Hair accessories such as claw clips are increasingly popular for effortless up-dos, but one teenager has warned against wearing them while driving after she was left brutally injured by hers.
Jeena Panesar put her hair up in a claw clip before heading out to her car on January 24, but feared she would die after it sliced through her scalp and became lodged in her head.
She was driving home from work in Swadlincote, Derbyshire, when her vehicle hit a tree and the car skidded for 50 metres before flipping over - throwing Jeena against the roof and crushing the clip into her head.
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The 19-year-old was travelling at around 50 to 60mph on her drive home when the accident resulted in her being savagely injured by her hair accessory, which remained in her scalp for around two hours.
Jeena managed to escape the wreckage and flagged down a nearby motorist to help her before passing out as "most or all" of the clip was embedded skull-deep in her flesh.
"It's sad to say but I kind of thought I was going to die," said the student teacher, who was rushed to hospital by ambulance where the 10cm-long clip was removed.
Shocking selfies show the giant 30cm wound running from the back of her scalp to her left eyebrow, which she's not able to move even six weeks on.
Jeena, from Derby, said: "When the car started crashing the claw clip wedged into the back of my head. Then the car roof clamped down into my head, so it was a joint effort from both.
"It was just really painful. If you've ever worn a claw clip and forgotten to take it out and lay down on your back, it's that pressure and that discomfort.
"I had to lie there with what I'm assuming is most or all of it stuck in the back of my head. I think I might have been really cold and just in too much shock to feel all of the pain.
"When the clip was in the back of my head, they [the paramedics] didn't let me see the damage that had been done because they didn't want to scare me.
"When I arrived at the hospital, a female nurse was like, 'oh that's probably really painful'. She turned me over and then took it out."
She's now warning motorists to ditch wearing claw clips while driving and use an elastic bobble instead to avoid the same gruesome experience.
"Because I work in a school," Jeena explained. "I keep my hair up in a claw clip at the back because I can't be bothered to brush it.
"I didn't know wearing a claw clip while driving was a problem until I had the accident. It has definitely deterred me from wearing claw clips.
"Now I've seen it's happened to other people too so I'm part of a rare handful of people in this world who have experienced that.
"Don't wear a claw clip whatsoever when driving. If you want to tie your hair up, just use a rubber band."
After the crash Jeena crawled out of the car's shattered window and was able to flag down a driver in a passing car, before passing out.
Jeena regained consciousness to find concerned passersby had called her parents and the paramedics who drove the injured student to Queens Medical Centre in Nottingham.
She stayed in hospital for three days, where surgeons cleaned and stitched up the skull-deep wound.
Six weeks on from the incident, Jeena's still got a lengthy scar and has lost movement in her left eyebrow due to muscle damage in her forehead.
Her viral post has been viewed more than three million times and has racked up almost 1,000 comments from horrified TikTok users, who will "never wear a claw clip in a car again".
One said: "I'm slowly taking off my claw clip on the bus." while another added: "My jaw literally dropped."
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