Lowering Finasteride Dosage - No Side Effects

[Timmysee]

Hi everyone, I thought I'd make an account to post this here because searching google with any kind of search terms relating to this subject just brings up negative reviews of finasteride and its side effects and I feel like this needs to be shared.

I started taking finasteride 1mg a while back and suffered side effects (lack of sex drive, difficulty getting erections). I'm 19 so that really hit me hard and I stopped taking finasteride after around a week. Tried again a little later on out of desperation with the same effects. I think a lot more men get negative side effects than Merck would lead us to believe.

I recently saw a few people saying that 0.2mg dosages worked almost as well as 1mg in a study, but nothing about decreased dosage resulting in decreased side effects. I decided to bite the bullet and give decreasing the dosage a go myself to see if side effects would persist or not.

I've now been taking 1/3 of a tab of generic finasteride every day (around 0.33mg) for around two weeks and experience no sides so far. Obviously I can't comment on how this is working for my hair yet, but I will keep taking it and probably post another thread with my progress a little later on.


Just wanted to let everyone who had side effects with finasteride know that they shouldn't give up yet, a lowered dose may help.

 

[captain_que]

Good for you, I´m planning to try the same thing as I just got a prescription.

Stay on here and keep us posted on your treatment

 

[Timmysee]

Yeah I plan on sticking around. Unfortunately I didn't think ahead and shaved my head before I joined up, so I can't really start documenting my progress with pictures until it grows back a little seeing as I'm VERY blonde. xD

Have you already tried them and had side effects, or just cutting them down to make sure/save money?

What dose are you planning on cutting them to?
I was originally going to go with 0.5mg but the pills are a b**ch to cut so I ended up making one into thirds and just following suit with the rest.

 

[captain_que]

I haven´t been on oral finasteride before -only topical. A bit worried about sides, so I´m planning to start low, .25 - .5 and perhaps increase..

 

[zeroheat]

please keep us updated!

 

[Timmysee]

Will do.
It's worth noting that I get depressed quite often since starting the pills, but I have an inherited predisposition to it, so I don't think it's anything to be concerned about.

My sex life has definitely not suffered.

 

[7up]

CAUTIOUSLY OPTIMISTIC.

Hi all.

1st time poster.

WHERE I'M AT:
Like Timmysee, I recently gave up on a Finasteride regimen (12 months of 1.25mg daily, 4 out of 5 days) following about 10 months of massively reduced libido and a recent split with a long term girlfriend not totally, but partly, attributable to my lack of sexual interest.

Certainly, it was a wake up call. A fear-drenched, erectionless, oh-god-have-i-fcuked-everything?? wake up call.

That was a few days ago.

I felt an obligation to report the following info, and continue to report, because whilst there are many negative accounts describing the horn-sapping side effects of this drug, even after discontinuation, there is a noteable lack of reports concerning the success/failure of libido-recovery via dosage reduction.

I am cautiously happy to be able to report the following.

SINCE QUITTING finasteride:
5 days after quitting the finasteride, I woke up today with my first morning erection in (what I estimate) to be over 6 months.
And although I am not yet nearly as horny as I was before my finasteride regimen, I have definitely started to feel some subtle, loin-tingling inclinations towards the ladies. Thank God in heaven.

MY PLAN:
I will stay off finasteride altogether for the time being and continue to monitor my 'horn' status and progress over the coming 5 weeks or so. As a lifestyle supplement I have begun a healthy diet and regular excersise to boost my confidence in the meantime, and to try and help speed recovery along.

If my libido returns to a satisfactory level during this time,
I plan to start again on a greatly reduced dosage, probably as low as 0.25mg initially, building up to 0.5mg if no further sides.
I will continue to report back here.

If my libido does NOT return to a satisfactory level during this time,
I will postpone any new finasteride regimen indefinitely until such time that it does. Fingers crossed.
Again; I will continue to report back here.

PLEASE GET INVOLVED
If you're reading this and have experience in combating finasteride sides by reducing dosage, successful or not, please take the time to get your thoughts and experiences down here. I am a forums novice, but I am struggling to find many threads that focus purely on this aspect.

OVERALL:
I have seen very satisfactory results over 12 months using finasteride, and am hopeful that I can continue to make progress with the drug- BUT ONLY if I can successfully eradicate the libido problem. For the time being, however, I am keen only to get my lusty mojo back.

IN CLOSING,
Your input, advice and questions are genuinely appreciated, as well as any pointers to threads which might be of interest. Feel free to ask/advise me about anything head related, whichever head that may be.

A big post, I know. Thanks very much for your time. Five years ago I never thought that I would one day plan to regularly update a community of anxious males as to the status of my erections, but there you have it.

Yours,

7up

Apr '09 - Apr '10: 1.25mg Finasteride daily, every 4/5 days.
May '10 onwards: No hairloss drugs, finasteride or otherwise.

 

[Timmysee]

Hi 7up.
That's pretty much why I made this thread. It seems like people are a lot more eager to jump on the net and shout about things going wrong than share stories about things working as they should. This is understandable, but it makes finasteride seem a little hopeless, especially if you've already tried it and experienced sides.

I hope it works out for you on a lowered dose

Edit - I just upped my dose to 0.5mg/day. Will see how it works out.

 

[7up]

Hi Timmysee,

Nice one! Thanks for convincing me to get involved.

But listen - is it perhaps worth sticking to your original dose for a while longer? I don't think two weeks is enough to judge the side effects.

Its up to you of course, but think - if you get on OK after three months on the 0.33mg, you could always increase.

But the danger is that if you go to 0.5mg now, and you experience more libido-sap, you will have to wait for it to return to normal before trying anything lower.

Also, (and this is an uneducated guess), your body may respond better working up from 0.33 to 0.5mg, rather than hitting 0.5mg now and dropping later.

It's not as though you stand to lose much more hair in that time, and you will still be benefiting from the finasteride in the meantime.

Slowly slowly catchy monkey!

 

[johnt]

Thank you for this thread -- I was going to start an identical one myself when I came upon this. I'm 37 years old, and here's my quick story...

I was on propecia for about 8 years. When I first started it I have to admit I didn't know anything about it except it was prescribed by a doctor (so must be safe) and it was supposed to stop hairloss, so I used it at 1 mg per day for the entire 8 years. In time I think I noticed sexual sides, but it occurred so gradually and I was uneducated about the drug so I didn't really blame it on propecia. When I did finally strat to learn about the problems associated with it I think it "registerd" that it is probably the drug causing the sides...

So I quit gradually and went to a natural regimen, hoping that the natural regimen would save my hair after quitting propecia. Well, I noticed the sides did go away. I started getting better erections, and morning erections regularly, it was really great. Well then, after about 5 months, I started losing again in the same pattern as 8 years before (before propecia). So now I've went back on the propecia at .5 mg per day (about 2 weeks ago). My morning erections stopped almost immediately, and I haven't experienced an erection at all for about 4 days. So now I'm toying with quitting again, but before I do I'm going to experiment with lowering the dose. I'll try either .5 mg eod, or .25 mg every day, haven't decided yet. I'll definitely post on what I experience!

 

[johnt]

By the way, I saw a graph once that showed DHT inhibition at different finasteride levels, along with how many days the DHT was suppressed. I looked all over for it to post here but couldn't find it. As I recall, it showed that a .25 mg dose per day was almost equal to .5mg and 1 mg. Even more astonishing to me was that each of those doses suppressed DHT levels for I think it was 13 days! I recall thinking that someone could practically get away with taking .25 mg once every week and a half and achieve practically the same results -- but this is all based totally on recollection. If anyone knows the chart I'm talking about please link it.

 

[timbo]

 

[neuromet]

I'm in the same boat. Started at 1.0. Then went to 0.5. Tried 5 mg of Cialis with 0.5 mg of Finasteride. It cured the weak erection problem, but Cialis gives me headaches. So I'm going to 0.25 mg of finasteride. Based on that chart, though, I'm not expecting it to do much to lower my DHT levels. But every little bit helps, I guess.

 

[7up]

Hi johnt, neuromet and all,

Thanks for getting on board! Let's see how things go for us, then.

Thanks timbo, for the chart.

finasteride every day, or every other day ('eod')?
I will need to research again to verify this and provide sources; But I remember reading that it is better to take a small amount daily than double dose every other day, to help maintain consistent levels that are affected by the drug, which is fast acting.
I'm sure people with personal experience/references can jump in to verify/dispute this.

It has been reported by some that there is often an initial temporary period of libido-sap when starting any finasteride regime, which subsides after few weeks or possibly months. This is the reason I stuck it out at [1.25mg per 4/5 days] for a year with no libido, hoping I would move past it and start feeling lusty again. No joy.

johnt: Since you are already experiencing sides again on 0.5mg, would you consider continuing at 0.25mg per day for the time being, say 3 months, and working up to 0.5mg if successful?

Whichever way you choose to go, best of luck. Hope this thread proves useful to us and others.

Me: finasteride Cessation Update:
(See previous posts, Stopped 6 days ago after 1 year on 1.25mg every 4/5 days)
Last night before bed I cracked one off, to use the parlance. First time in a while, and though while not rock hard, definitely a little more horny than the last time about 10 days ago, when I had to really focus to bleed a pathetic amount out of my partly flaccid wanger.
Stop me if I'm getting too technical.
Readers will be thrilled to learn that there was over double the amount of jizz than my previous effort, (which really felt like an effort), end of April.

However, far more interesting (and of great relief to me) was the fact that last night I had a prolonged, sexy dream for the first time in at least 10 months or so. I had forgotten just how much I love girls' big, fleshy boobs.

I'm nowhere near back to normal, just excited that ANYTHING is happening so soon after quitting, and given the horror stories I have read.
And I'm still very cautious about the so-called 'Post Propecia Syndrome' which if true could potentially kick in at some point, but at least for now I'm feeling a little less panicked.

 

[johnt]

Timbo: Thanks for the chart - a little different from what I remembered but it's interesting and nice to see.

7up: Last night was the first night in two weks I didn't take any propecia - yesterday I had a particularly bad day... anxiety, impatient, down, etc. I do have the tendency to blame anything bad that occurs to the drug, but I have to say that during my 5 months off I felt more relaxed and calm, and obviously more sexually charged. In fact, so much so that other's commented on it.

As I sit here I honeslty don't know what I'm going to do tonight as far as taking it. One idea I had was to stay off it completely until the sides go away and then start in an another dose of .25 mg per day and see if the sides return. However, as was mentioned by someone else, I completely agree that there is an initial surge in sides as the body gets used to it and then it subsides. So that being the case, I'm considering taking a .25 mg dose tonight and each day hereon after and seeing if the sides go away.

One thing that is somewhat discouraging is when I came off propecia at the end of the 8 years of initial use, I stopped it gradually ... .5mg per day for about a month, then .25 for about a month, then .25mg eod for about a month and it wasn't until about 3-4 weeks after I stopped completely that I started feeling a significant change in sexual sides and calmness. However, after 8 years of 1 mg. per day I have no doubt that it just probably took a longer time for my body to get back to normal. So we'll see...

Part of me wonders if there is a level that is the "magic number" -- little side effects while still ceasing hair loss (and hopefully getting some regrowth again). It seems my hair is very susceptible to androgens and therefore need to really reduce DHT for positive effects on hair -- but at the same time I really want to maximize my libido... but that's the goal of all of ours and the "experiment" we're interested in discovering I guess.

I'll keep everyone posted.

 

[7up]

Hi johnt,

I totally relate to the dilemma, johnt, and I've got real sympathy that you stuck it out for so long previously. To be honest, i'm bracing myself for the likely possibility that even on a very low dose, the finasteride sides will be too much to justify what is ultimately 'a little bit more hair indefinitely'.

More hair is nice - but enjoying life with a positive outlook, a fat libido and a fully functioning brain is much nicer

And lets face facts; as individuals our hair loss issues are infinitely more important to us than they are to anyone else who knows us. In a very real way the real problem is all in our head. Har, har.

So dude, by all means lets have another try, but also recognise that we should draw a line under finasteride permanently if it turns out that unacceptable consequences are unavoidable.

It sounds as though you have had a particularly tough time with the sides, and for a long time. There's no rush, so if you're unsure, leave it a couple of days and have a think. Don't feel bad about packing this sh*t in completely and getting on with your life. Alternatively, if you decide to try again on a lower dose, set yourself a strict timeframe. Something like
'If in 4 months on 0.25mg the sides are not subsiding, then goodbye finasteride, hello gym, hello new wardrobe, hello sex life, hello good mental health and goodbye nagging, all consuming, pointless angst'.

 

[johnt]

Ok, I have a renewed optism ... I took .25mg propecia last night and plan to stick with it at that dose daily UNLESS the sides get unbearable and I decide to throw in the towel and try lasering (which actually I'm contemplating doing in succession with this anyway, but more to come on that).

7up: I don't recall at the moment, but are you experimenting with finasteride doses right now too, or currently not taking any? Are you trying anything else?

 

[Timmysee]

After upping my dose to 0.5mg, I have decided to take it back to 1/3 of a pill everyday again. About 15 hours after taking 0.5mg I got a terrible stint of depression. I can't speak for the sexual sides because sex is the last thing on my mind in that circumstance, but 0.5 is obviously too much for me.

I lowered the dose again but didn't break in taking the drug, I'm feeling better now and hopefully the side effects will subside.

 

[7up]

Hi all.

Timmysee: Good work, now stick to the lower dose for a while, even if the depression subsides! At least a couple of months.

Johnt: I'm off finasteride completely for the time being. See earlier posts in this thread for full story.

Sides continue to fade. Libido also steadily improving. Clarity of mind. Bit hyperactive, even Now realise I had mental/emotional sides I wasn't even aware of.

I'll do a proper update in the next couple of days.

Cheers guys.

 

[TheGrayMan2001]

Are any of you guys taking that much via proscar, or just dividing propecia\finpecia pills?

I have fincar and was considering a lower dose but I don't know how to cut it any smaller.