenan Thompson and Regina King. Not shabby."

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7. Interview with Tessica Brown

In an exclusive interview, Tessica Brown opens up about the emotional and psychological toll of her experience. She discusses the immediate aftermath of her viral TikTok, the relentless online harassment, and the challenges of navigating sudden internet fame while managing her personal and professional life. Tessica also reveals the strain the incident placed on her family, particularly her daughters, and the critical role they played in supporting her through the ordeal.

Notable Quotes:

Tessica Brown [63:16]: "You have to think it's completely out of line because I can say a lot of stuff on social media, but I don't."

Tessica Brown [84:50]: "I'm gonna tell you that it's draining."

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8. Reflection and Moving Forward

Four years after the incident, Tessica reflects on her journey from a local business owner to an internet sensation. She highlights the importance of resilience, the support of her family, and the lessons learned about the fickle nature of social media fame. Tessica remains committed to her daycare and continues to engage with her online audience on her own terms, balancing her public persona with her private life.

Notable Quotes:

Tessica Brown [93:37]: "Wouldn't have never. And then everything. I'd just be, you know, still normal."

Tessica Brown [87:54]: "I started blocking. Listen, I think thousands of people that's blocked."

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Conclusion

This episode of "Sixteenth Minute (of Fame)" offers a comprehensive exploration of Tessica Brown's extraordinary experience with viral internet fame. Through detailed narrative and personal interviews, Jamie Loftus sheds light on the complexities of modern social media dynamics, the human cost of sudden fame, and the enduring spirit of individuals navigating the unpredictable landscape of internet notoriety. Tessica's story serves as a poignant reminder of the need for empathy and understanding in our digital interactions.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Tessica Brown [06:48]: "Hey, y'all. But those of y'all that know me know my hair has been like this for about a month now. It's not by choice. No, it's not by choice."

• Jamie Loftus [07:56]: "The Sixteenth Minute of Fame is the place where we figure that out, putting people in the context of the moment they've been frozen inside of."

• Candace Benbow [36:09]: "We were endeared to her because we know what it's like to be judged by the biggest mistake you've ever made and not to be given the compassion and empathy necessary to move through its implications."

• Tessica Brown [45:17]: "Clout is something I will never chase. I promise you."

• Tessica Brown [63:16]: "You have to think it's completely out of line because I can say a lot of stuff on social media, but I don't."

• Tessica Brown [93:37]: "Wouldn't have never. And then everything. I'd just be, you know, still normal."

These quotes encapsulate the emotional depth and societal commentary presented in Tessica Brown's story, highlighting themes of empathy, resilience, and the often harsh realities of internet fame.

Transcript

[Jamie Loftus]

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[Cleish Hearer]

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[Cleish Hearer]

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[Cleish Hearer]

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[Jamie Loftus]

Jamie here again reminding you that if you're in the Los Angeles area, I am taping my very first special called the Tiny Man Is Trying to kill me on December 4th. There are two shows. The first one is basically sold out, but there are still tickets available to the 9:30. I have the link in the description and I hope to see you there. Enjoy the episode. Early 2021 is a time many of us have complete memory holes for and not without good reason. In the US, Covid was still ravaging the country after the spread of the virus had been repeatedly sabotaged by conspiracy theorists in and outside of the government. Lockdown restrictions were reaching the year mark after an extremely contentious election where Covid missed the opportunity to do the first and only funny thing it could do, which was kill Donald Trump. There was something that happened on January 6th of this year, but I can't quite recall what it was. It was a bad time and collectively I don't know that we really remember it. There's some science behind this complicated issue, but the short story is that your brain can protect you from a traumatic memory or event or period of time. You know when you're listening to this at the moment it comes out, you probably won't remember this time very well if you live in the US soon either, because for most people, and surely to different degrees depending on what your day to day was like during COVID And if anyone in your life was personally affected, this was a terrifying time. Add this to Black Lives Matter demonstrations being met with violent reprisal from police forces and no vaccine in sight until the very end of 2020. 2020 with a long line before it got to non essential workers and by early 2021 a lot of people were reaching the ends of their ropes. Really think about where you were at around this time. I had it comparatively easy. Podcasting is not essential work, if you can believe it. And even still by the top of 2021 I was a fucking wreck. I was terrified for my immunocompromised parents across the country. I was trying to get out of the house to do outreach work and I'd Gotten arrested at a protest in front of Eric Garcetti's house. Whoops. And I do it again. The lockdown era was horrendous for Americans mental health. There's extensive reporting on how anxiety, PTSD and depression increased tremendously during that year and into today. I don't think anyone could look back at their social media at this time and think, wow, I was hanging in pretty well then. And if you can, you are the fucking weirdo. It was an age where people were knowingly or unknowingly posting their L's every single day non stop. Because unless you were an essential worker, what the fuck else was there to do? But one L posted during this time made Internet history, bringing people together collectively to say oh my God. In a way that was not centered on a global catastrophe. Of course, plenty of commenters took it too far immediately, but for a single moment on February 3, 2021, all of TikTok wasn't focused on Covid disinformation or insurrection analysis or, sorry, objectively bad mental health content. No, we were all talking about Gorilla Glue.

[Tessica Brown]

Hey, y'all. But those of y'all that know me know my hair has been like this for about a month now. It's not by choice. No, it's not by choice.

[Jamie Loftus]

Tessica Brown, the woman who used Gorilla glue in her hair. Your 16th minute start.

[Tessica Brown]

And I'm not so bad when you turn up.

[Jamie Loftus]

16 minute.

[Gina Rodriguez]

16 minutes of fail.

[Tessica Brown]

One more minute.

[Jamie Loftus]

Welcome back to 16th Minute, the podcast where we take a look at the Internet's main characters, Talk to them about how their moment affected them and what it says about us and the Internet. My name is Jamie Loftus and today my phone connected to an ex boyfriend's wifi when I was walking by in a neighborhood I didn't know he lived in. Guess he moved. And today we're talking about the infamous early 2021 Gorilla Glue hair incident. And look, I've already PTSD'd you by bringing up the later days of the pandemic and you don't deserve it right now. But bear with me. I really want you to dig into your sad little brain and pull out where you were at in early 2021. Because today's subject, Tessica Brown. And yes, we got the interview. Baby was in the same position as everyone was in the world, only she was having to run a full time daycare called Tessica's Little Angels in the Middle of COVID for folks in her neighborhood who still had to work. Plus, she was a mother of five. We were all at the end of our rope. But as you'll see, Tessica didn't get very much grace in the moment or in the public's memory. So let's go back to the dark place. Come with me if you dare to February 2021, Donald Trump's second impeachment trial raged on in Washington D.C. fat lot of fucking good that did. Meanwhile, the US reached a five person death toll to Covid. And in Violet, Louisiana, Jessica Brown ran out of Got2B blasting freeze spray and needed a quick solution. Was what she did the smartest decision of anyone's life? No, but hear her out. It's February 2, 2021. Tessica has a lot of stuff going on in her personal life, which she references in our interview, and there is a lot going on in the big disgusting world. She is a lifelong Louisiana resident, a place where Covid had affected about half a million reported people since 2020 before vaccines were made widely available. In fact, this whole thing happens two days before vaccines were made available to people 65 and over in Louisiana. And the state's relationship to vaccines is complicated. Regardless, sometime in early January, Tesica mistakenly sprayed gorilla glue into her hair out of running out of got 2B. And the next month was rough. Gorilla glue. If you don't know, and you really should, is no joke.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

So this guy thought he could lick the glue off.

[Jamie Loftus]

Basically, he took some gorilla glue and he put it on the edges of.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

This cup and then put it on.

[Jamie Loftus]

His face and he thought he could lick the glue off and get this cup off of his face. Well, that didn't really work out very well for him. It's a super glue that's been on the market since the 90s, eventually prompting the phrase gorilla grip, which has been a term of inspiration among Kegel's TikTok for years. And I refuse to expand on that sentence. You can do your own research, but superglue existed in general since the 1940s. Because, yes, as every episode of 16th Minute inevitably leads to Superglue, say it with me. Is the product of colonialism and warmongering. We don't need to talk about it, but hey, let's talk about it for a second. Switch the music a little. Let's make this fun. Superglue was discovered by an inventor named Dr. Harry Wesley at Kodak, as in the photography company, during World War II while pitching in to make new gun sights for Allied forces. He didn't end up trademarking the material until the 1950s, but by that time it had taken on any number of practical and frankly horrifying uses over the years. The Military Times reported that Wesley's invention was later used as a liquid bandage on soldiers in the Vietnam War in order to stem bleeding until someone with an open wound could get to a military hospital. Really think about that. Gross. But it did sort of work and was later tweaked into what's now known as actual liquid bandages like Dermabond and Trauma Seal. And if you had a liquid bandage fanatic like my mom, you'll know that these products really hurt on sensitive skin because while effective, these extreme adhesives are not comfortable. With that in mind, enter Tessica, who at 40 had the expected social media for a person of that demographic at that time. What I'm saying is she was a Facebook mom and she promoted her business and shared family photos and livestreams primarily there and on Instagram. And she posted a lot. But her audience was fairly limited. From what I could find, she mainly stuck to the Zuckerberg products, Facebook and Instagram, where she had, as she tells me, only a few thousand followers at the time of the Gorilla Glue incident. Fast forward to the day she sprayed the glue. It did not go well, but at first, as with any major L, Tessica kept it to herself, not even telling her mother or sister at first. Days later, not only was it not coming out, her scalp was starting to hurt and it was feeling like it was constricting. She tried everything to try to slow this effect. Goo gone, rubbing alcohol, coconut oil, tea tree oil, you name it. But it became clear that this may not be a Google able problem. So she swallowed her pride and she reached out to the women in her lifeher mother, her sister, her daughters. But that didn't do much either. Until according to Tessica, one of her daughters said, hey, Maybe someone on TikTok will know what to do. Yes, this is a TikTok story. And per Tessica, she has no idea how or why this particular TikTok went viral. Because prior to the Gorilla Glue story, Tessica had only used TikTok twice. Two posts. One was of her daughter in late 2020 dancing while wearing a face mask, and the other was Tasica herself lip syncing to a cover of Countdown by Beyonce. You know the song you weren't born yesterday, mom. Content, right? And then Tessica's daughter, a true kid of the COVID era, says, hey mom, maybe people on TikTok will find you and have some ideas on how to get the glue out. Because not only had TikTok experienced Tremendous growth during COVID lockdown, particularly with people her kids age. It had also become notorious for becoming a place of hyper niche discussion. And so Tessica does with the self assurance of a consistent poster. Just not a TikTok poster. So she's in her bathroom filming on her phone in a hot pink hoodie with full makeup and a long braid. And as in all her posts, Tessica looks great. But yeah, there is something clearly going on with her hair. It's, you know, it's super glued to her head. Here's the 59 seconds that made her famous.

[Tessica Brown]

Hey, y'all. For those of y'all that know me, know my hair has been like this for about a month now. It's not by choice. No, it's not by choice. When I do my hair, I like to, you know, finish it off with a little Got To Be Glue spray, you know, just to keep it in place. Well, I didn't have any more Got To Be Glue space, so I used this gorilla glue spray. Bad, bad, bad idea, y'all. Look, my hair, it don't move. You hear what I'm telling you? It don't move. I've washed my hair 15 times and it don't move. Stiff wear my hair. So I'm tell y'all like this, if you ever, ever run out of Got To Be Glue spray, don't ever, ever use this.

[Jamie Loftus]

So that clicking noise is the sound of Tessica's nails on her own scalp. And this post does go viral on TikTok basically immediately. Tessica says she posted it before bed with no hashtags. TikTok doesn't really respond to that as much. It's just captioned stiff wear my hair, which is a reference to a meme where a black mom and her daughter are joking around in a car while the daughter is wearing a new wig. Maybe you've seen it right back on.

[Tessica Brown]

Right back on. Oh, no. Bam. Yes, yes. Ooh, ooh, ooh. Stiff wall. Stiff wall.

[Jamie Loftus]

If you haven't, go watch it. And Tessica has definitely seen this because she's pretty online. And for all intents and purposes, she's just a normal person posting a weird kind of stressful TikTok. But when she wakes up the morning after posting glues still in her hair, her TikTok account is. Has gone nuts. She has officially been sucked into the algorithmic vortex. And she asked herself, fucking how? Well, as we've discussed on this show before, that's kind of the whole question with TikTok. Most, if not all, social media algorithms are completely diabolical by nature. And again, if you want to know more about that, I will shout out friend of the show Max Fisher's book the Chaos Machine, which breaks down how algorithms have increasingly informed how we consume news and ourselves in the space of the last decade. The section where he unpacks a period of time leading up to the 2016 election where the top brass at YouTube just let the algorithm run itself lives rent free in my mind forever. The point is, the way that algorithms function remains very opaque to this day, something that seems like should maybe not be allowed, given the fact that these algorithms have disproportionate influence on how we receive information and often disinformation. And in case you're not aware, there's a bit of an infinity saga with TikTok and disinformation, with the platform itself repeatedly vowing that they are definitely taking steps internally to combat disinformation as recently as this past fall. Although I will say I have some doubt on how effective that's been. I don't really know what this kind of announcement does to imply TikTok's accountability. It seems more kind of like they're passing the buck to their users. Take a listen if you try to.

[Sunny Hostin]

Share content with an unverified claim, we may also ask you to reconsider before sharing, especially during emergencies and unfolding events. This helps prevent the spread of misinformation. You should still think critically about content that's not labeled as unverified and report potential harmful misinformation so our safety teams can assess it.

[Jamie Loftus]

Okay, TikTok give us less a 2022 report from News Guard indicated that when it came to hot button issues like vaccines, election information, and even things as specific as the January 6th insurrection, around 1 in 5 TikTok posts contained disinformation of some kind. So let's hope a commitment to combating disinformation is true, because TikTok has a very strong influence on Internet users. Right now. It is by far the most addictive platform, with the Digital 2024 Global Review report estimating that the average user clocks in around 34 hours of TikTok use a month. That's followed by YouTube at 28 hours and Facebook at almost 20. Its base is also young in comparison to other platforms. Over half of TikTok users are teenagers, and 80% of users say they primarily use the platform to find something entertaining. And if you've ever used it, the TikTok algorithm is good at figuring out what you specifically will find entertaining. Here's what's in my algorithm on TikTok right now because making this show has destroyed all of my algorithms. Thank you so much. And the fact that someone called me the butt floss fairy godmother because I've been telling people where to get their seamless thong so they're not.

[Tessica Brown]

Well, I hope that I don't fall in love with you.

[Jamie Loftus]

I'm sorry, what?

[Tessica Brown]

Did you guys see that video of.

[Jamie Loftus]

That girl who started crying because she started chewing remineralizing chewing gum and her cavities literally went away? She I heard Tati's trying to do live stream. It's flopping but for the sake of this story, we're Talking about the TikTok algorithm in 2021, specifically an algorithm we can assume is somewhat different from the crack that they're putting in the TikTok algorithm today. And here's what we knew at the time. According to a report from the New York Times Ben Smith at the end of that year. The report reviewed internally leaked documents from the China based company called TikTok Algo 101 which stated the four core tenets of the app at the time were user value, long term user value, creator value, and platform value. And it is worth mentioning that TikTok's being a non American company does affect how it's discussed in Western media. We don't have enough time to unpack it fully, but suffice it to say, yes, social media and big tech are quite evil, but they're nothing next to Senator Tom Cotton. Here's Senator Tom cotton talking to TikTok CEO Shauzi Chu in January 2024.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

So you said today, as you often.

[Jamie Loftus]

Say, that you live in Singapore. Of what nation are you a citizen? Singapore. Are you a citizen of any other nation?

[Tessica Brown]

No.

[Jamie Loftus]

Zenith. Have you ever applied for Chinese citizenship, Senator? I served my nation in Singapore. No, I did not. Have you ever been a member of the Chinese Communist Party, Senator? I'm Singaporean. No. Wow. So much more of this to look forward to in the next four years. Really cool. The app's ultimate goal in 2021 at the time of the Tessica Brown post features a term we've also heard in The Story of YouTube Infinite Wealth, wealth, wealth, or getting as many users as possible to spend as much time as possible on TikTok. And this almost always leads to the algorithm pushing content that is manipulative in some way. This Times report detailed a tendency for TikTok to focus on, quote unquote sad content to get people to Keep watching and even provides a little equation that details how it ranked which posts to boost relating to likes, plays, comments, and time watched. It goes on to detail the ways in which TikTok aims to keep people engaged by recommending similar, but not too similar content in order to avoid boredom. Again, this is an echo of the YouTube algorithm story that can and has led to users getting coaxed into increasingly extreme content. With these qualifiers in mind, it's not super surprising that Tessica Brown's video performed well within TikTok's algorithm. The video is kind of long. You're definitely not sure how it's gonna end. The subject is sad and upset, and even now Tessica says in our interview that she understands that in some sick way it could be entertaining to watch her struggle. Or at very least, you can't look away. And when Tezica's TikTok went live under her username IMD pretty funny. Viewers could not look away, which prompted a very polarized comment section. Hit the music. Why? Why? Why would you do that? Girl, you're lucky it didn't get in your eyes, ears, hands. What the fuck is wrong with you?

[Candace Benbow]

This better blow the fuck up because. Damn. I'm sorry, girl.

[Jamie Loftus]

Girl, I'm so sorry, but this is so funny.

[Sunny Hostin]

Baby oil, goo gone dawn. Dish soap and nail polish remover. Last resort, girl.

[Candace Benbow]

Please update us.

[Sunny Hostin]

This is literally a plot of a Victorious episode.

[Candace Benbow]

Baby, you made a helmet. You could survive a natural disaster, wind and dabriga. Never. You're unstoppable.

[Jamie Loftus]

Okay, hopefully I'm not the only person that wanted to fact check that. Next to last comment, was there an episode of Nickelodeon's early 2010s tween show Victorious about this subject?

[Cleish Hearer]

What is this for? Oh, that's glue. Yeah, but why is it with your makeup supplies?

[Jamie Loftus]

What's the problem? This is grizzly glue.

[Cleish Hearer]

It's like an industrial cement. Cat, tell me you didn't use this on Tori's face.

[Jamie Loftus]

Uh, yes, indeed. This was a victorious episode from 2010 in which a character played by one Ariana Grande. Yeah, super glues a monster mask to Victoria Justice's face. I love culture. But it's here where the gorilla glue story splits in two because Tessica has become a main character off of her third TikTok ever. And as she hints at in the post, she's also starting to be in a lot of physical pain from a month's worth of ever constricting superglue. I'll let Tasica share the more specific details in our interview, but this hurt and what the TikTok comments on this ever growing post. At present it sits around 56 million views. Confirmed was that she seemed to have tried everything that was possible to do from home in the month. The glue had been in her hair, but still she kept trying. The next day Tessica posted a TikTok of her squeezing a handful of Pantene into her palm, rubbed it into her hair and showed that where there would normally be a lather, nothing happened.

[Tessica Brown]

Like this is the life that I guess I'm have to live. No, no.

[Jamie Loftus]

This is a hard clip to watch. She's close to tears here and you can hear the business of her household continuing just outside of the bathroom. Later that day, Tessica posted again acknowledging how viral her first post had gone while continuing to ask for help. She writes thanks for you guys encouraging words and ideas to get rid of this forever ponytail. I will try some today when I get off from work and I will keep you guys posted. By the way, if you see me walking around with a headscarf, just mind your business. Lol. So from the jump, Tessica had a good sense of humor about the incident, even as the pain and the mocking comments continued to roll in.

[Sunny Hostin]

You are the reason items have instructions.

[Candace Benbow]

Call Gorilla Glue customer service. After they stop laughing, they may give you a commercial deal.

[Jamie Loftus]

But it's clear that as time goes on, Tessica was becoming increasingly desperate, updating her increasing online following on solutions that hadn't worked until finally, on February 6, she checked into the St Bernard Parish Hospital nearby to seek professional help. And after that visit, she wasn't much better off. The hospital estimated that using acetone and sterile water would make the whole process take about 20 hours, and Tessica opted to go home and continue to work at it with her sister instead. Once back home, video footage shows Tessica panicked and completely beside herself as her sister used acetone wipes from the hospital to try and loosen the glues. Hold, hold. But it's worth mentioning Tessica does lean into posting updates on TikTok, YouTube and Instagram immediately. There's not really a time where she's rejecting the attention. And this isn't a criticism, it actually reminds me quite a bit of our Ken Bone episode. He was very baffled when he became a star, but you never really saw him resisting it. But of course, the difference between these stories is significant. Tezuka was in many cases being openly mocked instead of celebrated. Like Ken, she is also a black woman and subject to all of the misogynoir that comes with that but it does feel worth mentioning that she doesn't really resist the attention around this story. What she does resist is people and the press misrepresenting who she is and what really happened. So Tessica has become a TikTok main character quite literally overnight. And mainstream media is pretty quick to catch on to this story. I think in part because media was generally faster to catch on to online stories in general during lockdown. Because of the intensity of eyes on TikTok at the time, we're seeing headlines.

[Sunny Hostin]

Like Woman's Gorilla glue hairstyle on TikTok has everyone baffled Tezika Brown is not.

[Candace Benbow]

Just the Gorilla Glue Girl. Her message to the Internet Gorilla Glue.

[Sunny Hostin]

Said it's sorry to hear about the woman who accidentally glued her hair in.

[Candace Benbow]

Place, the undeniable hold of the Gorilla Glue Girl and what it says about the empathy of the Internet.

[Jamie Loftus]

Meanwhile, Tessica's support system was not satisfied with the options that the hospital was offering. We talk about that more in our interview and on Sunday, February 7, the family starts a GoFundMe for Tasika in the hopes of getting money for an actual solution. The goal for the FundRaiser was only $1,500, but because of the number of eyes on the story, the account quickly surged to over $23,000. And of course Gorilla Glue couldn't resist getting in on the free prime. Once Tessica had returned from the hospital on February 8, the company tweeted that.

[Sunny Hostin]

Quote, we are very sorry to hear about the unfortunate incident that Ms. Brown experienced using our spray adhesive on her hair. We are glad to see in her recent video that Ms. Brown has received medical treatment from her local medical facility and wish her the best.

[Jamie Loftus]

However, Gorilla Glue stood their ground, saying in the same post that it was not, you know, intended for hair. But I was heartened to see that the comments around this post are pretty firmly on Tessica's side. Commenters suggested that Gorilla Glue should just donate money to Tessica to show good faith. Some mentioned that the spray does not in fact explicitly say it shouldn't be used on hair, and others warn that Tezuka very well may have a good lawsuit on her hand, even comparing it to the McDonald's hot coffee lawsuit of 1994, I'd recommend the you're wrong about episode on that topic. If you don't know more about that lawsuit. And there were rumors that Tezica planned to sue Gorilla Glue that were mentioned in a couple of news sources, but Tezuka says that this was never true or a plan of hers. And to be fair. She was a little busy to be organizing a lawsuit at this time to split between trying to get this very painful problem figured out and documenting that process and posting it online. And that appears to be it. So checking in. It's been nearly a week since Tessica went public with her saga and still nothing has been figured out. Except that the Internet was wrapped with attention as vaccines continued to be disseminated across the world. And I'm not joking, Benjamin Netanyahu was on court for a bribery charge. Time is a flat circle, and you'll notice from what we've even discussed so far, there is a pretty wide range of reactions to Tessica's story, and I think that this is because you can easily trace a wide range of diversity in the race, age and gender of accounts that are replying to support her or not. By the time Tessica went to the hospital, prominent figures had begun commenting on her situation as well, including Chant the rapper. And more relevantly to what I'm trying to talk about, Sunny Hoston of the View, who tweeted the so many are.

[Candace Benbow]

Being dismissive of GorillaGlueGirl. Given the history of how black women are targeted and still battle the pervasive belief that our natural hair is unprofessional, unkempt and in some way a statement, please show her some grace and understanding.

[Jamie Loftus]

Tessica's story is tied into the historical relationship with black women and their hair, a topic that has been spoken on extensively over the years. Some major Examples are the 2009 documentary Good Hair hosted by Chris Rock and the Oscar winning short film and best selling children's book Hair Love by Matthew Cherry, just to name a few.

[Tessica Brown]

My name is Ziri and I have hair that has a mind of its own. It kinks, coils and curls every which way.

[Jamie Loftus]

But I'll link more resources in the description as well. And Tessica's story is one of the iconic main character moments that revolves around black hair. So many of the top comments come from Black users on TikTok. Of course, plenty of these users are teasing Tessica and are baffled at the choice in using Gorilla Glue. And the media clapback at Tessica specifically reeks of misogynoir and this was thankfully called attention to, although not with the same frequency as the clickbaity. You won't believe what happened. How embarrassing. Style of post not by a long shot, but these essays do exist. They do exist. This is from a February 8, 2021 piece from Essence by Candace Benbow.

[Candace Benbow]

Perhaps all this history is what joined so many of our hearts to Tessica's plight. We may have never had an industrial product for styling purposes, but we've done things to our hair and to ourselves we wish we hadn't. We were endeared to her because we know what it's like to be judged by the biggest mistake you've ever made and not to be given the compassion and empathy necessary to move through its implications. All across social media, there are scores of people suggesting Tessica is attention seeking and deserves whatever she gets. She should have known better. In a world where hacks are celebrated and people become Internet sensations overnight for discovering new uses for old products. Tessica is villainized because her attempt resulted in failure. Why is it so easy to dehumanize black women when we make mistakes? Why must compassion for us be measured and mediated? How different would the response to Tessica be if she were white? We don't have to wonder too long about the answers to these questions. We know them already. We know black girls and women have to be perfect. There is no room for error. And when we mess up, we know it was nobody's fault but our own. And we know we live in communities that won't let us forget it either.

[Jamie Loftus]

And unfortunately, a lot of what Candace is describing here, the quickness to demonize and shame Tasica Brown does bear out a number of times in the days that followed. And I also want to mention that yes, many people did accuse Tessica of spraying gorilla glue in her hair just for attention and just to go viral. Which I think is pretty clearly not true, but also speaks to the Internet brain of what we are conditioned to believe people will do for attention, including hurt themselves. Right? Moving on, another piece from the King County Hazardous Waste Management Program adds to this.

[Sunny Hostin]

While most would never dream of putting gorilla glue anywhere near their body, sometimes black women need to venture outside the hair care aisle to find products that work. Castor oil, olive oil, mayonnaise and super glue are all used for hairstyling purposes. Also, many products marketed exclusively for black women include chemical based products like hair relaxers, texturizers and bond. Research over the years has shown there are fewer non toxic options in black hair products than there are in those marketed to the general public. Although understudied, there's growing evidence that a high number of products marketed for black hair care contain known harmful chemicals linked to cancer, reproductive problems, hormone disruption, asthma and other adverse health effects.

[Jamie Loftus]

In the coming weeks, Tessica Brown would be very forthcoming about how a cultural emphasis on whiteness factored into how she had felt about her own hair in the past. Later in February, she reflected on her early life, telling ABC Chicago about her experience in middle school. She said, I thought, if you have.

[Candace Benbow]

Another flaw, if your hair is together, you know, you look better. If I can't do nothing else, I'm gonna make sure my hair is on point. This has been a problem for me for a long time. If I wouldn't have cared so much about my hair, I wouldn't be going through this right now.

[Jamie Loftus]

So again, it is really overly simplistic to characterize Tezika's action as beyond the pale, ridiculous. Even if, like Tessica says now, she's embarrassed by making the mistake. It's a decision that exists in a far larger context, one that ranges from historical racism and misogyny to the fact that she was working full time during a pandemic and was likely just as burned out as anybody was. It was a mistake. But as the days continued, people didn't seem to get tired of making fun of her. As the situation reached its peak on Monday, February 9, Tezuka gave her first interview to Kiss9205 in Toronto, saying that she was waiting to shave her head as a last resort and felt some type of way about people making fun of her. Fair enough. On Tuesday, things really kick up behind the scenes. And unbeknownst to the public at the time, Tessica had been reached out to by manager Gina Rodriguez. Not that one. This Gina Rodriguez is a reality and viral star manager, including a number of names. You know, some of the Real Housewives, Mama June of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, Scott Disick of the Kardashians, Tori Spelling, the Ocean Spray Skateboard Guy, Nathan Apodaca, Gina Rodriguez, answer my email. I want to talk to him. The list goes on, right? And when Gina heard about Tessica's story, she both seemed to see a person who needed help and a potential business opportunity. Rodriguez got in touch with Tessica to connect her with a plastic surgeon who she knew in la, one who claimed that he had the ability to save her hair and would do the procedure in Beverly Hills for free. Enter Dr. Michael Obeng, who has over 20 years of experience in the industry. And finally, it seemed like Tessica had a solution. She announced she was heading out to Beverly Hills in an emotional interview with Entertainment Tonight that same day.

[Tessica Brown]

I'm not that person y'all trying to make me out to be. I'm not that person. I'm not this whole gorilla blue girl. My name is Tessica Brown. Call me, I'll talk To y'all, let you know exactly who I am.

[Jamie Loftus]

And on Wednesday, February 10, Tessica Brown arrived in a red hoodie and a mask to lax, where there was, and I'm not joking, literal paparazzi waiting for her as she headed out to Dr. Obeng's office. This story was big. The procedure was done that evening. And while Tessica recovered, the good doctor got a little PR in by giving CBS Los Angeles an update.

[Sunny Hostin]

Tessica is doing well. She's awake. The hair crew is doing her hair.

[Jamie Loftus]

This interview also revealed maybe one of the most impressive things I've ever heard, which is that Dr. Obeng literally created a new chemical product to remove remove the gorilla glue. And it was successful. He invented a whole new thing. And tmz, classy as ever, filmed and posted the whole procedure. If you feel anything, if it's too.

[Tessica Brown]

Uncomfortable, let me know.

[Jamie Loftus]

We can get you more payments, okay? Which is a potential insight into why this $12,500 procedure was done for free. Look, I'll be honest. I could not bring myself to watch the video of the procedure. I'm too squeamish. But the final procedure is said to have taken four hours while Tasica was under a light anesthetic. Per the LA Times, Dr. Obeng's potion was a combination of medical adhesive remover, aloe vera, olive oil and acetone mixed in a way to prevent harm to her scalp. The healing process was estimated to be about two or three months. And thank God it worked. And yes, of course, Dr. Obeng mentioned he was considering selling the product in the future. Put a pin in that. So finally, a week after this whole TikTok saga began, and over a month after the glue had been put in her hair in the first place, Tessica's head was gorilla glue free. And now she was Internet famous, complete with an entertainment manager and a full blown press tour that ranged from network TV to more prominently, her ever growing social media feeds. And once she was liberated from the glue with Rodriguez signed, Jessica Brown showed no signs of slowing down. She launched an official merch site on February 12th featuring her image from the viral TikTok with the caption bonded for life. Pretty good. And sure, people clowned on her for printing merch over a one social media moment, but people were watching and buying the stuff with an estimated million and a half social media posts about the gorilla glue incident by the middle of this month. And like William Hung and Ken Bone before her, Jessica Brown even broke through to appear in a middling SNL sketch on February 14th.

[Tessica Brown]

So it happened to you. Your worst nightmare. We've all been there. You ran out of hair product and you used gorilla glue instead, and it turned your beautiful, luscious mane into a hard candy shed.

[Jamie Loftus]

That's Kenan Thompson and Regina King. Not shabby. And throughout this time, Tessica was adamant about who she is. And to me, it's admirable how she continued to remind reporters and online randos that she didn't appreciate being called the Gorilla Glue Girl and that her plan was to forge ahead with her business and the dance team that she had coached her daughters on before this incident. In a profile of her from Vox by Melinda Fakuate on February 19, Tessica.

[Candace Benbow]

Said, clout is something I will never chase. I promise you. The dance team was in a commercial. They were in newspapers. They were in a magazine. That's enough clout for me. I don't need all this, because this was just way, way too much. And truly, who would want to go through that pain I went through for clout?

[Jamie Loftus]

Again, this is Tessica having to stave off the accusations that she had done the whole very painful ordeal for attention. But the Internet couldn't let go of the gorilla clue moment. There were, from what I could find, at least two copycats who were ostensibly trying to, like, bust the idea that super glue could have caused this much damage to Tessica Brown's hair and life. And the results. Drumroll. Both of these Mythbusters went to the hospital. Great job, guys. Myth busted. Look, if you know anything about the Internet, this is nothing new. Social media has always been a place where random challenges that could possibly kill you rule the algorithm. Examples in the early 2000 and tens. The cinnamon challenge, where someone puts a spoonful of uncut ground cinnamon into their mouth with no water.

[Tessica Brown]

All right, so here's the cinnamon.

[Jamie Loftus]

All right, all right, here goes. Or how about the Tide Pod Challenge, which was a 201718 social media craze where users were mainlining laundry pods because they were colorful. I don't know. I have no insight. People died eating those. Eight deaths were associated with ingestion of the packets. Two in children under one year old and six in adults with a history of dementia. This will never stop. And as disinformation gets worse, I think we'll see these kinds of things get more dangerous. But the copycats going to the hospital is just another way that Tessica Brown's saga continued kind of much longer than your average social media main character. For some expected reasons, Tessica was willing to engage with the story and it was also a rare social media moment that continued to develop as the days passed. I remember observing this story. You would want to check in on how she was doing. All of the commenters are wanting updates, wanting to know that she's okay. But once the procedure with Dr. Obeng was complete, of course things began to sort of die down. But by this point, Tessica had a following. It was this weird mistake that brought her to prominence. But Tessica is funny, she's attractive, and she was interested in continuing to post and see how this fluke could potentially improve her quality of life. And it really seems to have a few quick things, though. There has been some speculation about how the money from Tezica's GoFundMe was dispersed after she received the hair procedure from Dr. Obing for free. This is a report from the New York Post, so take it with a heavy grain of salt. But they stated that the GoFundMe had been put under investigation by the platform when Tessica announced that she would be donating that $23,000 raised in the early days of the guerrilla glue panic to local families and other causes. And to be clear, there's no doubt that she did give a chunk of that money in the form of $1,000 big checks to local families in Louisiana in need. And she says to have donated the rest to Dr. Obing's nonprofit, Restore Worldwide Incorporated, to support his ongoing efforts to provide complementary reconstructive surgery to people in need abroad. Moving into late February, still less than a month after her viral fame began, Tessica became a news item again. After returning to Dr. Obeng for a follow up about her hair procedure, which it turns out was also a consultation for additional work with the doctor, including a breast lift, implants and some liposuction. Per the New York Post at the time, there were lumps detected in Tessica's breast in these early consultations, which were thankfully removed and she announced were benign. And from there she moved ahead with the procedures, also including some complimentary dental work from another provider in the LA area. And so accusations lingered in her comments section that these procedures were where the remaining GoFundMe money actually went. But there is no proof to show things went one way or another. But now, with manager Gina Rodriguez at her side, Tessica continued to forge ahead. And can you guess what she did next? That's right. Tessica Brown released a hair care product named Forever Hair just a couple months later in June 2021. And yes, the comments to this are what you'd expect. Nah it might be gorilla glue in it. LOL. Get the bag, sis, etc. And on and on. But this product got press and I can understand why people would be curious about it. At launch, ForeverHair sold two products. An $18 growth stimulating oil and a $14 Forever hold spray. And while these products didn't stick around on the market, they did sell out. Another testament to Tezika Brown's staying power and the work taking place on her management side. And before 2021 was over, she'd gone viral two more times. Once for trying to dye her grays before her scalp was healed enough to handle more chemicals.

[Tessica Brown]

I decided that I was going to start wearing my real hair, but when I looked at it, you know, I had a gray hair here, a gray hair there. So me thinking that my hair is strong enough to take chemicals, dude, no it wasn't.

[Jamie Loftus]

And another time for doing what at least two other 16th minute subjects have done in the past. Buy my math. Tessica made a play at a music career when she released a rap single in November 2021.

[Tessica Brown]

Almost went in a panic when I ran out. I gotta had a problem. I had to use gorilla glue just to salt in my room. From silky to solid, try to wash it with everything I could think of. But nothing was making progress.

[Jamie Loftus]

I was sopping what to do, it's fun, whatever. And through 2022, Tessica continued to post regularly to her platforms while continuing her business. And in early 2023, she made it all the way to cable TV and appeared on a season of the Food Network competition Worst Cooks in America after auditioning.

[Tessica Brown]

I'm Tessica Brown. I'm a daycare provider from Valo, Louisiana.

[Jamie Loftus]

What are you famous for?

[Tessica Brown]

I ran out of hairspray so I sprayed gorilla glue in my house.

[Cleish Hearer]

Oh, you're gorilla.

[Tessica Brown]

My health, it don't move.

[Jamie Loftus]

And these days, almost four years later, Tessica Brown's life is pretty similar to what it was when she first became a viral star. She still runs her daycare, she's had another child, and by her account, she's now in a much happier relationship than she was at the time. The difference of four years mainly is that she also has millions of eyes on her lifestyle content across platforms, mostly Instagram. And now a facet of her life, TikTok. And when we come back, I speak exclusively with Tessica Brown herself. It is Ryan Seacrest here. There was a recent social media trend which consisted of flying on a plane with no music, no movies, no entertainment. But a better trend would be going to chumbacasino.com it's like having a mini social casino in your pocket. Chumba casino has over 100 online casino style games, all absolutely free. It's the most fun you can have online and on a plane. Live the chumba [e-mail] sponsored by Chumba Casino. No purchase necessary. VGW Group Void where prohibited by law. 18/terms and the following ad is sponsored.

[Cleish Hearer]

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[Dr. Michael Obeng]

Oh, such a clutch off season pickup Dave. I know, right? I was worried we'd bring back the same team.

[Jamie Loftus]

Oh no.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

I meant those blackout motorized shades. MVP of the room lines.com made it crazy affordable to replace our old blinds. Hard to install? No, it's easy. Even you could do it.

[Regina King]

Nice.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

I. I installed these and then got some from my mom too. You fly across the country to do the install? Nope. Blinds.com can do it all. All she had to do was pick what she wanted. She talked to a design consultant for free and scheduled a professional measure and install. Look at you hall of Fame son. Oh, I just picked the winning team. They're the number one online retailer of custom window coverings in the world.

[Tessica Brown]

Oh.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

Blinds.com is the goat. The goat shop up.

[Cleish Hearer]

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[Gina Rodriguez]

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[Jamie Loftus]

We have one more act for you this evening. I don't even need to say his name. Mr. Come on.

[Regina King]

Dealing a complete unknown is now a Golden Globe in critics choice nominee for best picture.

[Tessica Brown]

Bobby, what do you want to be? Whatever it is they don't want me to be.

[Regina King]

Timothy Chalamet astonishes as Bob Dylan in one of the best performances of the year and critics rave. Edward Norton is absolutely fantastic.

[Tessica Brown]

70,000 people are here and Bobby is.

[Jamie Loftus]

The reason for it. They just want me singing blowing in the wind for the rest of my life.

[Tessica Brown]

How does it feel?

[Regina King]

Don't miss the movie. Critics are healing. Five stars. It's pure cinematic magic.

[Jamie Loftus]

Turn it down. Pay loud.

[Regina King]

And named to AFI and the National Board of Reviews top 10 films of the year.

[Jamie Loftus]

Make some noise. BD track some mud on a carpet.

[Regina King]

A complete unknown now playing only in theaters. We don't Dar under 1790. Middle without parrot.

[Jamie Loftus]

Welcome back to 16th minute. My name is Jamie Loftus and I just started taking ADHD medication. I feel like half of my body is underground and the other half is 40ft above sea level. Is that how the human experience is supposed to feel? Please discuss on the Reddit board. And today, we are revisiting the 2021 saga of Tessica Brown getting gorilla glue in her hair. As you've heard, this story was wild and continued to stretch on. Tessica is still active on Instagram and TikTok to this day, and she recently switched management teams to continue expanding on what she can do with her story and her online fame. But now that it's been nearly four years since the original event, I wanted to hear Tessica's story in her own words. And thankfully, she was generous enough to give us some of her time. So without further ado, here's my talk with Tessica Brown.

[Tessica Brown]

Hi, my name is Tessica Brown. I'm 43 years old, and I'm from St. Bernard Parish, New Orleans, Louisiana.

[Jamie Loftus]

I want to start by talking about your life a little bit. Where are you from? How did you grow up? I want to know a little bit more about you prior to this moment.

[Tessica Brown]

Okay. I'm from Louisiana, but I'm from, like, a little small town right outside of New Orleans.

[Jamie Loftus]

Okay.

[Tessica Brown]

It's called St. Bernard Parish. If you have to raise your children anywhere, this would be the place I'll go. I have five sisters. Well, four sisters, two brothers. I have five kids. I've been owning my daycare for 10 years now. I had a dance team when the glue thing first happened, I made the dance team for my girls. I have three girls.

[Jamie Loftus]

Oh, cool. Are you still running the daycare now?

[Tessica Brown]

Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am.

[Jamie Loftus]

Because you were in your late 30s, early 40s when this happened, and I talked to people with such a wide age range for this show. What was your relationship with the Internet like at the time that this happened? Did you post a lot? Yeah. What was your relationship with the Internet?

[Tessica Brown]

I have one video on TikTok. Only one? I used to go live a lot on Facebook. Like, Facebook was my thing, you know, because my kids was like, you know, this is where you belong on Facebook, I guess, because, you know. Yeah, that's so I belong a lot of posts. Right? Right. I did a lot of posting on Instagram, and like I said, I went live a lot on Facebook, but only had one video on Tick Tock. I had, like, a little singing my. My intro to Tick Tock. That was the one video. Then came the Gorilla Glue.

[Jamie Loftus]

You'd been using Facebook and Instagram for a long time. Did you have audiences sort of, like, outside of your general family or circle, or was it.

[Tessica Brown]

Yes, I had. On Instagram, I had, like. I want to say, like, 10,000 followers. And I feel like that was because, like, I have the daycare and we do. I do prom for the daycare. Oh, yeah, I do. Yeah, I do. I have pictures if you want to see. I do parades every year, and I felt like I got a lot of followers doing that.

[Jamie Loftus]

Like, especially when you're a small business owner figuring out how to make social media, like, kind of work for you. So you had so many. Some idea of, like, how to make social media work for you. Okay.

[Tessica Brown]

Right. Yeah. Now it's to the point where I post something. Now I'm looking to see how many people watched it, who commented, yeah, it's totally different from before.

[Jamie Loftus]

That's so interesting. I'm very excited to talk about that sort of shift. But first, of course, we gotta go through the day itself. So I've seen the original series of videos many times. What motivated you to post this to TikTok specifically?

[Tessica Brown]

My little girl, my daughter.

[Jamie Loftus]

So she suggested, like, well, maybe someone here will know what to do.

[Tessica Brown]

Yeah. Because the thing is, I kept saying, you know, I don't know what else to do. I don't know what to. Because I was scared to even tell my mama because I figured she was gonna Come over here and, you know, slap me in my head, you know, you shouldn't have did that. So that's why I didn't wanna call her. But when it got to the point where the ponytail just kept getting tighter and tighter, it felt like my scalp. You know how when your legs fall asleep?

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

That's what it felt like inside my head. Like, just tingling. Yeah. Just singing all the time. So I'm like, you know what I have to call Mama. And we like to call Mama. Dr. Quinn, medicine woman, because she know pretty much how to do no matter what you say. This lady could tell you exactly what to do and how to get rid of it. So she came and we did a whole bunch of stuff. And it's before the TikTok gotcha. And absolutely nothing worked. Nothing. Nothing she did worked. And I knew if my mama didn't know, I have to go, you know, social media. So my baby was like, mad. Put it on TikTok.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

And I'm like, I only have, like one video on TikTok. She said, mom, put it on TikTok. So I put it on TikTok that night. And I'm thinking, I'm guessing like 9:00 at night. I put it on TikTok. Got up the next morning, you know, getting my children ready for school. The little girl jumps up because I wake them up. I go to the doors and I start waking everybody up.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

So the oldest one, after she got up, you know, she check her phone before she even get up and brush her teeth.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

She. She come running. I'm like, what's wrong? My, you got over a million followers, girl, you going viral. I'm like, well, wait, did somebody say, you know, how I could get it off? Ma, you worried about the wrong thing. I'm like, you know what, dude? I need somebody to help me get this off. She was worried about the numbers. I'm trying to, you know, get this off or whatever.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

So, yeah, I started going through the comments. Oh, my God, those comments? Yeah.

[Jamie Loftus]

What was this first wave of comments like?

[Tessica Brown]

Listen, I promise you, I knew it was going to be like, people around here that's gonna be like, oh, you know, that was stupid. Or that was dumb. I didn't think for one second the world was gonna. You know what I'm saying?

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

And it got to the point where they telling me, you know, of course I'm dumb. That was stupid. And then letters started coming to the house. I literally got a letter to the house. And the thing is, they had My address because of course I have the daycare. So everything was. And I didn't think again, I didn't think that they would do like it did because I probably would have took all that offers. But I just thought, you know, it's gonna be people around here. They started sending me stuff. They was. Caught the phone, the phone was just ridiculous. I ended up taking my phone and threw my phone. I'm not answering absolutely nobody else because again, my phone number was on social media. So I mean, they call you stupid soon answer the phone, you dumb. Like it was bad. And then the letter, when the letter came, it was. They drew me, right?

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

With my head cut off with. I'm holding it like this.

[Jamie Loftus]

Oh my God.

[Tessica Brown]

It was some bad, bad people. It was. And the thing is, you know, like sometimes you think like people think this stuff, but for you to really say this stuff and do this stuff, I thought it was completely out of line because I can say a lot of stuff on social media, but I don't. Oh, I would send it in a text message to my sisters, you know what I'm saying? I'm never going to post that. That, that was really, really hurtful. And don't say like maybe three days after it happened. Dragged me for two weeks. She called me a nothing girl. She the one put this in her head. They kept saying I was clout chasing. Let me tell you something, ma'am. If anybody that really know me, I don't like to be embarrassed. I hate being embarrassed if I'm outside and I rip my. I hate being embarrassed so that me doing that, trust me, I wouldn't have did it if I, if I'd have knew. I would have just probably died in my head like that. I would have never put it up, I promise you.

[Jamie Loftus]

Which is so unfair. I mean I, I totally hear you. And part of what kind of confuses me about people's reaction, I mean people are just out of their mind and always looking for someone to be cruel to. I mean, I feel like that's rule number one of the Internet. I've been so confused about how the TikTok algorithm works. I feel like everyone is just erasing the fact that you weren't trying to reach anyone outside of like your general area. But because no one knows how the TikTok algorithm works, it just got sucked up and like regurgitated to everybody. And how was that your fault?

[Tessica Brown]

It was bad.

[Jamie Loftus]

I mean, I want to go back to those first couple of days as well, because I mean, just going back through the story, it seems like you're not only dealing with suddenly the eyeballs and attention of millions of people, but you're also still dealing with the physical problem. So how do you manage those first couple of days where there's like two really stressful things going on?

[Tessica Brown]

We started looking at some of the comments, and they were saying, well, use this, use that, use this. So now glue, be gone. Acetone, the stuff I started using now, of course, it was pretty, you know, as I'm trying to keep getting it off myself, but now I'm following what they're telling me. So now I got cotton balls stuck to it. The inside is not just tingling, it's burning. That first day, Judy. Judy called me, and that's from Kaleidoscope.

[Jamie Loftus]

Did you just find the TikTok?

[Tessica Brown]

Yeah, yeah. And she, of course, again, my number was on there. She said, oh, well, I'm about to send you a bunch of stuff. Okay, thank you. You know, it's something going to be in there to get it off.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

Oh, no, this is to grow your hair back. Well, we still trying to get it off at this point. So my sister was like, you know what? Like, when it all started, she said, you know what? You're going to have to he have surgery, you know what I'm saying, to get this off. Like, dude, nobody gonna give me surgery, you know, to get this off. So now she's answering my phone. She gave me the lady, Gina, a lady named Gina. She said, call her in the morning. So I ended up calling Gina the next morning.

[Jamie Loftus]

And Gina is the manager, your eventual manager.

[Tessica Brown]

But I'm still wondering, like, when is somebody going to tell me, you know, like, what I can do? You know what I'm saying? Everybody's trying to tell me what they can do for me and what they could get, but I'm still have a headache. My head is burning now. Like, it's just nobody's telling me what to do. So she called me back and said, well, I talked to a doctor, and the doctor said he could take it off. And not only can he take it off, he's gonna take it off for free. Three days later, I was in Los Angeles.

[Jamie Loftus]

Is this all happening in less than a week? Kind of.

[Tessica Brown]

Less than a week.

[Candace Benbow]

Wow.

[Jamie Loftus]

Okay.

[Tessica Brown]

I was in Los Angeles. What he did when she first called him, he thought it was a joke. And so she was like, no, I'm really, really serious. So he went and bought a can of gorilla glue, and he sprayed it on a mannequ. So he went to Putting all kind of stuff together to see if he could take it out. And whatever he put together, he was able to take it out. The mannequin head. And they flew me out there. And I tell you, they flew me out there. It took four hours for the surgery, and when I woke up, I was able to. Oh, my God.

[Jamie Loftus]

I promise you, I'm trying to wrap my head around what a crazy week that is for you, where you start. I mean, because the day. The day you posted the Tik Tok, it was just a normal work day, right? Like you.

[Tessica Brown]

Right?

[Jamie Loftus]

And then a week later, you're in Beverly Hills getting a surgery that was developed just for you.

[Tessica Brown]

Like, even my parents that were coming to the door, they was like, oh, girl, I just thought you liked that hairstyle. Like, nobody. Nobody knew why it was like that for that long.

[Jamie Loftus]

How long was your hair stuck before you posted to TikTok?

[Tessica Brown]

Over 30 days.

[Jamie Loftus]

Okay.

[Tessica Brown]

Over 30 days. And it's just like. It just. Like I said, it just. The ponytail thing is just kept getting tighter, and it was tingling in the inside, and it got to the point where I just couldn't do it anymore. I'm taking Advil, pms. Like, I'm eating M and M's.

[Jamie Loftus]

When this starts to go viral, when you start to get this, like, absurd amount of attention, that no one could be prepared for it, much less with their scalp on fire, how did your family and friends react? How did they come together for you? I think it's very funny. Like, the generation gap of your daughter being like, the numbers.

[Tessica Brown]

Oh, no, listen. My sisters was like that too. My mama was the only one that sat there and cried with me. My little sister, she was there with me through the whole thing. I'm talking from coming from the hospital because, you know, I ended up going to the emergency room because after they was telling me all the stuff they used, this is when it got beyond. I can't even take it no more. I went to the emergency room, and the lady was like, oh, I just seen you. She just seen me on TikTok.

[Jamie Loftus]

Oh, my God.

[Tessica Brown]

So she get me in there. She has this acetone stuff, and she's trying to get it out. So it's to the point where I'm gonna be in this hospital. So it was either me being hospital all this time end up having a heart attack because as she's taking the stuff off, it's burning so bad to. My pressure kept going up. So I asked her, can she give me the stuff? And then I could go home. And do it. And then, you know, my sister, my mama, they could take their time and, you know, do it some at a time, but it was just burning so much. And then, like, the next day, that's when Gina told me about Dr. Obeng. So we just stopped and just waited to go out there. Right before that, my sister started. My little baby sister, she started the GoFundMe. Because she was like, you know, you're gonna need surgery. Then she said, once you're gonna be bald, you're gonna need wigs. And if anybody know these wigs. Not cheap these days. So she started to go fund me. And I think she put it for. I think it was like $5,000 she put for the GoFundMe. The GoFundMe raised $26,000. Wow. Then they started saying that I'm suing Gorilla Glue. Now people. Oh, they want their money back from the GoFundMe. And this is when people went crazy on.

[Jamie Loftus]

Wait, can. Can you just. Where did that rumor come from?

[Tessica Brown]

I don't even know. I don't know. Cuz listen, when this happened, when I seen the numbers and every. Everybody was talking about it, I emailed Gorilla Glue myself, and I told them, I'm sorry for all of this, you know, attention. I love your products. I'm sorry. And that was it.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah. Yeah. You didn't know that.

[Tessica Brown]

Yeah, because I didn't want that. I didn't want that. I didn't want that, and I didn't want no negative stuff. But then Gorilla Glue and say it's something like, you know, just a bunch of free publicity. Everybody was buying it just to make these videos.

[Jamie Loftus]

So this rumor came up that you were suing Gorilla Glue, and then people got upset. How did that play out?

[Tessica Brown]

This is. I did it on purpose just to sue Gorilla Glue. And here's the thing again. I have a daycare. I've been having this daycare for 10 years. Yeah, I'm okay. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. I didn't need. I felt like I'm gonna say this. I felt like with the whole daycare, I was doing way better in life before this happened.

[Jamie Loftus]

I understand why no one trusts anyone on the Internet, but it's so obvious. You didn't post a lot to TikTok. You have a whole life, and you can't control what goes viral on TikTok. Like, it seems completely random. How. How does. Where do things land with the. With the GoFundMe in the longer term?

[Tessica Brown]

Okay. With the GoFundMe. I ended up taking it down and because I even had to make it a whole do a whole appeal because they messaging the GoFundMe people so we had to do a whole appeal. And then when he sent it to me 3,000 of the dollars, I came back home and I gave three different families a thousand dollars. And then with the rest of it I gave the doctor obeying because he did the surgery for me for free, right? He did the surgery for free. And then he goes to like Africa. He goes all kind of Ghana. He goes everywhere and he do all of these surgeries for, you know, like the babies with the cleft lips and he really do like all kinds of free surgeries. So I felt like if I give this to him that can help him help a lot of more people. Then they told me, oh, that was dumb. You should have never gave that money. Like nothing I did, nothing I did was okay. Everything I did was wrong. They fussed at me for doing the GoFundMe. They fussed at me from giving it away. It was just nothing. Absolutely nothing I did was okay.

[Jamie Loftus]

We'll be right back with more of my talk with Tessica Brown.

[Cleish Hearer]

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[Jamie Loftus]

We have one more act for you this evening. I don't even need to say his name.

[Regina King]

Mr. Bob Dylan, a complete unknown, is now a Golden Globe in Critics Choice nominee for best picture.

[Tessica Brown]

Bobby, what do you want to be? Whatever it is they don't want me to be.

[Regina King]

Timothy Chalamet astonishes as Bob Dylan in one of the best performances of the year and critics rave. Edward Norton is absolutely fantastic.

[Tessica Brown]

70,000 people are here and Bobby is.

[Jamie Loftus]

The reason for it. They just want me singing, blowing in the wind for the rest of my life.

[Regina King]

Don't miss the movie. Critics are healing. Five stars. It's pure cinematic magic.

[Jamie Loftus]

Turn it down.

[Regina King]

Hey Loud and named to AFI and the National Board of reviews top 10.

[Jamie Loftus]

Films of the year make some noise BD track some mud on a carpet.

[Regina King]

A complete unknown now playing only theaters rated R under 1799 without parent it's.

[Elvin Gray]

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[Dr. Michael Obeng]

A clutch off season pickup Dave. I know right? I was worried we'd bring back the same team.

[Jamie Loftus]

Oh no.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

I meant those Blackout motorized shades. MVP of the room. Blinds.com made it crazy affordable to replace our old blinds.

[Jamie Loftus]

Hard to install?

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

No, it's easy. Even you could do it.

[Regina King]

Nice.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

I installed these and then got some from my mom too. But you fly across the country to do the install? Nope. Blinds.com can do it all. All she had to do do was pick what she wanted. She talked to a design consultant for free and scheduled a professional measure and install. Look at you hall of Fame son. Oh I just picked the winning Team. They're the number one online retailer of custom window coverings in the world.

[Tessica Brown]

Oh.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

Blinds.com is the goat. The goat shop.

[Cleish Hearer]

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[Jamie Loftus]

Welcome back to 16th minute. I never use ChatGPT because I'm ethically opposed to it and it scared me. However, last night I was missing my dad and so I went on Chat GPT and I asked Chat GPT who was Mike Loftus? Hoping to read something like nice about my dad and folks, Chat GPT told me Mike Loftus was comedian and podcaster Jamie Loftus's ex boyfriend or ex partner. So I dated my dead dad according to the scary computer. Love that. That's what the historical register will show. And here's the rest of my conversation with Tessica Brown. So you go to la. Thankfully, you're able to get this resolved, right? I guess before I. Because I want to talk about how the management stuff sort of came together originally, but I do want to talk about. There were also some copycats. How did that. How did that come together? What?

[Tessica Brown]

Okay, the girl with the purple hair. Boy. I don't know if it was a girl or boy. I'm sorry, I don't know. But that person did it. They didn't do her nearly as bad as they did me. And she was trying to prove a point that, oh, you can put this on and take it right off. And she ended up in hospital. Then there was another man that put gorilla glue on a cup. He had to get the top of his lip cut off. I'm telling y'all, don't do this. Like, this is serious, right? And everybody, like, I didn't get that at all. But nobody said nothing about them talking about me. Like, I was the dumb one.

[Jamie Loftus]

You have that stuff. And then there's also. I mean, the media starts to pick up on this. How did you manage that? How did you decide who to engage with or who not to, all while you're dealing with this medical emergency?

[Tessica Brown]

I talked with Jess. Hilarious.

[Jamie Loftus]

Okay?

[Tessica Brown]

I like, talked with her on the phone. And here's the thing. I've been loving her since long time ago. And when I seen that she was calling me, I was scared to answer because I know she's a comedian. So I feel like you're gonna be like, you know. But she was like, tess, babe, you know what's going on. I told her what happened, and she was like, I'm so sorry. That made me. The love I had for her went a thousand plus. It was a lot of people like, saying, you know, it's gonna be okay. You know, you gonna get through this. But then it was those other ones.

[Jamie Loftus]

You specifically mentioned the Wendy Williams coverage. As those things come through, how do you take that in stride? How does that affect you?

[Tessica Brown]

Before, Wendy would say everything she was saying, I love Wendy. You know, me and mom watch Wendy all the time. Like, you know, how you doing? All the time.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

So what happened was as she just kept. Every day this lady had my picture on her screen. My mama. My mama called the show and she played it on our show. She played it. My mama called the show and said, wendy, my baby made a mistake. You know, I love you. My baby made a mistake. Can you please cut us some slack? And then after that, she bought a bunch of shirts for everybody that was in the audience. I still don't like her, but, you.

[Jamie Loftus]

Know, okay, so I want to take you back to la. You've gotten this surgery done successfully. You can finally think a little clear, more clearly. And you've been connected with Gina. So how does. How does that relationship come together? And how did you decide to be like, I. I need a manager to. To sort of navigate this time?

[Tessica Brown]

No. Well, she called me, like I said, and I called her the next day, and she was like, you know, this is big. I know you're trying to get it off and. But this is big. I can do this and I can do that.

[Jamie Loftus]

What kind of. What kind of things?

[Tessica Brown]

She was Honey Boo Boo's manager. I know a lot of people, you know, I can get it. You know, she told me, like, she can find somebody. I didn't know she really would find somebody, but she was saying she could find somebody and she can help me through this whole thing. And that was it. It was. A lot of people wanted to do interviews, and I didn't know what to do or how to. So she set up, like she was sending me a whole, like, layout. You have an interview at this time. Interview at this time. Interview at this time. I'll do all the interviews. Call, let her know it's done, get ready for the next one. And like I said, the biggest thing. I didn't care about the interviews. The biggest thing she did for me was finding Dr. Obeng, because that's, like, life changing. It was.

[Jamie Loftus]

This is something I've talked with a lot of people about in the Past of, you know, going from your everyday life to all of a sudden having a spreadsheet of, like, here are my interviews for the day. What is that changed? Like, where all of a sudden you're like a public figure overnight.

[Tessica Brown]

But you. Let me tell you, the thing was, I feel like if I can do all those interviews over now, it would be better because every interview I was doing, I was crying. Like, ugly crying. Every interview?

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah, yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

They asked me questions and I mean, you know, it's just. It had just happened. I'm ugly crying on every interview. Listen, I lost £20 and everything. It was bad. It was really, really bad. And then, like, two weeks after we got the glue off, you know, he gave me these.

[Jamie Loftus]

Oh, really? Wait, what? Walk me through that.

[Tessica Brown]

He did a mommy makeover two weeks later. And, you know, since I. Since I've been through so much, he was saying, I'm gonna do your mommy makeover. So he gave me breast implants and he did a. He did liposuction on my stomach.

[Jamie Loftus]

Wait, the. The doctor who did the scalp surgery?

[Tessica Brown]

Same doctor? Yes.

[Jamie Loftus]

Wait, hold on. So. So wait, you. You ended up.

[Tessica Brown]

You.

[Jamie Loftus]

Do you stay in LA for a little while after.

[Tessica Brown]

No, after. After the glue thing, I think I stayed for like, two days. And then we came back home two weeks later, we went back.

[Jamie Loftus]

You flew. You flew out to. To get implants and what else?

[Tessica Brown]

A tummy tuck. And then they gave me the diesel.

[Jamie Loftus]

Wow. So, like, this is. Okay. This is like the craziest month ever. Okay, so you go back to la, you have these procedures done. What happens then? Because now it's like, I feel like you. You, like, became a social media star overnight. You go through this first wave of interviews where I think, very understandably, you're very emotional. I'm always curious about that turning point of like, okay, now that the immediate huge moment is over, what am I gonna do now? How much do I want to engage with this moving forward?

[Tessica Brown]

Well, what happened was I went to LA for something. I don't know why I was going, but I was going for something else, right? I get off the plane and my phone, it's messages I'd have missed, all kind of. So I call him. I'm like, well, what's going on? You need to talk to your daughters and talk to them now. What is going on? The teacher came to one of my children and said, oh, we so sorry for your loss. So they're thinking, I went on this plane and the plane crashed. The Internet said I died. It was. It was Listen, it was everywhere. So now it got to the point where I'm on live. Oh, I thought you died. And still to today I could get on live and somebody's gonna say, oh, they told me you passed away. Like they literally killed me. So then a lot of stuff started.

[Jamie Loftus]

Dying off and so how long after the original incident was this?

[Tessica Brown]

Oh, this happened maybe what, a month after I died.

[Jamie Loftus]

So gorilla glue incident, surgery, interviews, implants.

[Tessica Brown]

Dead, dead, like I said. All right, so if, you know, if anybody that really, really know me, know me.

[Candace Benbow]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

In this situation, I always try to make it as a joke. I always try to make light of any situation. Just like I tell people now, right now, if I watch the video, I understand why people thought it was funny. I understand why people thought it was a joke. Because you know what? That was stupid. That was dumb. But I understand now why people thought it was funny. I didn't understand then because I was so angry.

[Jamie Loftus]

Sure.

[Tessica Brown]

But I understand now why they thought it was funny.

[Jamie Loftus]

You had, you started developing a hair product from there?

[Tessica Brown]

Yes.

[Jamie Loftus]

How did that come about? What was that process?

[Tessica Brown]

Like, like I said Dr. Lubeng put some stuff together and my hair, like all the little bald spots that I had, I had like bald spots here, but I still had some hair. But I went, got it cut like shorter than after I first had the surgery. The stuff that he had my hair growing with, we bottled it up. Now I was scared, don't get me wrong, I was scared to put it out because all I'm thinking, if I was somebody, why would I want to buy something for my hair from her? You know what I'm saying? That first day I made 70,000. I didn't make, not me personally, but yeah, I had to split it with, you know, the people that was putting it together. The manager, $70,000 in the first day. And then we added edge control, we added some hairspray. But what happened with that demand was too much because the people that was doing it was like, you know, like a little. They were no big time company. The demand couldn't keep up with what they was doing and we couldn't find nobody else to do it. So that was it, man. That was it. It was going after that. And everybody keeps saying, when are you bringing them drops back? Because the thing is they were. You know how people be like, oh, I'm using this, you know, just so I could get people to buy it. Yeah, it really, my hair really grew from there.

[Jamie Loftus]

I mean. Cause at this point we're kind of like a Few months out from the original. You mentioned earlier, like, your attitude towards social media changed significantly. What does that mean? Interacting with social media after this first wave of craziness had passed.

[Tessica Brown]

Before the craziness, it was, you know, like I said, go on live. Talk about a football game. Oh, I'm just at the park with my kids. We just, you know, live, whatever. Now I'm on live. Hey, y'all, tap the screen. Share the live. Let's get these numbers. Why am I doing all this? You know what I'm saying? I post a video every five minutes. I go back to see how many views. I shouldn't be doing that. Like, I feel like that's crazy. I've never worried about numbers before. It changed you. It changes you. It really changes you. I try to keep my hair done now.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

Once upon a time, baby, I would get on social media and just be like, you know, whatever, whatever. But now I have to make sure my lashes is done. I got to make sure, because at this point, because I have a couple of videos after that that went viral. So now I'm like, oh, well, I don't know what video will go viral. So I got to try to make myself presentable. Like, even my children, they'll come show me. Now. It's. You know, at first it was. They were just posting stuff. Now, let me see this. Bring me this phone. Let me see this video. I need to see what's in the background. I need to see if anything on the floor. It's Dre. Draining. I'm gonna tell you that it's draining.

[Jamie Loftus]

It sounds like the kind of thing that once it starts, like, you don't. You don't really go back, right?

[Tessica Brown]

No. Some people, if they do, you know, God bless them. But I would have never thought this is how I would be when it comes to social media at this point. Now, don't get me wrong. I still post, like, me and my kids dancing, like, you know, just, you know, little cute things. Yeah, I don't post nothing. Oh, well, let's do this, because it'll go viral. I don't do that.

[Jamie Loftus]

The answer is either, like, quit, or you have to totally, like, go with.

[Tessica Brown]

It, like, get off altogether. Because you know what's another bad thing? Don't read comments. That what everybody keeps telling me. Stop reading the comments. Stop reading the comments. Of course, me reading the comments, crying, ugly, crying, because the girl. Them people in those comments. My thing is, because this is a lot of stuff that I see that I could go make a comment on But I wouldn't make a comment. I'll screenshot it and make the comment and send it in my sister's group. I'm not gonna go on social media. Another thing is, if I wasn't as strong as I feel like I am, I would have unalived myself long time ago. This is how bad it was. This is how bad it was. And one boy, he ended up coming in my inbox, and he was like, I'm so sorry, Ms. Tessica, but I'm in this troll group, and we go around and we just troll people. And I'm sorry this happened to you. This. I blocked them because you're not gonna put me, you know, in my face over here and then try to come in my inbox and telling me you're sorry. So I ended up, like, I started blocking. Listen, I think thousands of people that's blocked. And one of my sons was like, no, you don't block nobody. You know, any engagement is, no, no, no, y'all. No, no, I'm blocking you. It's to the point where when I look on social media, unless I'm live, when I look on social media, the comments. I would think everybody in the world just loved me. But no, I had my son, he's on it, and he's just taking off all the bad ones before. Before I could see him.

[Jamie Loftus]

I think it's so cool. And also just, like, from a, like, Internet culture perspective. Interesting that your kids are helping you navigate this, too, because they, you know, were, like, born with phones in their hands. I'm assuming just because of, like, the generational difference. How did they sort of help you through this moment? Was there anything where their feelings about what you should do or how you should interact with social media was different?

[Tessica Brown]

Okay. This was the week I didn't even have it off my head yet. When this first happened, there was a picture going around with a lady, like, with pieces of hair, like, everywhere. And of course, they said it was me. So I let them know, hey, you know, y'all know that's not me. Look at my head. You know it's still here. Y'all know that's not me. Go to school. Nobody told them about that, but they started singing the Gorilla Glue Girl song. So my baby came home crying. I just let her know, hey, you know what you do? Learn the song. And next time they sing it, y'all sing it with them. But then I'm trying to encourage them, and I go in the bathroom and I'll start crying because it's like, because I put them, you know, I will go cry because, you know, I felt like I put them in that situation and I didn't want my children to be bullied behind something, you know, that I did. But those same friends.

[Jamie Loftus]

Yeah.

[Tessica Brown]

Now it's like, oh My God, it's Ms. Jessica. They won't take pictures.

[Jamie Loftus]

It seems like, I mean, a lot has changed and also not a lot has changed. Right. Has your day to day shifted that much since the whole ordeal?

[Tessica Brown]

No, I still get up at 5:30 in the morning, do my daycare on a Saturday. I try to put a bunch of videos together so I can have, you know, stuff to post during the week when it's time for the dance team to do anything. We still have practice. No, it's pretty much the same thing except for anywhere I go, no matter where it is. Oh my God. It's the.

[Jamie Loftus]

It's always something.

[Tessica Brown]

I went to Angola to go see my uncle. Like now I think all of that stuff is cute. Like when people call me a gorilla goo girl now it's like, hey, at first I kept saying my name is Tessica. I cried so much, my name is Tessica. But now it's like, whatever, that's. I'm gonna go ahead on and run with it.

[Jamie Loftus]

What motivates you to maintain this relationship with social media?

[Tessica Brown]

Those little girls. My little girls. And it's a lot. Listen, in between all of this, I promise you it's so much. But next month we start shooting a movie about what happened.

[Jamie Loftus]

What, Wait, how did that come about?

[Tessica Brown]

It's. His name is Elvin Gray. He's a director that usually. Well, he just posts. He makes movies about people that went viral. This movie, I'm gonna be in it. Like the other movies that he make, he pretty much just takes up from tick tock, seeing how it went or he taking stuff from headlines. But with this one, he has all the information from me.

[Jamie Loftus]

So is that gonna be made like you're acting in it or is it documentary?

[Tessica Brown]

Yeah, I will be in it. I will be in it. I will be playing myself. Yeah, they're gonna see, they're gonna see like what happened right before I put this glue in my head. Well, if I was a normal human being that bullied me, I would be like, oh my God, this girl was really going through a lot. And we just put more. People have no clue what I was going through. Like in the house by myself before this glue thing. Like, yeah, the day this glue thing happened. Right. But they'll be able to see it in the movie.

[Jamie Loftus]

Outside of that, what is next for you? Do you have like bigger social media aspirations or is it just sort of maintaining your normal life?

[Tessica Brown]

Well, I have a new manager now and I was telling him that, you know, I wanted to do a swimsuit line. It's a couple of things that I want to do because like, even when this first happened, my sister was like, girl, you got to leave that daycare alone. This is what I've always wanted to do. I worked at a daycare for seven years before Hurricane Katrina. Hurricane Katrina came and we was, you know, displaced for like two years. We came back and I seen that things were happening around here. I ended up getting a job, ended up quitting. But this is what I love. I would never, I don't care what happens. I will never, ever let this daycare go.

[Jamie Loftus]

My final question is just sort of reflecting on these like last couple of years at this point and the emotional and also like life changing journey you have been on. When you reflect on it now, would you do anything differently and was there anything that really sort of surprised you?

[Tessica Brown]

Okay, so as far as would I change anything? Promise you wouldn't have never used the girl either?

[Jamie Loftus]

Well, yeah, wouldn't have never.

[Tessica Brown]

Wouldn't have never. And then everything. I'd just be, you know, still normal. Yeah, but I think that's the biggest thing. Look, don't use it if you don't have it, go get it. If you can't get it, go without it. That's it.

[Jamie Loftus]

Thank you so much to Tessica for her time and her insight and keep your eyes peeled for her upcoming projects. You can follow her on Instagram or TikTok, mdoldlady. And if nothing else, I hope this is the kind of 16th minute story that reminds you that that people are people first. If you had been stressed enough to post an egregious L, this could have been you. So have some grace. And when it comes to capitalizing on these random Internet moments, again, consider who that capitalizing is supporting. If it's an already rich person exploiting followers to become richer because they're Mormons who took PPP loans to buy Chanel purses, get them. Check the list of episodes. But if they're capitalizing on their moment to keep getting by with joy and aren't hurting anyone, chill out. Tessica's awesome. Thanks for listening and for your moment of fun, here's some more. Regina King as Tessica Brown.

[Tessica Brown]

Bye. Every day as many as one people fall victim to using gorilla glue in place of a beauty product and they deserve compensation. We all do. You should not have to go through life with hair like a Lego man because one time you use Gorilla Glue instead of Dax Wave Grease. We will get you monies for Gorilla Glue or the next best thing. A lifetime supply of Gorilla Glue.

[Jamie Loftus]

Sixteen Minutes is a production of Cool Zone Media and iHeartRadio. It is written, hosted and produced by me, Jamie Loftis. Our executive producers are Sophie Lichterman and Robert Evans. The amazing Ian Johnson is our supervising Producer and our editor. Our theme song is by Sad13. Voice acting is from Grant Crater and Pet shout outs to our dog producer Anderson. My cats Flea and Casper and my pet rock bird who will outlive us all byee With Kroger brand products. You can get all of your favorite things this holiday season because our proven quality products come at exceptionally low prices and with a money back quality guarantee. Every dish is sure to be a favorite from sweet sugar cookies and holiday ham to that perfect slice of pie. Whether you shop, delivery, pickup or in store, Kroger brand has all your favorite things. Kroger Fresh for everyone.

[Dr. Michael Obeng]

Hey there, it's Scott Patterson from I Am all in again. Podcast Life Short Talk Fast Stream Gilmore Girls on Hulu that's right, grab your coffee and get cozy because all seven seasons of Gilmore Girls are now on Hulu. Hulu Stream all the witty, banner, heartwarming moments and awkward Friday night dinners with Lorelei, Rory and the eclectic mix of characters. Whether you're rewatching or going Gilmore for the first time, Hulu has you covered. It's a show. It's a lifestyle. It's now streaming on Hulu.

[Gina Rodriguez]

Have you ever considered becoming a surrogate at my Donor Connection? You can help a family bring their baby home while earning $50,000 or more. Use your compensation to pay off debt, save for a home or achieve your dreams. We're looking for women who loved being pregnant and want to help others experience parenthood with unmatched support. Every step of the way, your journey will be life changing. Take the first step today. Visit mydonorconnection.com surrogate to complete our quick questionnaire and see if you qualify. That's mydonorconnection.com surrogate now on BET Wednesdays at 109 Central.

[Tessica Brown]

BET Original Series D Ara from Detroit from executive producer Kenya Barris and BET Studios comes what Variety calls a PI Drama with flair. Meet Diara Brickland, a public school teacher turned amateur private eye after the disappearance of a very hot date. With the help of her friends and even her ex husband D? Ara's on a mission to find her missing lover. D? Ara from Detroit is now on bet.

[Jamie Loftus]

Wednesdays at 10, 9 Central, Thursday on ABC.

[Joanna Teplin]

Get ready to move that bus. The beloved series Extreme Makeover Home Edition is making a triumphant return to kick off the new year. Join the Makeover mavens Joanna Teplin and Clee Shearer as they hit the road on a mission to transform lives of deserving families. They have just four days to rally communities, demolish old homes and rebuild not just houses, but lives. Extreme Makeover Home Edition premieres Thursday at 8, 7 Central on ABC and will be available to stream next day on Hulu.