5 years fighting hair loss (20 to 25 years old)

[SPascucci]

Sorry for my english, its not my first language, im making this thread to show everyone my story of 5 years battling hairloss, im now 25 years old, i had receeded temples since i was 17 but it was until i was 20 that i noticed that all my hair in the top was thinner and grew slower than the hair the sides, i was diffuse thinning in all the top, so at 20 years old i decided to start minoxidil, this is my regimen

REGIMEN
20-23 years old-minoxidil 1 ml once a day
23-24 years old- no treatment (lost a lot of hair due to stopping min)
24-25 years old- finasteride only for 9 months
microneedling once a week for 3 months
minoxidil 0.5 ml once a day (1/4 of the recommended dose) for 3 months

This is my hair at 20 years old

and this is after a few months of minoxidil usage

as you can see minoxidil worked great for me and i regrew a lot of density on it but eventually after 2 years of usage i started slowly losing my results, i had super thin hair on top i decided to buzz my hair and stop minoxidil after 3 years of usage at 23 years old, i went one year with this buzzed look and people said it suited me so i was okay with it

at 24 years old at the start of the pandemic i decided to grow my hair to see how it looked, as i was buzzing my hair i never realized how much hair i lost after stopping minoxidil and this was the result

i was shocked, i knew you lost a lot of hair after stopping minoxidil but as i was buzzing my hair it was not this noticeable, i panicked at the idea of losing even more hair and immediately ordered finasteride, i saw some great results on finasteride alone in reddit so i was hopping i was one of the lucky ones that got a lot of regrowth from finasteride alone, this was my hair after 8-9 months of finasteride only usage

finasteride basically mantained and made my hair thicker, also i got very minor regrowth only in the temples area, side effects of finasteride were like 2 days of ballache at the first weeks of treatment and i think i have a lower libido but i count that as a positive side effect, also my beard grows at a slower rate, finasteride did what it could for me so i decided to add minoxidil and microneedling but only in the crown area, so i decided to use a low dosage of 0.5 ml once a day, so 1/4 of the recommended dose, this is after only 3 months of adding min and microneedling in the crown

im super happy, still not a great density but i have a lot more coverage than i had a year ago but im only in my third month of minoxidil so i think i will see more improvements, i think im finally winning the fight

 

[Einstein]

SPascucci, great write up and summary consisting of pics. I hate when people write books with nonsense and irrelevant sh!t, but yours was concise and straight to the point. Well done.

Your results are remarkable. Your results are a testament to the power of microneedling and Minoxidil combined. Whatever you do don’t stop minoxidil and don’t stop finasteride, you’ll be back at ground zero. You should elaborate a little more on your microneedling. Congrats.

 

[Pacho]

great result!

 

[SPascucci]

SPascucci, great write up and summary consisting of pics. I hate when people write books with nonsense and irrelevant sh!t, but yours was concise and straight to the point. Well done.

Your results are remarkable. Your results are a testament to the power of microneedling and Minoxidil combined. Whatever you do don’t stop minoxidil and don’t stop finasteride, you’ll be back at ground zero. You should elaborate a little more on your microneedling. Congrats.

Thanks!! yes i am surprised at how fast my crown is filling, i am lucky to live in a country where finasteride and min are ultra cheap so i am planning to stay long term with them, i microneedle with a 1mm ZGTS dermaroller once a week, i dont have a routine per se, i try to needle like 5 times in every direction possible for like 5 minutes, i dont apply too much pressure, just enough to feel the needles pierce my skin, after needling my skin becomes reddish but i almost never bleed, the days i needle i try to do it in the morning and apply min at night

 

[JaneyElizabeth]

Thanks!! yes i am surprised at how fast my crown is filling, i am lucky to live in a country where finasteride and min are ultra cheap so i am planning to stay long term with them, i microneedle with a 1mm ZGTS dermaroller once a week, i dont have a routine per se, i try to needle like 5 times in every direction possible for like 5 minutes, i dont apply too much pressure, just enough to feel the needles pierce my skin, after needling my skin becomes reddish but i almost never bleed, the days i needle i try to do it in the morning and apply min at night

Wow. Just three months. That's fantastic. I am at two years of weekly microneedling and did a long session last night. Along with finasteride/Duta and maybe adding oral min, that's close to HRT type growth and just about the best that I have seen, especially so quickly. I keep spreading the word. It works to eliminate all scar tissue and is remarkable in how it can make faces look younger and spotless.

 

[MrPortugal]

Very nice gains

 

[Likewise]

Great result. I don't even want to post a picture of myself. It is really bad and i am feeling depressed. Thinking of getting a wig maybe. I wanted to talk to professionals about that (if i can have a self designed wig) but wigsis phone number is all the time busy for some reasons.

 

[SPascucci]

UPDATE
Bad news, a month ago i started shedding like crazy and it has not stopped, this is the first big shed i ever had, even before using treatment i never had this amount of hairfall, i have 3 theories of what could be this shed

1- This is maybe my first big finasteride shed, i read some cases on reddit where they had a big shed in the second year of treatment
2- I had an accident 2 months ago and maybe this is telogen effluvium and it will regrow it in afew months
3- Because of my accident i was prescribed prednisone to help with inflamation, i only used it for a few days but at a high dose of 40 mg daily, prednisone is a steroid that has listed hairloss as a side effect

i still above baseline but im approaching baseline at an alarming rate

keep in mind this picture is taken in very harsh light conditions and with shorter hair

What do you think? i hope i can regrow my lost gains in a few months, i will update in a few months