4 Months on finasteride & minoxidil, good progress

[I.D WALKER]

Reducing the dosage at first may be instrumental in helping to minimize adverse sides, for finasteride. beginners in particular. Incremental dosing may be key here. There is some anecdotal evidence that this approach may be worthwhile to further explore and/or implement. Always put your personal health and overall well being first.

 

[BeardedOne]

That is an excellent post ID Walker. I started at 1.25mg but after a couple of months I began to play around with the dose, knowing my own body a little and how it was reacting to the dose. So I began reducing the dose, skipping a day every week or so. I'm taking the approach that maintaining a little bit of finasteride in my system will suppress DHT levels and therefore positively impact my hair loss. I think with everyone (who can safely tolerate finasteride) there is a sweet spot in terms of how much finasteride they should take. It's not necessarily 1mg per day. It could be less, maybe more too, I suppose.

 

[I.D WALKER]

Thanks BeardedOne, I hope you find your sweet spot soon.:sun:

 

[BeardedOne]

Hi Ashurockers2211, sorry I haven't been on the forum for a while, been quite busy and a lot of travelling. Unfortunately by the time I get to post photos my haircut will no longer be new! I promise I'll do it again after the next haircut!

Things still going good, I think, not too much to report. More pictures soon.

 

[lukeyybrown]

So are you still running finasteride? just at a lower dosage?

 

[BeardedOne]

So are you still running finasteride? just at a lower dosage?

Yes, about .8mg a day.

 

[RonBurgondy]

The hairs are the runners, barefoot on the street, about to pass out. minoxidil is like that ball-buster of a life coach screaming KEEP GOING!!! in the runners ear, squeezing just another few more yards out of them, step by step. And finasteride is like the water station, or a pit stop, making them stronger with every station and pit stop, bringing them back to 100% so that they can keep going and finish the race. At least that's how I see it!

@BeardedOne - Well Said! Thanks for the great analogy. Have you had any bad sides since getting on the finasteride regime?

 

[BeardedOne]

@RonBurgondy - no real bad sides. I think it makes your junk feel 'tighter', if that makes sense. I had slight ball ache at the beginning but I can't even remember what it feels like now.

 

[BeardedOne]

Just a quick update: things are still going well, I have not had a single comment in recent times about thinning hair (when before I might get one every couple of weeks or so) and I have actually noticed that nobody seems to be glancing at my hairline anymore. I feel it's gone from 'thinning' to borderline 'age-appropriate', in that I'm somewhere around a NW2 now at aged 33. Recently I've taken to either combing it back or slicking it back and it looks pretty good - not like Brad Pitt good but good enough. In any case whether it looks 'good' or not to other people isn't exactly the reason, it's more about whether or not it's acceptable to me. It's not perfect, but it's finally in the realm of acceptable to me.

Also one thing I forgot about is that, regardless of what you do, sometimes your hair just looks like sh1t3. Nothing to be done. Wrong shampoo, water, sweat etc. I think the last few years I blamed that on thinning strands. But it's not just that - just to repeat, sometimes your hair just looks like sh1t3. So wear a hat!

 

[BeardedOne]

Here's a quick pic of the left-hand side of my hairline:


The photo is with hair wet and pulled back. I think you can see clearly where the finasteride + minoxidil has helped to regrow some hair at pretty much my juvenile hairline, and you can also see that it's not so thick for the first 1cm. I'm not sure whether any of the new hairs will ever come back fully?

In any case I'm still quite satisfied as a huge amount of those hairs in the first 1cm were not there or were barely present a year ago and even the rest of my hair looks healthier than then, too.

 

[oggabogg]

Wow gj man, hope i have that much progress in two months aswell, in second month now.

 

[BeardedOne]

8 month update pics

I'm now 8 months into my finasteride & minoxidil regime so thought I'd do a couple of comparison pics:

Pre-Finasteride, August 2013


8 months on Finasteride & Minoxidil, July 2014



Yes - wet hair in the second one, possibly different lighting although I took them in the same spot under the same lights at the same time of day! But I think you can see that the forelock has widened significantly since last year, so much so that I can wear my hair slicked back like this and I think it looks pretty good. Also, so much of the hair on my hairline was so weak, almost see-through and unmanageable, and they have also somewhat thickened up. I'm still about a NW2-NW2.5, but I think I just about get away with it.

 

[mosd]

thanks for posting update! Could you do a one little more outzoomed? So we can se your full head?

 

[BeardedOne]

hi mosd, thanks for the interest! I'd rather not post a full-head pic as I do like being anonymous on this blog. It might be silly but I don't try to let on to anyone that I'm worried about my hair so I'd rather not reveal myself on the internet about it! Also, I don't know how to blur out my face...

 

[BeardedOne]

Hi MrChrome, cheers for the comment. I do agree with you, I don't regularly slick my hair back like that but thought it would be good to take pictures wet and slicked back as it's the harshest condition and you can see what the receding part is like.

 

[BeardedOne]

Hi Ashurockers, sorry for the late reply. Usually style my hair short cut on the sides and long enough on top to style to one side or to mess up convincingly.

Here are a couple of comparison shots from before I started finasteride and today, nearly 9 months after I started finasteride. The snaps I took today are more or less how I try to style my hair now, although it's not much of a style really. I took some of the snaps right after the shower so you can see the hair fully wet.


Pre-finasteride (August 2013):


9 months on finasteride (August 2014) - Wet:

 

[BeardedOne]

9 months on finasteride (august 2014) - Dry:

 

[lp-killen]

That is amazing!! I'm so glad for you! How do you feel?

 

[BeardedOne]

Well, I still worry about my hair but definitely not as much as before. I'm doing all I'm prepared to do right now so that in itself makes me feel a little better. Of course, I'd still love to be full NW1, and I have days where I think it just looks like **** and stresses me out. But by and large I think it looks okay, presentable if still very difficult to style.

 

[BeardedOne]

I think the meds have worked somewhat on my temples, not as much as the crown but definitely an improvement. Psychologically, at least.

I considered a hair transplant last year but I don't know, I don't feel I need one anymore - at least that's how I feel now. Initially I wanted a procedure to just fill in the corners but now I'm not convinced that's the way to go as it wouldn't match the density of my hair and probably just stick out. hair transplants are a big decision and risky, too, like any cosmetic surgery. We'll see...

- - - Updated - - -

Crown shot, August 2013:


Crown shot, August 2014: