I Am Actually Regrowing My Hair + Hairline Without Min Or finasteride (mechanical Stimulation)

[MyThinningConfidence]

Can one use the cartridges of a dermapen as a small stamp? Not sure exactly how I would hold it but if it works you would get clean punctures and shouldn't hurt as much as the electric pen going in and out at crazy speeds. Plus you can throw it away when you are done as opposed to having to clean or throw away the larger 7$ derma stamp.

No, that's a ridiculous idea. The actual cartridge needles are much greater than just 2.5mm and I doubt you'd be able to penetrate correctly with it anyways. The actual pens/derminators are actually the least painful from my experience and using the dermastamp manually was the most painful and least effective. Just get a pen or derminator, if you don't have the cash just get a dermaroller, it's much better than the stamp which was a painful ineffective mess. Your body releases a natural painkiller so if you're honestly worried about pain you can just set the derminator to 0.5mm and go over your head a few times initially to numb it up. I wouldn't worry about having to discard of it either, I just washed mine in hot water and never once had an issue. You'll save more getting a decent roller/pen and reusing.

 

[ElTioLaBota]

Guys, which 1.5mm dermastamp/dermapen do you recommend me?

 

[INT]

Bruh, even steroid users are fertile. That sh*t is not going to do sh*t with your fertility

Apples and oranges.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Roughly a week off a year on finasteride, hair is heaps thicker now. Hairline seems to still be moving up but it's hard to tell at times due to perspective distortion, Seems to be roughly moving forward about 0.5cm into the slick bald every 6 months.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Roughly a week off a year on finasteride, hair is heaps thicker now. Hairline seems to still be moving up but it's hard to tell at times due to perspective distortion, Seems to be roughly moving forward about 0.5cm into the slick bald every 6 months.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Made this post for Reddit but Tressless insta-removes my posts for some reason so I guess I'll post it here, nothing really that new as I posted an update here a couple of weeks ago but this was my 1 year finasteride update. - https://imgur.com/a/q4nIG1p

Results: Imgur link in comments since this sub never works (also please note the before pictures aren't from when I first started finasteride as I had grown hair before that so the total elapsed time is about 1.5 years, I think I got more serious about my regime late March 2018.)

Side Effects: I ejaculate less and it's sometimes slightly watery, sensation and sex drive is the same as ever. I also had minor gyno which got slightly worse on finasteride but I don't think that's finasteride's doing as I reached the heaviest weight I had ever been which is likely my metabolism slowing down being 22 now.
Other Benefits of finasteride: Thinner and slower growing body and facial hair, the odour of my sweat isn't as severe, less ingrown body hairs, scalp hair doesn't get oily within hours of washing anymore, skin is less oily, less acne.

I regrew quite a lot of hair and it looks like I'm still regrowing, it doesn't feel like I've regrown that much until I look back at my older pictures and I'm blown away by how awful my hair was. Your brain always plays tricks on you so make sure you take plenty of pictures. There is a lot more to balding than just simple loss of temples and bald patches, balding completely changes the quality and texture of your hair and makes it all frazzled looking, after this whole ordeal I funnily have a keen eye for balding males that wouldn't normally be considered balding by others. I suppose the point here is that your perception plays tricks on you so make sure to do all that you can to combat balding and to take plenty of pictures and pace things realistically. Most people on these subs are too damned neurotic which is understandable but honestly that flimsy attitude will be the death of your hair.

 

[Moosey]

Made this post for Reddit but Tressless insta-removes my posts for some reason so I guess I'll post it here, nothing really that new as I posted an update here a couple of weeks ago but this was my 1 year finasteride update. - https://imgur.com/a/q4nIG1p

Results: Imgur link in comments since this sub never works (also please note the before pictures aren't from when I first started finasteride as I had grown hair before that so the total elapsed time is about 1.5 years, I think I got more serious about my regime late March 2018.)

Side Effects: I ejaculate less and it's sometimes slightly watery, sensation and sex drive is the same as ever. I also had minor gyno which got slightly worse on finasteride but I don't think that's finasteride's doing as I reached the heaviest weight I had ever been which is likely my metabolism slowing down being 22 now.
Other Benefits of finasteride: Thinner and slower growing body and facial hair, the odour of my sweat isn't as severe, less ingrown body hairs, scalp hair doesn't get oily within hours of washing anymore, skin is less oily, less acne.

I regrew quite a lot of hair and it looks like I'm still regrowing, it doesn't feel like I've regrown that much until I look back at my older pictures and I'm blown away by how awful my hair was. Your brain always plays tricks on you so make sure you take plenty of pictures. There is a lot more to balding than just simple loss of temples and bald patches, balding completely changes the quality and texture of your hair and makes it all frazzled looking, after this whole ordeal I funnily have a keen eye for balding males that wouldn't normally be considered balding by others. I suppose the point here is that your perception plays tricks on you so make sure to do all that you can to combat balding and to take plenty of pictures and pace things realistically. Most people on these subs are too damned neurotic which is understandable but honestly that flimsy attitude will be the death of your hair.

Do you think the finasteride actually sped up the regrowth or contributed to any extent after it obliterated your hairline and temples?
Or do you think you could have progressed at the same speed, wether you used finasteride or not (after the shed was over).
Hope that makes sense

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

By no means perfect but overall a massive improvement, you can easily tell how far my hairline has moved forward.
If we also look closer too it seems my temples still have grown vellus hairs which means even more regrowth to come.

I've also booked a GP appointment which will be happening on Monday, I'm wanting to test for hypothyroidism so I'll make sure to update here if I do actually have it. It would make a lot of sense that it'd play a part in me balding so early in my life.

 

[Jonny Craig]

By no means perfect but overall a massive improvement, you can easily tell how far my hairline has moved forward.
If we also look closer too it seems my temples still have grown vellus hairs which means even more regrowth to come.

I've also booked a GP appointment which will be happening on Monday, I'm wanting to test for hypothyroidism so I'll make sure to update here if I do actually have it. It would make a lot of sense that it'd play a part in me balding so early in my life.

Will be interesting to find out what your TSH numbers are.

 

[StudyHacks]

By no means perfect but overall a massive improvement, you can easily tell how far my hairline has moved forward.
If we also look closer too it seems my temples still have grown vellus hairs which means even more regrowth to come.

I've also booked a GP appointment which will be happening on Monday, I'm wanting to test for hypothyroidism so I'll make sure to update here if I do actually have it. It would make a lot of sense that it'd play a part in me balding so early in my life.

I don't wanna sh*t on you, but without seeing your hairline before all this treatment, your hairline and hair are still horrible lmao What the f***, gotta be NW3+ just going by the looks of it.

At that point just shave it off, like wtf seriously I'm sorry man no offense but ffs you need a hair system or just shave it off

 

[Señor Feo]

While I think styling your hair in a way that exposes your hairline doesn't do you much favour (which is something you're probably aware of and I suppose you don't do it anyways, just did it for the photos), your results are batshit insane. I seriously envy the progress you went through and I hope you still find a way to further progress. Good luck!

 

[Moosey]

I don't wanna sh*t on you, but without seeing your hairline before all this treatment, your hairline and hair are still horrible lmao What the f***, gotta be NW3+ just going by the looks of it.

At that point just shave it off, like wtf seriously I'm sorry man no offense but ffs you need a hair system or just shave it off

What is the point of this comment? Are you seriously making fun of someone for having hairloss, on a hairloss forum?
Just shave it off? Do you know where you are? This isnt "just shave it off bro.com". People with hairloss come here to reverse it.

The guy had almost no hair before. His progress is insane.
Go away dude, what a useless comment

 

[StudyHacks]

What is the point of this comment? Are you seriously making fun of someone for having hairloss, on a hairloss forum?
Just shave it off? Do you know where you are? This isnt "just shave it off bro.com". People with hairloss come here to reverse it.

The guy had almost no hair before. His progress is insane.
Go away dude, what a useless comment

But it still looks like sh*t. That's not NW2 yet where you can hide your balding. Anything past NW2 is not doable, trust me I'M nw2.5

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

But it still looks like sh*t. That's not NW2 yet where you can hide your balding. Anything past NW2 is not doable, trust me I'M nw2.5

Definitely not perfect as I said but honestly a major improvement, I was about a NW4.5 with massive density loss and slowly regrew to about a NW3 with relatively thick hair in 2.5 years. Honestly with the amount of density I gained I could easily get a hair transplant to fix my hairline at this point since I've mostly recovered fully elsewhere but it's not something I can realistically afford at the moment if I did want to go down that route.

Besides my hair is at least livable for now and it's still filling in, this process literally takes months to years. If you look closely at my hairline you can see little black hairs forming and filling in, even further into the bald zone are little vellus hairs that are starting to grow out which should theoretically turn terminal in some months if they follow the same path as the rest.

My density is thick but my hairline is the weakness, I don't think I need to shave it off especially after going through all this regrowth, worst case scenario is that I can wear a hat and my hair will look good just based on the thickness.

I attached some pictures of my old hairline and density loss along with some current pictures and the new hairs forming on my hairline.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Will be interesting to find out what your TSH numbers are.

Bloodtests came back, I'm not allowed to see the actual values till Friday when I see my doctor next but I do know that the hypothyroidism test came back negative. That really eliminates a lot of the thyroid theory for me, at least on a personal level.

Interestingly I had another bloodtest come back positive which was by my doctors theory of me having anemia, I don't actually know what type of anemia I have until I go in but based on symptoms I'm assuming it's a Vitamin B12 deficiency. In retrospect I had looked into the possibility of having it but it entirely went over my head. With my recent diagnosis it seems like the pieces are fitting together a lot better. I don't know if correcting my anemia will actually help my hair grow back but I can see how it could have contributed to the diffuse aspect of my thinning. From my knowledge I actually had 3 forms of hairloss which was male pattern baldness, diffuse thinning from anemia and seborrheic dermatitis which is likely why my hairloss was so severe at such a young age.

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Alright so I went back to my doctor and it turns out I don't actually have anemia, the positive was actually indicating only two things that got picked up as out of normal ranges and that was slightly lower than normal blood platelets which are what allow blood clotting, I'm assuming the reason for the reduced amount is from my microneedling if they work that way and my liver enzyme was slightly high, Aside from that everything was normal so I basically got scammed into paying for another doctors trip. He didn't actually test my B12 levels although he said it was unlikely I had a deficiency and I'm not wanting to pay for another bloodtest and doctors visit so I think I'll just leave that. I'm somewhat disappointing to hear I'm perfectly healthy which is a funny way of looking at it.

With hypothyroidism and anemia out of the way, that opens the door to me trialing out my Avodart I got forever ago now., although the reduction in allopregnanolone is worrisome compared to finasteride which I think is a very safe drug (if you can tolerate some minor to moderate sexual side effects.) I've actually grown quite fond of finasteride over the last year but I do desire even more hair. Primarily along my hairline, I'm definitely pleased and happier but not satisfied. But realistically I can expect some thickening of my current hair and some additional support on my hairline but nothing major unless I get lucky with my genetics greatly favouring dutasteride.

This leads me to the next phase of my hairloss journey and I have a ridiculous idea I want to try out. I'm planning to burn my scalp with acid along my hairline, this is already something I've been doing with 40% glycolic acid directly on the scalp although my scalp is too thick and tough for it to have much effect, This is where my next idea comes from.

Where I got the idea -
I actually have some acne scars on my face which is the original reason I got the glycolic acid to smooth them out, I've burnt my face a couple of times using too high of a percentage without dilluting it enough but nothing that scarred or left anything permanent. Now I actually had this rather large scar on my nose that became rather depressed like a massive dint. Now what I actually did one day when I got insecure was that I massaged and scratched it lightly hoping it'd help. What this actually meant though was it weakened the top layer of my skin so when I came around to using the glycolic acid I figured I should use a lesser amount since I had active acne at the time and my nose was weakened so I only used 20% it burned a bit but nothing abnormal. I hop in the shower and rubbed my face followed by my nose and my skin scratches off, figured it was just the top layer and fine and a bit sore. Now when I hopped out of the shower it was a bit of a shock, I had burnt a massive hole fairly deep into my skin which quickly pooled with blood. I could literally see the sebaceous filaments with all the pores melted away as the blood started the seep out of my skin, the top layer was literally burnt off, I could see the roots of the little white hairs on my nose etc. Now what ended up happening afterwards was that the hole scabbed up and took about two weeks to heal, I was anxious it'd scar my face and I was constantly moisturizing it. now about two and a half weeks later things healed up pretty well and the massive dent from the acne is heaps better, still a slight dent but far less drastic and there was no scarring at all. So basically I achieved something people told me only fillers every year could fix. I'd show pictures of my burnt skin but it might be a bit too graphic for here.

So this leads me to my idea of burning my scalp with acid to try and promote regrowth, it could be like microneedling and mechanical stimulation on steroids. It seems risky and crazy but that's the kind of innovation we need here. I don't think I've ever seen anyone else do this, closest thing was some guy who gave his scalp sunburns which reportedly helped regrow. Besides as long as I don't excessively melt my scalp away I think I can minimize the risk and glycolic acid actually has a lot of benefits for the skin which include changes to the deeper layers over months. Worst case scenario is that I create scar tissue which will inhibit my ability to grow any hair but I think that's avoidable if I take things at a reasonable pace.

 

[Moosey]

Alright so I went back to my doctor and it turns out I don't actually have anemia, the positive was actually indicating only two things that got picked up as out of normal ranges and that was slightly lower than normal blood platelets which are what allow blood clotting, I'm assuming the reason for the reduced amount is from my microneedling if they work that way and my liver enzyme was slightly high, Aside from that everything was normal so I basically got scammed into paying for another doctors trip. He didn't actually test my B12 levels although he said it was unlikely I had a deficiency and I'm not wanting to pay for another bloodtest and doctors visit so I think I'll just leave that. I'm somewhat disappointing to hear I'm perfectly healthy which is a funny way of looking at it.

With hypothyroidism and anemia out of the way, that opens the door to me trialing out my Avodart I got forever ago now., although the reduction in allopregnanolone is worrisome compared to finasteride which I think is a very safe drug (if you can tolerate some minor to moderate sexual side effects.) I've actually grown quite fond of finasteride over the last year but I do desire even more hair. Primarily along my hairline, I'm definitely pleased and happier but not satisfied. But realistically I can expect some thickening of my current hair and some additional support on my hairline but nothing major unless I get lucky with my genetics greatly favouring dutasteride.

This leads me to the next phase of my hairloss journey and I have a ridiculous idea I want to try out. I'm planning to burn my scalp with acid along my hairline, this is already something I've been doing with 40% glycolic acid directly on the scalp although my scalp is too thick and tough for it to have much effect, This is where my next idea comes from.

Where I got the idea -
I actually have some acne scars on my face which is the original reason I got the glycolic acid to smooth them out, I've burnt my face a couple of times using too high of a percentage without dilluting it enough but nothing that scarred or left anything permanent. Now I actually had this rather large scar on my nose that became rather depressed like a massive dint. Now what I actually did one day when I got insecure was that I massaged and scratched it lightly hoping it'd help. What this actually meant though was it weakened the top layer of my skin so when I came around to using the glycolic acid I figured I should use a lesser amount since I had active acne at the time and my nose was weakened so I only used 20% it burned a bit but nothing abnormal. I hop in the shower and rubbed my face followed by my nose and my skin scratches off, figured it was just the top layer and fine and a bit sore. Now when I hopped out of the shower it was a bit of a shock, I had burnt a massive hole fairly deep into my skin which quickly pooled with blood. I could literally see the sebaceous filaments with all the pores melted away as the blood started the seep out of my skin, the top layer was literally burnt off, I could see the roots of the little white hairs on my nose etc. Now what ended up happening afterwards was that the hole scabbed up and took about two weeks to heal, I was anxious it'd scar my face and I was constantly moisturizing it. now about two and a half weeks later things healed up pretty well and the massive dent from the acne is heaps better, still a slight dent but far less drastic and there was no scarring at all. So basically I achieved something people told me only fillers every year could fix. I'd show pictures of my burnt skin but it might be a bit too graphic for here.

So this leads me to my idea of burning my scalp with acid to try and promote regrowth, it could be like microneedling and mechanical stimulation on steroids. It seems risky and crazy but that's the kind of innovation we need here. I don't think I've ever seen anyone else do this, closest thing was some guy who gave his scalp sunburns which reportedly helped regrow. Besides as long as I don't excessively melt my scalp away I think I can minimize the risk and glycolic acid actually has a lot of benefits for the skin which include changes to the deeper layers over months. Worst case scenario is that I create scar tissue which will inhibit my ability to grow any hair but I think that's avoidable if I take things at a reasonable pace.

Very interesting post. Some things i want to say:
- Why are you so confident you are able to replicate that incident again, with different parts of your skin? Im not trying to discourage you, but i wouldnt know wether that was pure luck. I mean, how was that wound from the acid different than any other kind of wound to not cause scar tissue?
- Just my 2 cents: Try not to go all out with that method. Maybe try experimenting with one spot of the scalp to see if it does anything. You dont wanna risk destroying your entire scalp because of your inpatients.
-Thats an insanely strong acid?! I have some lactic acid that i sometimes use to exfoliate my skin. If i leave it on too long it gives me a harsh burn and red skin, but nothing that comes close to melting away some of my skin. What made that glycolic acid burn/melt your skin so badly in such a short time?

- This reminds me of that report where this old guy regrew his hair after burning his head/scalp. I used to think that if the trauma to the scalp is too big it will have negative effects on hair growth. Its why i cant decide my needling protocol. I go from bleeding myself heavily on my sessions to just causing some redness because i just cant decide which ones best for me. You have studies for micro needling where hair growth is achieved with mild needling, and then you have people who butcher their scalps and get regrowth too. Then you have reports like that old guy who burned his scalp, people who sunburn their skin with UVB lamps, and people who tattoo their scalps and suddenly grow hair again.
I wish the data on this whole subject wasnt so confusing. Clearly wounding your scalp could be an extremely effective way to cause hair growth, but no one knows the best way to do it.

You put alot of effort into your posts and you go out of your way to share everything on your journey, which is a rare thing to see here. Its been more than a year since you created this thread and you are still updating it. Thank you

 

[MyThinningConfidence]

Very interesting post. Some things i want to say:
- Why are you so confident you are able to replicate that incident again, with different parts of your skin? Im not trying to discourage you, but i wouldnt know wether that was pure luck. I mean, how was that wound from the acid different than any other kind of wound to not cause scar tissue?
- Just my 2 cents: Try not to go all out with that method. Maybe try experimenting with one spot of the scalp to see if it does anything. You dont wanna risk destroying your entire scalp because of your inpatients.
-Thats an insanely strong acid?! I have some lactic acid that i sometimes use to exfoliate my skin. If i leave it on too long it gives me a harsh burn and red skin, but nothing that comes close to melting away some of my skin. What made that glycolic acid burn/melt your skin so badly in such a short time?

- This reminds me of that report where this old guy regrew his hair after burning his head/scalp. I used to think that if the trauma to the scalp is too big it will have negative effects on hair growth. Its why i cant decide my needling protocol. I go from bleeding myself heavily on my sessions to just causing some redness because i just cant decide which ones best for me. You have studies for micro needling where hair growth is achieved with mild needling, and then you have people who butcher their scalps and get regrowth too. Then you have reports like that old guy who burned his scalp, people who sunburn their skin with UVB lamps, and people who tattoo their scalps and suddenly grow hair again.
I wish the data on this whole subject wasnt so confusing. Clearly wounding your scalp could be an extremely effective way to cause hair growth, but no one knows the best way to do it.

You put alot of effort into your posts and you go out of your way to share everything on your journey, which is a rare thing to see here. Its been more than a year since you created this thread and you are still updating it. Thank you

Well it's a mostly subjective thing but I'm just using this as a basis since the burns were actually quite bad, at least the worst I've had yet and my body was able to recover from it just fine. It seems my skin heals exceptionally well and has zero issues with things like dyspigmentation. I think for me, trialing out this acid with different procedures makes a lot of sense since it appears from a personal level I'm able to withstand and heal from strong acids quite well.

I've actually been using this acid for a few months now, I've been using 40% undilluted on my temples for about 20 minutes at a time but I've never even had a faint tingle, so my new idea is to actually just damage the top layer of my skin or microneedle it so the acid can actually penetrate my scalp skin and do its job. What made it melt away in my story was that I massaged that part of my nose and lightly scratched it which damaged the top layer of my skin, this is why only 20% did so much damage in such a short period.

I'll have to find the study again sometime but glycolic acid is actually beneficial for a few reasons, it helps exfoliate the skin unclogging pores etc. But the more interesting part is that a study found concentrations of around 40-50% for AHAs thinned the top layer of the skin but this is only temporary and over a matter of many months it actually thickens the deeper layers of the skin. Depending what theory of hairloss you follow glycolic acid actually targets issues with a few of them. I'm using it on my face already so I'm not really going out of my way to trial it out.

Someone also informed me that someone else tried glycolic acid in the past at 20%, the thread was 10 pages long but from what I've seen they left 20% glycolic acid on their head most of the day and then massaged and got all the dead skin off later. I don't know if they added anything extra but their results seem solid. The first picture is supposedly after they saw some growth and the last one is the latest one I found in the thread. You also need to account for the fact that the hair is longer but that's some nice results. Not exactly a thick head of hair but any potential boost to regrowth is amazing considering how hard it can be to grow new hair.

 

[Haironnu]

@MyThinningConfidence Do you not recommend scalp massaging anymore due to risk of wrinkles?

Also, did you get any side effects from finasteride? I kinda have similar hormonal profile as you described, I have gyno, I got high estrogen (it's at the high end of the 'normal' range) and fairly low testosterone, I'm also very hairy. I want to try finasteride but I'm afraid I'm prone to side effects because of all these stuff.

 

[Moosey]

@MyThinningConfidence Do you not recommend scalp massaging anymore due to risk of wrinkles?

Also, did you get any side effects from finasteride? I kinda have similar hormonal profile as you described, I have gyno, I got high estrogen (it's at the high end of the 'normal' range) and fairly low testosterone, I'm also very hairy. I want to try finasteride but I'm afraid I'm prone to side effects because of all these stuff.

just try it. if you get side effects just stop