Award for the fastest Hairloss ever? I AM AWESOME's story

[I AM AWESOME]

OK tick the time back a year ago my hair was the fullest shiz ever. I mean literally. I had people that used to go through my hair with their hands saying how thick and full it was. It was very good hair. Here's a short haircut from about a year ago with harsh lighting on my hair:



Now about late may/early June I experienced some horrendous shedding, it was awful, whenever I combed my hair about 10-15 hair came out PER stroke, in the shower I had at least 150 hairs shedding. At the start I didn't give it much notice but it started getting annoying because of how much hair was coming out. This shedding lasted from about late May - Mid October. But to my shock the damage was done and the damage was very weird. Here's a pic of my vertex wet with harsh lighting back in October:



From that point I thought I was gonna be bald in about a few months because my hair was nothing compared to its normal self and every hairstyle bar a a comb to the right revealed scalp especially mid scalp, the hairstyle I had before straight comb down was not an option since it revealed scalp. The remaining hair was all thick however and hardly any hair were thin and small. Even more confusing was the fact that the right side of my head (The right ''horseshoe'') was also not dense at all and revealed scalp.

Well flash forward 8 months from then and here's my hair now with the same harsh lighting:



Normal lighting:



So as you can see there has been a minimal difference 8 months on, but I wanna get my original hair back, it was awesome. It just depresses I lost so much hair in such a short amount of time, it was only about 4 months of shedding but it totally destroyed my hair. I cannot spike my hair anymore since too much scalp shows. My hairline however is still a juvanile one which is probably the only good thing left about my hair. My family does have a strong history of balding; my dad started balding in his early 40s, and out his other 3 brothers 2 are bald. However all their sons are older than me yet have very very good hair. I'm now 18 but was 17 when this mess started. My mum also has some mild balding so I suppose the genes aren't on my side.

Now in terms of treatments I don't think my mindset is good enough for Propecia after reading all these side effect stories I think if I took it I'd start posting about a gazillion side effects. I'm gonna give minoxidl a try in about 2 weeks to see how it goes. Also the reason that made me make this thread is that I have seen some increased shedding in the last week and it's making me scared that another monster shed is gonna happen. Ever since the shedding stopped in October my hair has hardly come out but recently more and more hairs I'm spotting when combing etc.

 

[Rawtashk]

minoxidil will be like putting a band-aid on a severed arm. DHT is destroying your hair, and you need to do something about it. I can promise you that only using minoxidil will be a waste of time.

Give finasteride a try. If you get sides, then stop taking it.

 

[jl8490]

I AM AWESOME, I can sympathize with you man. I'm Chinese and until a few years ago I had the density and thickness of Asian pop star hair. I shed like you without any change to the hairline. I couldn't really see a difference in the mirror so I didn't pay much attention until I saw the top of my head in the monitor of a security camera system in a convenience store and was shocked.

All I can tell you from the last two years on this journey is that the only this that has dramatically slowed down the shedding is finasteride/propecia. I spent(wasted) a year on minoxodil only and even stopped finasteride for a few months after reading about side effects (even though I wasn't having any).

Even though I've probably lost 30-50% density on top, like you, it still covers the scalp and my cowlick (swirl) hasn't gotten too bad for most people to notice yet. My hope is to hold onto what I've got with finasteride and minoxidil for the next 5-10 years and slowly lose it in my 40s assuming the finasteride/minoxidil efficacy decreases over time and no better products come on the market (just being pragmatic).

My honest, non-biased suggestion for you with such aggressive DHT hair loss is to get on finasteride. If you get sides, switch to avodart or one of those topical antiandrogens some of the guys here are experimenting with. Like Rawtashk says, minoxidil will not have any appreciable effect for you. You MUST block DHT to even slow this process down. If you're in the lucky 5-10% you may even regrow some.

 

[raptorizedamazing]

150 hairs in the shower? dude are you serious? did you literally count that many? i rubed my hands against my showers walls and counted 40 before.. and ive been using minoxidil for 4 months now.

 

[I AM AWESOME]

minoxidil will be like putting a band-aid on a severed arm. DHT is destroying your hair, and you need to do something about it. I can promise you that only using minoxidil will be a waste of time.

Give finasteride a try. If you get sides, then stop taking it.

Dude did you even read my post?

 

[Tyler_Durden]

minoxidil will be like putting a band-aid on a severed arm. DHT is destroying your hair, and you need to do something about it. I can promise you that only using minoxidil will be a waste of time.

Give finasteride a try. If you get sides, then stop taking it.

Dude did you even read my post?

I did, and I'm sure he did as well. That's the best advice you're going to get though.

Want to save your hair so desperately, get on finasteride. Otherwise I'd say you're heading down a pretty depressing path.

Fins side aren't permanent and they are recorded in like 1-2% of users. Pretty simple choice if you ask me.
You should go see a doctor/derm first though. See what they think.

GL.

 

[Rawtashk]

Every word of it. I read that you think you'll be a bad candidate for finasteride. I would encourage you to get the finasteride fears under control and jump on it. There's a 98% chance that you won't get any sides. If you do, then you can simply stop it. There's a 99.99% chance that they'll go away within a few weeks.

 

[Rawtashk]

Also, go back and edit your post. Delete the

after them. That way the pics will show up inside of the post instead of having to click through to them. Makes it easier to see what's been going on with your hair.

 

[I AM AWESOME]

Ok thanks I went back and did that. What do you guys think about the fact that my hair hasn't changed in like 8 months and the fact that the side of my head is not dense. Also what about the main fact that my hair just went in like 3 months.

 

[Rawtashk]

It looks like you took a picture with wet hair and one with dry...so it's hard to compare :-/

 

[I AM AWESOME]

It looks like you took a picture with wet hair and one with dry...so it's hard to compare :-/

No lol i have one before which is wet and one after which is after. Trust me when I say there has been a minimal difference in the past 8 months. The shedding stopped and hasn't come back....yet.

 

[kabooski]

Have you noticed the texture and maybe even the color is slightly different than from the sides of the head ?

I would have some blood work done and ask for them to check your T and DHT levels as well.

I too had a thick super fast growing hair about a year and half ago
now my hair grows slow. Lost 30% density. I hope I caught mine early, as I can still hide almost the whole scalp.

After blood work, I would go see a dermatologist and see if it is Telogen Effluvium or male pattern baldness

 

[I AM AWESOME]

Have you noticed the texture and maybe even the color is slightly different than from the sides of the head ?

I would have some blood work done and ask for them to check your T and DHT levels as well.

I too had a thick super fast growing hair about a year and half ago
now my hair grows slow. Lost 30% density. I hope I caught mine early, as I can still hide almost the whole scalp.

After blood work, I would go see a dermatologist and see if it is Telogen Effluvium or male pattern baldness

That's what had confused me. The texture, thickness and colour is all the same. My hair is as fast growing as it was as before. I supose I should go and see a derm its just that there's not any derm near me. And as I said the side of my head too is not very dense, in fact you can easily see scalp there, even if I have styled it.

 

[I AM AWESOME]

2 months on and my hair is the same. I might have Telogen Effluvium but the hair's not regrowing :thumbdown2:

 

[Lloyd Braun]

2 months on and my hair is the same. I might have Telogen Effluvium but the hair's not regrowing :thumbdown2:

There was a 17 year old a few weeks back on hairlosshelp that went from no balding to like a Norwood 5 in less than a year. It scared the crap out of me and I felt really bad for him--how horrible! Get on finasteride OP. If you are more concerned about your sex drive than your hair you should consider yourself lucky. I would give up my sex drive forever for a good Norwood 1 hairline, which would be a relatively minor improvement over what I have now. Get on finasteride and get your crown back.

 

[I AM AWESOME]

[quote="I AM AWESOME":1d62tasn]2 months on and my hair is the same. I might have Telogen Effluvium but the hair's not regrowing :thumbdown2:

There was a 17 year old a few weeks back on hairlosshelp that went from no balding to like a Norwood 5 in less than a year. It scared the crap out of me and I felt really bad for him--how horrible! Get on finasteride OP. If you are more concerned about your sex drive than your hair you should consider yourself lucky. I would give up my sex drive forever for a good Norwood 1 hairline, which would be a relatively minor improvement over what I have now. Get on finasteride and get your crown back.[/quote:1d62tasn]
WTF?! You'd take hair over sex drive? :shakehead:

And can you link me to that 17 year old? MAn that must absolutely suck. Why does hair go so fast for the younger people? :sobbing:

 

[I AM AWESOME]

OK guys been 8 months since I made this topic. Been religiously taking pics of my hair every week and comparing pics. Still no difference whatsoever.

WTF is this?! :sobbing: .

I haven't started any treatments yet BTW.

 

[Pyro]

when you say "still no difference" do you mean your hair hasn't exactly gotten any worse? i mean, i assume it hasn't gotten better, but if it's stayed the way it is and not got thinner, then that's good man!

 

[I AM AWESOME]

Gonna post some updated pics in a bit.

 

[I AM AWESOME]

OK here are the photos. I've added a lot because I simply am stumped about my hairloss

Here's the left side of my hide (Notice how thin it is WTF?!?!):

Here it is under normal lighting:

Right side (This side is alright, not like a normal person's side but scalp cannot be seen in normal lighting but again scalp can be seen when in light):

Back of the head/crown:

Hair spiked:

Hair combed down:

Hair combed to the side (Real WTF. Usually I cannot see scalp when I comb my hair to the side but the photos say otherwise. The next photo is of my hair combed when I see it in the mirror under harsh light and I cannot see even a bit of scalp):

Hair combed to the side (No scalp can be seen WTF?! But the previous photo suggests otherwise):

Hair wet (This is just a comparison to the photo in the OP but you cannot really compare because my hair in this pic are much shorter than in the OP ):

I really feel that there has hardly been a difference between September 2010 and March 2012 in terms of my hair. Really suck man. I don't even know what to do