Hi, I just wanted to get up a quick introduction post which I plan on updating in the coming months. I have been reading a lot of posts from others here over the last few months and wanted to contribute something myself. Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to give a complete history of my journey.
I recently turned 30 and my hair has been thinning slowly since I was 17. At the start of the thinning, my hair was ridiculously thick. At various parts of my life stresses have resulted in noticible sheds where I thought I was going to go bald, but it never got too bad. Halfway through college, I was sure I was going to go bald at one point and started taking propecia. For me, I was worried about side effects and stopped taking it after about a year. I also was using Niacin shampoo which i stopped using at the same time because it seemed to be nuking my hair. I switched to good sulfate free shampoos/conditioners, my hair stabilized and after leaving collge my hair looked a whole lot better. The texture wasnt as nice as my younger self, but I had a full head of hair with no noticible thinning spots.
After college and getting a little bit out of shape, I decided to start hitting the gym again. I started taking creatine. For those that don’t know, creatine increases testosterone levels which in turn increases DHT levels, which for DHT sensitive individuals will lead to an increase in hair loss. Working out by itself does this, but creatine greatly amplifies this process. I did not realize this at the time, but again I was in a position where I thought for sure I was going to lose all my hair. I was pretty jacked, but didn’t want to lose all my hair! I stopped taking creatine and after several months my hair stabilized and again looked about the same as it did before.
Throughout the entire ebbs and flows, however, I was still progressing towards thinner hair. Around the time I turned 28 I was no longer experiencing wild swings in the look of my hair, but this was about when I started to become unhappy about how it looked. Its not so much that it was super thin, but the texture was not good with very uneven lengths. Id wake up in the morning and my hair would really look like crap. I didn’t decide to do anything about it until on my 30th birthday when my dad told me I should start thinking about a small hair transplant(he’s had 4 rounds of transplantation.
So I started taking Rogaine, Biotin Supplements and using Nizoral shampoo (which I have now replaced with Regenepure) on January 7th. Within days I was experiencing the Rogaine Shed. I was losing about 100 hairs in the shower, 60-80 when i applied the rogaine foam and another 20-30 when I combed my hair. During this time I googled “rogaine hair shed,” “Minoxidil shedding,” “how long does rogaine shed last,” etc etc. i was nervous. My hair has gotten MUCH thinner. My hairline took quite a hit and also thinned quite a bit from my temples back. My crown thinned a bit too, but luckily doesnt look too exposed. After a month though, I can say that my shed has stabilized. I stopped using Nizoral(honestly, the keto is important, but don’t use Nizoral). Nizoral is cheap shampoo with sulfates and for me stripped the hell out of my hair. Regenepure seems to be a great shampoo and conditioner. Instead of losing 200 hairs every morning and another 100 at night, i now seem to be losing about 40 in the morning and 20-30 at night. It is too soon to see what kind of progress I will get, but I am going to be staying the course and will update this post in the coming months.
I recently turned 30 and my hair has been thinning slowly since I was 17. At the start of the thinning, my hair was ridiculously thick. At various parts of my life stresses have resulted in noticible sheds where I thought I was going to go bald, but it never got too bad. Halfway through college, I was sure I was going to go bald at one point and started taking propecia. For me, I was worried about side effects and stopped taking it after about a year. I also was using Niacin shampoo which i stopped using at the same time because it seemed to be nuking my hair. I switched to good sulfate free shampoos/conditioners, my hair stabilized and after leaving collge my hair looked a whole lot better. The texture wasnt as nice as my younger self, but I had a full head of hair with no noticible thinning spots.
After college and getting a little bit out of shape, I decided to start hitting the gym again. I started taking creatine. For those that don’t know, creatine increases testosterone levels which in turn increases DHT levels, which for DHT sensitive individuals will lead to an increase in hair loss. Working out by itself does this, but creatine greatly amplifies this process. I did not realize this at the time, but again I was in a position where I thought for sure I was going to lose all my hair. I was pretty jacked, but didn’t want to lose all my hair! I stopped taking creatine and after several months my hair stabilized and again looked about the same as it did before.
Throughout the entire ebbs and flows, however, I was still progressing towards thinner hair. Around the time I turned 28 I was no longer experiencing wild swings in the look of my hair, but this was about when I started to become unhappy about how it looked. Its not so much that it was super thin, but the texture was not good with very uneven lengths. Id wake up in the morning and my hair would really look like crap. I didn’t decide to do anything about it until on my 30th birthday when my dad told me I should start thinking about a small hair transplant(he’s had 4 rounds of transplantation.
So I started taking Rogaine, Biotin Supplements and using Nizoral shampoo (which I have now replaced with Regenepure) on January 7th. Within days I was experiencing the Rogaine Shed. I was losing about 100 hairs in the shower, 60-80 when i applied the rogaine foam and another 20-30 when I combed my hair. During this time I googled “rogaine hair shed,” “Minoxidil shedding,” “how long does rogaine shed last,” etc etc. i was nervous. My hair has gotten MUCH thinner. My hairline took quite a hit and also thinned quite a bit from my temples back. My crown thinned a bit too, but luckily doesnt look too exposed. After a month though, I can say that my shed has stabilized. I stopped using Nizoral(honestly, the keto is important, but don’t use Nizoral). Nizoral is cheap shampoo with sulfates and for me stripped the hell out of my hair. Regenepure seems to be a great shampoo and conditioner. Instead of losing 200 hairs every morning and another 100 at night, i now seem to be losing about 40 in the morning and 20-30 at night. It is too soon to see what kind of progress I will get, but I am going to be staying the course and will update this post in the coming months.
