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Hairloss has always scared the sh*t out of me. Long before I had any sign of hairloss I was literally horrified of it. My brother who is 6 years older than me was the first to be struck by it at age 21. It was absolutely brutal to witness. I saw my brother go from a very thick nw1.5/2 long dark wavy brown haired guy to a full NW5 within 2 years time. At a certain point he was literally ending up with clumps of hair just by running his hand through his hair in front of us. I saw him go from confident, exceptionally succesful for his age, and very pleasant man.. To an utterly devestated, depressed, bitter and unmotivated man. He got fat (which only made his appearance so much worse) and even though he tried to "take it like a man" in front of others, you could see how devestated he was. I'm not going to lie, it was seriously like he had aged 30 years in 2 years time.
At the age of 18 I was struck by the same faith. My hairline receded to nw2 by that time. I asked my brother if there was anything to tackle this, he said "man up, badasses are bald, just shave it. There's nothing you can do". My doctor also made 0 mention of finasteride or minoxidil, it was simply natural, own it. For whatever reason all the articles I could find online boiled down to some nonsense of the "dominance of a bald head" and forums dedicated to "just shave it bro!". The only thing that was mentioned was dutasteride. Which seemed more like an illegal drug that was guaranteed to blow up your d*ck and make your a*shole go numb, and thus not a rational option.
With grinding teeth, I went on. Hoping it wouldn't get worse. But, of course, it did get worse. Untill the age of 22 my hair seemed to remain a thick NW2. Then it seemed like my hair started to become lighter, it became hard to style, and my hairline started to slowly but steadily round off. It was like my forehead became huge. Meanwhile everyone around me was going Johnny Bravo with his hair, and I looked like I didn't care (I did, but it was impossible to style and it looked horrible with recession). I decided to bald fade my head, and replaced one bias with another. I was going to be a cool guy like Statham, except, I didn't have his robust jaw. I was more like Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne, or his character in American Psycho. I looked more like that guy from American History X than a Patrick Steward or Statham. I'm not going to lie balding/shaving was a dramatic hit to my sex appeal. Women who knew me with my long hair went "why would you do that?!" most people were supportive, but it was obvious some people were shocked from their body language alone. It was like my appeal, my "edge" was gone. It's not like 0 women were interested, but overall women didn't care that much, and I did attract some very freaky girls (not something I could consider viable long term though). Mind you: at the time I was convinced how badass and hot shaving was. I wasn't uncomfortable, or lacked confidence. However I started to notice people didn't treat me as well regardless. Strangers were more avoidant of me, I didn't feel people took me as seriously, and I frequently heard people I had met say down the line "you are actually a very charismatic and cool person! I really thought you were a bit of a prick or bully when I first met you". I never heard this prior to shaving my head. I was pretty amazed how many women remarked "God I wish you had more hair, you would be perfect". Comments like that didn't sit well with me, so those relationships were short lived. I didn't want to believe hair could have such an impact on me. I felt degraded as some sort of thug, but my personality was nothing like that. I literally had women tell me "oh wow, I really thought you were a drugdealer or something when I first met you". I was wearing turtle necks and I was still some sort of gangbanger. What the f*ck? At airports, or borders I was consistently being picked out and thoroughly checked. It honestly brutalized me how much looks impact your life. Whatever I did I was constantly judged in a pretty negative way. Not by everyone, but enough that it drove me up the wall. Like I constantly had to prove myself. I became bitter, resentful, more introverted. I became depressed, suffered an identity crisis, and wasted at least 4 years of my twenties feeling misunderstood, alone, and angry.
People didn't understand my situation at all. I had realized that baldness impacts people very differently, and why. Facial features. I looked nothing like Statham (wish I had his jaw though) or moby except for a shaved head. I looked like an angry slightly mature male cause I was born with eyebrows that naturally look evil. I constantly got to hear examples of men who were bald and didn't go through the same things as I did (who looked nothing like me), so it had to be my personality (which is pretty insulting cause in my case that's like saying you behave like trash of society). Or, and this is why it's so ironic, how I shouldn't complain cause I at least looked better than George Costanza. What a contradiction. On one hand looks don't matter, but when it's convienent it does? Things like this was just insult to injury.
The final straw that obliterated my soul however was (surprise) because of a woman. When I met her I was wearing a cap. We really hit off, had fun, and the moment I put off my cap I could see the shock from her body language. Nonetheless, we started dating and seeing each other. I frequently wore caps and it was pretty obvious she wasn't really fond of my shaved look. So I just bluntly asked her, and she admitted balding was just about the biggest turn off there was for her and not even the best looking bald guys seemed to spark interest in her, but she didn't want to be "shallow" cause she felt attraction to basically everything else and wanted to make it work. After about 6 months she broke down in tears absolutely devastated and admitted she hated the bald head and it really affected her sexual attraction (you simply can't have a relationship without it). I just packed my bags, wished her the best and left. I wasn't even sad, disappointed or angry. There was no emotion. I was literally dead inside. I got home, excercised, made dinner and turned on the tv. It was like survival mode took over. The final stage of cynicism/hardcore depression. F*ck hope. Nothing, absolutely nothing, had any meaning to me anymore. I didn't care. It was like I just functioned on auto pilote. I woke up, went to work, did the basics I had to do, and went to bed. I had no interests, no ambitions, no motivation. Not even resentment. I was sick of having to compensate for this bullsh*t gene and how it seriously not once had a positive effect on me personally in any way.
I became so careless, everything lost meaning to me. Relationships, people, friendship. I didn't care. Every form of social media I cut out of my live. I literally cut all my friends out of my life as well. I skipped a week off work, rented a nice car and went on vacation to Italy and was so out of tune that I basically blasted with 240km/h from Hamburg to Rome without sleep. In Swiss for whatever bizarre reason I met a girl at a highway restaurant, and she joined me on my trip. The girl crashed the rental car while we were drunk in Rome, I didn't care. We partied, lavish hotels with jacuzzi's, drunk 24/7. When the gate didn't open on the autostrada I just rammed the car through it. When I got home I didn't bother to turn the car in. They tracked the car down and had to pick it up themselves. It was a mess. All in all it was a trip of a mere 5 days and with the hotels, fines, damage it had cost me 15000 Euro's and I was not permitted to enter Italy for the next 3 years. It was absolutely ridiculous. Did I enjoy it? I barely remember any of it... My parents thought I had become bipolar or something. It was a build up of rejection, frustration and negativity which resulted in a self fulfilling prophecy in which I lost my friends, my money, screwed up my job, myself, everything and ended up in debt. It took me a year to come to my senses.
One year after this event I spoke to a colleague who thought it was brave I shaved my head, he could never do it. I was like "you're 34 with barely any sign of hairloss, I think you're fine". Then he told me he was going bald at 18 and jumped on finasteride at the first sign of recession. I asked him what the hell he was on about (never heard of finasteride) and he showed me everything. Finasteride, RU, minoxidil, you name it. Save to say, I got on finasteride the same day. The worst part? The same doctor who said there was nothing that could stop or slow it, prescribed it to me. But I had to specifically ask for finasteride. He then actually said "oh yes, finasteride. One of my colleagues does prescribe it for his patients with male pattern baldness as that seems to work at slowing it down". I couldn't believe this guy! Either he's malicious or an idiot. I wasted at least 5 years of treatment because of that bullsh*t.
I understand that not everyone will have the same experience going bald In my case though baldness impacted my life even when I wasn't thinking or obsessing about it.
At the age of 18 I was struck by the same faith. My hairline receded to nw2 by that time. I asked my brother if there was anything to tackle this, he said "man up, badasses are bald, just shave it. There's nothing you can do". My doctor also made 0 mention of finasteride or minoxidil, it was simply natural, own it. For whatever reason all the articles I could find online boiled down to some nonsense of the "dominance of a bald head" and forums dedicated to "just shave it bro!". The only thing that was mentioned was dutasteride. Which seemed more like an illegal drug that was guaranteed to blow up your d*ck and make your a*shole go numb, and thus not a rational option.
With grinding teeth, I went on. Hoping it wouldn't get worse. But, of course, it did get worse. Untill the age of 22 my hair seemed to remain a thick NW2. Then it seemed like my hair started to become lighter, it became hard to style, and my hairline started to slowly but steadily round off. It was like my forehead became huge. Meanwhile everyone around me was going Johnny Bravo with his hair, and I looked like I didn't care (I did, but it was impossible to style and it looked horrible with recession). I decided to bald fade my head, and replaced one bias with another. I was going to be a cool guy like Statham, except, I didn't have his robust jaw. I was more like Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne, or his character in American Psycho. I looked more like that guy from American History X than a Patrick Steward or Statham. I'm not going to lie balding/shaving was a dramatic hit to my sex appeal. Women who knew me with my long hair went "why would you do that?!" most people were supportive, but it was obvious some people were shocked from their body language alone. It was like my appeal, my "edge" was gone. It's not like 0 women were interested, but overall women didn't care that much, and I did attract some very freaky girls (not something I could consider viable long term though). Mind you: at the time I was convinced how badass and hot shaving was. I wasn't uncomfortable, or lacked confidence. However I started to notice people didn't treat me as well regardless. Strangers were more avoidant of me, I didn't feel people took me as seriously, and I frequently heard people I had met say down the line "you are actually a very charismatic and cool person! I really thought you were a bit of a prick or bully when I first met you". I never heard this prior to shaving my head. I was pretty amazed how many women remarked "God I wish you had more hair, you would be perfect". Comments like that didn't sit well with me, so those relationships were short lived. I didn't want to believe hair could have such an impact on me. I felt degraded as some sort of thug, but my personality was nothing like that. I literally had women tell me "oh wow, I really thought you were a drugdealer or something when I first met you". I was wearing turtle necks and I was still some sort of gangbanger. What the f*ck? At airports, or borders I was consistently being picked out and thoroughly checked. It honestly brutalized me how much looks impact your life. Whatever I did I was constantly judged in a pretty negative way. Not by everyone, but enough that it drove me up the wall. Like I constantly had to prove myself. I became bitter, resentful, more introverted. I became depressed, suffered an identity crisis, and wasted at least 4 years of my twenties feeling misunderstood, alone, and angry.
People didn't understand my situation at all. I had realized that baldness impacts people very differently, and why. Facial features. I looked nothing like Statham (wish I had his jaw though) or moby except for a shaved head. I looked like an angry slightly mature male cause I was born with eyebrows that naturally look evil. I constantly got to hear examples of men who were bald and didn't go through the same things as I did (who looked nothing like me), so it had to be my personality (which is pretty insulting cause in my case that's like saying you behave like trash of society). Or, and this is why it's so ironic, how I shouldn't complain cause I at least looked better than George Costanza. What a contradiction. On one hand looks don't matter, but when it's convienent it does? Things like this was just insult to injury.
The final straw that obliterated my soul however was (surprise) because of a woman. When I met her I was wearing a cap. We really hit off, had fun, and the moment I put off my cap I could see the shock from her body language. Nonetheless, we started dating and seeing each other. I frequently wore caps and it was pretty obvious she wasn't really fond of my shaved look. So I just bluntly asked her, and she admitted balding was just about the biggest turn off there was for her and not even the best looking bald guys seemed to spark interest in her, but she didn't want to be "shallow" cause she felt attraction to basically everything else and wanted to make it work. After about 6 months she broke down in tears absolutely devastated and admitted she hated the bald head and it really affected her sexual attraction (you simply can't have a relationship without it). I just packed my bags, wished her the best and left. I wasn't even sad, disappointed or angry. There was no emotion. I was literally dead inside. I got home, excercised, made dinner and turned on the tv. It was like survival mode took over. The final stage of cynicism/hardcore depression. F*ck hope. Nothing, absolutely nothing, had any meaning to me anymore. I didn't care. It was like I just functioned on auto pilote. I woke up, went to work, did the basics I had to do, and went to bed. I had no interests, no ambitions, no motivation. Not even resentment. I was sick of having to compensate for this bullsh*t gene and how it seriously not once had a positive effect on me personally in any way.
I became so careless, everything lost meaning to me. Relationships, people, friendship. I didn't care. Every form of social media I cut out of my live. I literally cut all my friends out of my life as well. I skipped a week off work, rented a nice car and went on vacation to Italy and was so out of tune that I basically blasted with 240km/h from Hamburg to Rome without sleep. In Swiss for whatever bizarre reason I met a girl at a highway restaurant, and she joined me on my trip. The girl crashed the rental car while we were drunk in Rome, I didn't care. We partied, lavish hotels with jacuzzi's, drunk 24/7. When the gate didn't open on the autostrada I just rammed the car through it. When I got home I didn't bother to turn the car in. They tracked the car down and had to pick it up themselves. It was a mess. All in all it was a trip of a mere 5 days and with the hotels, fines, damage it had cost me 15000 Euro's and I was not permitted to enter Italy for the next 3 years. It was absolutely ridiculous. Did I enjoy it? I barely remember any of it... My parents thought I had become bipolar or something. It was a build up of rejection, frustration and negativity which resulted in a self fulfilling prophecy in which I lost my friends, my money, screwed up my job, myself, everything and ended up in debt. It took me a year to come to my senses.
One year after this event I spoke to a colleague who thought it was brave I shaved my head, he could never do it. I was like "you're 34 with barely any sign of hairloss, I think you're fine". Then he told me he was going bald at 18 and jumped on finasteride at the first sign of recession. I asked him what the hell he was on about (never heard of finasteride) and he showed me everything. Finasteride, RU, minoxidil, you name it. Save to say, I got on finasteride the same day. The worst part? The same doctor who said there was nothing that could stop or slow it, prescribed it to me. But I had to specifically ask for finasteride. He then actually said "oh yes, finasteride. One of my colleagues does prescribe it for his patients with male pattern baldness as that seems to work at slowing it down". I couldn't believe this guy! Either he's malicious or an idiot. I wasted at least 5 years of treatment because of that bullsh*t.
I understand that not everyone will have the same experience going bald In my case though baldness impacted my life even when I wasn't thinking or obsessing about it.
