

For years, this page sat with thousands of words on how the hair extensions were invented. I was editing it and lost all of that work.
Instead of being frustrated, I decided it was because this page wasn’t supposed to solely be about the invention, and creation of a hair extension brand.
Because this was only a small part of me.
I concluded this page should be about the creation and invention of the person, Tiffany Twist, so that’s where we’re going to go. Give you a glimpse into the days, the months, and years I’ve traveled through.
I was born and raised in Minnesota. Lots of moving. My mom and dad were divorced when I was just a toddler. I had a sister a year younger. Too young to remember as much as I did.
Subsequently, and because of my mom’s next marriage, not so great males entered my life. I both watched & suffered abuse in that time. I did everything I could to protect my little sister, making sure that I was the one who was “chosen."
I loved her so much.
Even with such heavy burden for just a little girl, I had a passion for creation.
When I went through the collection of items my mom had stashed away from my childhood, I found paintings, pictures, stories and little books I’d written, including one about horses and the little girl who loved them.


I don’t know that i'd ever seen a horse in real life, maybe in story books, or on a small TV but I also wrote stories about dogs and cats, animals I knew; birds and bunny rabbits, animals I saw.
About 5 or 6 years later, my mom left her abusive husband, and we moved south to Alabama.
That was a big journey for a little girl and her hamster. Another new school, another place to feel I didn't belong. Still, I smiled and tried to make friends.
Late summer of 1979 brought an intense hurricane, the strongest ever recorded in Alabama, and one we braved through and still very scary. Shortly after, my dad forced her to bring us children back to Minnesota. New to another school, once again.
I spent my preteen and teenage years in a large home with my mother’s 3rd husband, and he soon decided I was an easy target for him. My sister became the golden child, and, to her, he became our “rescuer,” the one who saved us from living in a trailer court.
The harassment crossed the line for the last time, and when I turned 16, I left that house. When I did, I was tagged the troubled child, a runaway, nothing to pay attention to. She’s just bad, disobedient and rebellious, they told themselves.
But I wasn’t.
And no one bothered to ask what was really bothering me so I never went back.
Ever since I can remember, I loved everybody I came into contact with.
I always carried a warm smile for others, made sure those around me felt comfortable, even while they were making me feel incredibly uncomfortable. I never wanting to even hurt a single creature and made friends of ants, butterflies, and even spiders... all the creatures I watched living their life outside, in an endless and vast world of nature, while wanting to be free to escape the inside that held me hostage, and especially during the hard and lonely times when no people could be found.
Just me and nature, with creatures who were free. And in their freedom, I’d find hope for my own bondage.
Emancipated at 17, when I had become pregnant, I had my first daughter 10 days after I graduated from high school. Though I lived across town and had to drive 40 minutes every morning to get there, I fulfilled my credits and made sure I wouldn’t become a “drop out.”
I was learning to be a mom in a tiny house on a junkyard, catching mice that seemed to appear faster than I could keep up with them. Life felt overwhelming at times, but my boyfriend and I were doing the best we could with our too-early, adult situation.
And, a little baby like this, changed my boyfriend. He became very possessive over his daughter, and mean to me. He didn’t even want me to take her out of the house, dress her in anything but her pajamas, telling me I only wanted to dress her up to “parade” her around the mall with my friends.

This relationship became emotionally and physically abusive towards me, so after a couple years together, I ended it.
A few years later, I met and married my first husband. We had 2 babies, in the following few years. I was in my early 20s and struggling greatly with my past abuse.
Living my life become a continuous battle, fighting myself, my existance, and my past childhood abuse.
As my babies played on the kitchen floor below me, I'd contemplate the knife I was using to prepare my dinner, and wonder if I could use it to cut myself open, if the pain would just bleed out of me...
Knowing this was not what I ultimately wanted, I sought answers and began to ask for help.
I found the Lord and buried myself deep into the Bible. I read it over and over again until it was a part of me. The promises. The redemption. The forgiveness. The love.
Through that, I became devoted to intercessory prayer.
I prayed for myself, for others, and for things of which I had no clue. And I do recall asking God to do something great with me, vowing to serve Him in my life...
A repayment to Him, for saving me from mine.
That foundation would catapult me into a lifestyle I could have never dreamed of. And when I say that, when I say, asking God to use you for the good of humanity, it is not a pretty picture or path that lies before you…
Because humanity can be pretty ugly, as I learned early on.
During the latter time of my first marriage, I began writing what became my first book, Tiffany Twisted. Needing to release the pain I carried from childhood, I sat myself down and wrote for 12 hours straight.
I wasn’t sure what I was writing, or what I should do with it, until I pulled out of my driveway one day.
My neighbor, across the street, lived on a large lot and was outside, cutting her grass. As I backed out my driveway, I felt or, I heard, God say, “Stop and ask her if she’s an editor.”
It was the strangest thing, and felt a bit embarrassing to ask a stranger something like this, but I know what I heard.
So I obeyed.
She answered, “Yes, I am, and my husband’s a publisher, we own a publishing company.”
I told her about my writing and she said to bring it by. When I dropped it off at her door, she said they will get back to me in a couple weeks.
The next day, there was a knock at my door, I opened it, and it was her, she said, “We will publish your book.”
My husband thought it was stupid. He didn’t like anything about me by this point. Wanted his party girl back. I mean who did I think I was, something special, he asked?

After 10 years of marriage, I found out my husband had cheated years before. We decided to separate after I became friends with a male entertainer I met on a night out with his sister. I didn’t think a friendship was cheating but I became emotionally involved with the man.
While my husband and I were separated, I became pregnant. And, the man, who wasn’t my husband, didn’t want children so I had a big decision to make.
I ended up divorcing my husband and having the baby, but only by God’s intervention and was married to the baby’s father a few months later.
My second marriage lasted 17 years and we raised our son together, along with my other children.
While I was pregnant, I wrote my book Some Dance - Hey Bartender, Give Me A Decade Of Marriage On The Rocks, A Therapist Straight Up And A Fantasy Guy With A Twist (May 2005 by et al Publishing) and also developed interest in writing screenplays so I studied all I could find and even attended a condensed version of film school in LA after a psychic told me I’d write a very famous one someday. Still waiting on that, I think.
During those first couple years of my 2nd marriage, I worked hard toward some success with my books, thinking that was the way my life would go. (God told me when I was nine years old I would be an author, so that’s what I was going to be.)
One season, I spent time on calls with Oprah’s producers.
They liked my book, Tiffany Twisted, and were considering it for a redemption show on overcoming childhood abuse, but, because of my inexperience and being equity published, even while winning a Minnesota Independent Publishing award, my publisher would not be able to handle the volume it would require to continue on that course. I was honored to even be considered.
The Some Dance book, I felt like I had some acclaim when a television show wanted to do an episode on it. Because of this, I rushed the finishing of that book, which I regret. My story was featured in the Style Network television series Diary of an Affair. The episode, titled "Tiffany Twist," aired on May 6, 2005.
There were other television producers reaching out on another project, because at this same time, I am discovering hair extensions and start wearing various products. I become pretty frustrated with many factors, including the length of wear, how they looked, how they blended. mostly frustrated with the damage that they were causing in my hair and even my daughter’s hair.
Since I was a mom to a little one all over again, I used a lot of my time to experiment with other products and ideas for getting hair extensions in myself. The very first ideas for a soft bond started around 2005/2006.
Once I had something sort-of working, I began to share it with others in online message boards. There were producers who took notice and I started talking with producers for Montel Williams, (did not appear) and another with Rachael Ray, and that segment aired sometime around 2006, I think, and was just a product feature.
So, while this project was gaining attention, I was still battling every issue in the development of it and worked tirelessly to resolve each one that came to me.
This went on for years and eventually I would fix those problems and apply for the patent for the method I had developed. Since this would have required disclosure, I chose to protect the formula I created as a trade secret instead.
In 2008, I became a grandmother and my daughter, needing a job to support her new little family, asked if I would watch my grandson, since I work at home. This was not something I wanted to do, I wanted her to be able to raise her son, and be with him, herself.
So, this is when I conceived the idea of using my product creation to offer the service of installing the hair extensions in others using my unique method and processes. I taught my daughter everything I know and we began to see clients in my home. When my younger daughter turned 16, she joined the business, as well.

Shortly after, I created the business WEST COAST HAIR, named after my love of gorgeous hair on those beautiful stars in the Hollywood I was raised with, Farrah Fawcett, especially. (Probably it was her hair she wore, I’m guessing not hair extensions, but now we all could achieve those long, full locks, and look just as great even if we were born without beautiful hair.)
I opened our first studio in downtown White Bear Lake, a small, little town near our capital city of Saint Paul in Minnesota and the exact place I met my first boyfriend, my eldest daughter’s father.
At the same time, I began building a small client list in Los Angeles, after I was called out there by a celebrity make-up artist to work with her actress friend.
This was a magical time but the product still needed work. It wasn’t yet perfected enough for the masses.
Still, my daughters and I began traveling back-and-forth from Minnesota regularly, every month or two. This was a big deal and so much fun. We loved California so much. I had lots of history through my lineage there. Sometimes it felt like I’d been there my whole life.
While doing this, and getting the word out, a related producer in Los Angeles showed interest in a reality show idea after meeting with my husband and me. So, we began to work together on that.
It was nearly a year of planning and filming, but because the producer wanted this based around my family, whereas I wanted it based around my business (somehow, I just knew it would destroy my marriage and family if we did it his way) we hit an impasse and had to drop the project.
Interesting, because my greatest fears regarding my family would all be met one day, anyway.

After this, a Shark Tank casting call produced interest and I spent time working with them for an early season when the show was just gaining interest, and this was another exciting turning point for my family.
Later, when they decided to hold me until the following season (we were late to the gate) my producer ended up quitting to work on another show so my appearance couldn’t be fulfilled as expected and, unfortunately, was never to be revived again.
.We soon outgrew our small hair studio and moved to Minneapolis, for a more central, expandable location. Once there, a surge in business took place and I started to wonder about a second studio location, but that was a big step. One I didn’t think I was ready for.
Then, when a strange man attempted to break into my Los Angeles hotel in the middle of the night, I decided the idea of a solid location in LA needed to top the list.
My daughter found a really cute spot on Rodeo Drive in the Rodeo Collection. It was under construction, so we waited and planned. It would be almost a year before we had occupancy.
I signed leases, secured an apartment, rented a U-Haul, put the places together, and then Covid happened. My beautiful, new Beverly Hills studio was open just 4 weeks before I had to close it down.
Because 2019 brought so much devastation to my life––my daughters had left the work at our Minneapolis location to take a break, the client list was overwhelming and busy, my marriage was coming to an end, and my dad lay in a hospital bed, dying––nothing made any sense, and now the world was shutting down.
I spent that following year in my California apartment, alone, and used the time to write another book, All Just Prisoners Here.
I walked empty California streets and considered walking off a building top while I was there. Most people had someone to spend shutdowns with—husbands, family, friend groups—I had no one and lived some very dark days. So I did what I do with my pain and confusion, and I wrote. No plans to publish this one, though, it’s dark. And that’s from someone who writes about childhood abuse, divorce, abortion, some of the more painful experiences life can offer.
I came back to Minnesota, and with my city in upheaval after 2020 riots, I closed down my Minneapolis location. I spent everything I’d saved to open Beverly Hills and with no business for four months, maybe $180,000 in total loss, it was plenty to shut me down. Never did I think to prepare for something like this.
At this point, I’d lost everything: family, father, husband, and my livelihood, so when my sister talked about having her DNA done and how exciting her results were, I was intrigued.
I wish I would not have been.
Because when I did my own DNA, I found out she is only my half sister and my dad was not my dad.
I’m not even a part of this family now?
This was hard to grasp, being created out of a one-night affair. Never knowing the person who helped create me. I couldn’t work for three months.
I came to discover things about myself. Reasons why I might be the black sheep, and so unliked by the people who raised me.
I did the best I could and then another huge blow would come my way.
After a year or two to think on it, I reached out to the living siblings of the DNA family.
They rejected me. Wanted nothing to do with me.
My only great takeaway from that experience is finding my DNA dad was a successful businessman, starting a business with his 2 sons, same as I had done with my 2 daughters, and this made me feel at home in myself. A connection to who I was and how I'd become so different than anyone I knew in my own family.


II was able to see pictures of him, when he was younger and so much became clear.
I had never seen such a smile on any other face, from the time I was born, until that day. And, he, my DNA dad had that very same smile.
My heart grew the moment I laid my eyes on him. A man I'd never meet and who I was created from. Made me truly a one of a kind.
And I knew their rejection had nothing to do with me personally, and more so just protection of the family they knew, and loved. I was an unwanted stranger so, I understood.
During this time, I reconnected with a man from my past, and while it didn’t work out romantically, he offered to help me work on my business systems and software. The systems I had relied on for years were disrupted, and my business plummeted.
After spending 2 years alone in an underground cellar of an apartment, unable to work and going deep inside myself to understand this, God moved in me.
I recorded my stories for future books and decided it was time to move forward.
Now in a bright new tower of a place to live, I’m repairing my life’s work. I have shut out the outside world to work on my businesses, my products and courses, knowing this is a solid solution for so many who love the idea of hair extensions and are frustrated with the products and methods out there.
I’m writing and creating again. Finding so much joy in every day as I watch the sun rise to greet me.
I’m creating courses that teach and coach others on how to apply their own extensions or how to add it to their business professionally, or creating a business of their own, licensing my products and methods.
So, that’s where we are today.
Five decades of a life I’m now happy to keep living. It’s quieter, calmer, and filled with way more peace than I ever knew was achievable.
I’ve also created a hair care line, something I hadn’t planned, and it was more recently brought to my attention that while breaking up with that very first boyfriend three decades ago…
That, while he told me I’d be nothing but a trailer trash drunk with eight kids, I placed my hand on my hip and stated, “Not true, I’m going to own my own hair care line one day…just like Paul Mitchell.”
At 19 years-old, I had no idea why I was saying that, no business even thinking that, but here we are.

Because, with God at the helm, our own innate confidence, freedom and the becoming of who we came here to be, amazing possibilities can be fulfilled for all of us, if we keep at it.
I’ve done my best to do exactly that.
And while I may not be a Paul Mitchell today, we don’t know what the future holds and as far as I can see it, I am just now -- FINALLY -- getting started!
And now I can boldly state, may the next fifty bring to me all the laughter, joy and happiness I missed out on in the first 50!
To be continued…



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