My balding story and how I've come to cope

[Diffuser3000]

This is just a story of how I've come to the point I am in life in dealing with my own battle with the norwood reaper and the best way I can live with it.

I've been diffuse thinning since I was 16 and despite this, still managed to attract girls and have a relatively active sex life until my early 20's when my hairline started receding.

By my mid 20's it was getting pretty bad and I had become a shell of the person I once was, the confident, funny and outgoing side of me had gone and the weird, quiet and socially awkward me had taken over. I started using Toppik which did a job but when your hairline is the problem it becomes difficult to pull off, I started styling it in ways to cover thinning areas which just looks worse than not doing anything. At this point, friends started getting married and settling down and posting their lives on social media whereas I shut off from the world, came off facebook and stopped socialising altogether.

I started Propecia 3 years ago when I was 27 after getting over my fears of side effects and it has slowed things down to a crawl but haven't noticed any regrowth. I went to a couple of clinics who said I was a NW4-5 diffuse thinner with below average donor (2-3000 grafts maybe) with retrograde so a transplant wouldn't make much difference. I tried a system during lockdown but that just made me more paranoid than I am already and I'm also someone who really doesn't have a face for a head shave.

So roll forward to about a week ago, I was on a packed train and there was an attractive couple (early 30s at a guess and the guy had a good head of hair) standing next to me. They were clearly in the honeymoon period of their relationship and were all over eachother, kissing and talking about their plans for the future full of hope and optimism. It was like a sick 'what you could've won' moment for me. This played on my mind for days after and I knew I had to change my attitude to life if I am ever to be happy again.

Now as I turn 30 today, I have decided to just focus on things that I enjoy. I've lost so much over the years to my obsession with this shitty condition that I refuse to let it take over the rest of my life. I have decided to give up on dating or finding a partner as that whole process these days with apps just seems legitimately soul destroying and instead go places and do things that do make me happy, even if that means doing it by myself. I have a decent, steady job and some savings which allow me to live fairly comfortably (I'm not rich though by any means).

At this point I'm just frustrated with myself for letting this change me and push some wonderful people out of my life, including potential girlfriends or wives. These are things I can't change, but I will always be greatful for the moments I had and memories I made because I know many others don't even have that.

Take from that what you will norwood brothers, it feels good to vent and I hope things get better for all of us.

 

[DyingOfTheLight]

Good story bro, I'm happy that you found some peace and closure. Your twenties are a hectic time. I know you often hear it's supposed to be the peak of your existence, but when looking around at people my age it hardly shows. My early twenties were a nightmare as well. Now I'm pretty much out of the storm, and inching closer to 30, I feel much more fulfilled and content. But same as you I still have a long way to go

 

[Diffuser3000]

Balding in your 20's is even worse when all your friends have great hair, I think that aggravated my situation at the time.

My prime years were 16 - 21, I just want to forget everything from then up until now lol.

 

[norwood_spotter]

this is all so depressing, when people are just 30 and they already know they will spend the rest of their life alone (could be easily 60 years).


„its just hair“ - i dont want to hear this ever again.

dont get me wrong, i like the attitude behind it. sometimes you just have to accept things, try the best. try the best to happy, to not come cynic, resentful and bitter is this brutal world.

but in the end it won't save you from anything; forced positivity doesn't do anything at all. you can try it for years, maybe decades. there are people who seem to go through most of their lives seeing the good side, but in the end, life always breaks your heart. doesnt matter how brave you are, or how reserved, or how much you have developed a sense of humour, you still end up with your heart broken. thats when you stop smiling.

 

[DyingOfTheLight]

this is all so depressing, when people are just 30 and they already know they will spend the rest of their life alone (could be easily 60 years).


„its just hair“ - i dont want to hear this ever again.

dont get me wrong, i like the attitude behind it. sometimes you just have to accept things, try the best. try the best to happy, to not come cynic, resentful and bitter is this brutal world.

but in the end it won't save you from anything; forced positivity doesn't do anything at all. you can try it for years, maybe decades. there are people who seem to go through most of their lives seeing the good side, but in the end, life always breaks your heart. doesnt matter how brave you are, or how reserved, or how much you have developed a sense of humour, you still end up with your heart broken. thats when you stop smiling.

Reminds me of a Houellebecq quote

 

[norwood_spotter]

Reminds me of a Houellebecq quote

lets say i got inspired by it ^^

 

[Diffuser3000]

forced positivity doesn't do anything at all

I agree, i'm certainly not looking at life through rose tinted glasses by any means, just being realistic with my expectations with what to get out of life.

The dating world is brutal at the moment so at this point I'd rather not try than keep getting ghosted or rejected, one girl even said I looked 40 when I was 28!

 

[norwood_spotter]

Now as I turn 30 today, I have decided to just focus on things that I enjoy. […] I have decided to give up on dating or finding a partner as that whole process

i dont think thats a good longterm strategy for your own happiness by the way. the desire for companionship, romantic or the desire to not just be alone is just too strong in most humans. yes of course, you wont die from it but will you be happy, or at least not unhappy? for a short time i think you can pretend so i guess. but like i said, at 30 you could live another 60 years….how long will you think that facade of happiness will stay? i think with 40 you will already start to regret that you didnt try your best to start a family. and it will only get worse. all your old friends will have families, are occupied, will have less and less time. then its not easy for an old bald men to make new friends in general, social connections that are just not acquaintances. then your parents will die at some point. are you prepared for this? to come home to an empty apartment every day, for the next 60 years? with a ton of time to think about your life?

i think in the end, no matter what the outcome is, you should at least try, so yoi have no regrets because you tried everything in your power. and with trying i dont just mean installing tinder (pointless for bald and/or guys with ugly faces anyways imho) but also other ways. maybe think out of the box. maybe even things that are looked down upon from society like „importing“ a wife from thailand or something, who cares what people think

 

[doubleindemnity]

I felt this way when I was turning 30 as a NW6. I thought that I would move on from hair loss and focus on things that I enjoy, and make the other areas of my life good. Well, I felt like this a few times but I never got over hair loss. Then I got a hair system and everything changed. I really feel like I'm done with hair loss and am starting to find it difficult to relate to the person that I used to be. I am just living my life with hair and it all seems normal. Highly recommended.

 

[norwood_spotter]

I felt this way when I was turning 30 as a NW6. I thought that I would move on from hair loss and focus on things that I enjoy, and make the other areas of my life good. Well, I felt like this a few times but I never got over hair loss. Then I got a hair system and everything changed. I really feel like I'm done with hair loss and am starting to find it difficult to relate to the person that I used to be. I am just living my life with hair and it all seems normal. Highly recommended.

what did your working colleagues say? friends? family?

im interested

 

[doubleindemnity]

this is all so depressing, when people are just 30 and they already know they will spend the rest of their life alone (could be easily 60 years).


„its just hair“ - i dont want to hear this ever again.

dont get me wrong, i like the attitude behind it. sometimes you just have to accept things, try the best. try the best to happy, to not come cynic, resentful and bitter is this brutal world.

but in the end it won't save you from anything; forced positivity doesn't do anything at all. you can try it for years, maybe decades. there are people who seem to go through most of their lives seeing the good side, but in the end, life always breaks your heart. doesnt matter how brave you are, or how reserved, or how much you have developed a sense of humour, you still end up with your heart broken. thats when you stop smiling.

This I totally agree with. I was all into the positivity. Sleeping well, eating well, good shape, meditating daily, affirmations, journaling you name it etc. But I didn't like the way that I looked and thought that I was considered unattractive. No matter how much of that positive stuff I did, I ended up more miserable. It got to the point where I needed even more time on the positive stuff (20 mins meditation rather than 10 etc.) to keep the misery at bay. I eventually quit it all. I ended up in therapy and eventually got a system. I think that if you're going down this route that I mentioned, do something that you actually enjoy not something that you "should enjoy" or that is "good for you". Think video games rather than meditation, tasty foods rather than healthy diet.

 

[Diffuser3000]

i dont think thats a good longterm strategy for your own happiness by the way. the desire for companionship, romantic or the desire to not just be alone is just too strong in most humans.

I might feel differently in 10 years or so and as you say there's always the option of Thai / Filipino brides which is probably the way I would go. Never say never I suppose. At the moment I just want to get the morgage paid off and see a bit of the world.

I'm sure I'll need to try many different things to move on from the last few years and be happy again, I just hope I can become the confident guy I was before and that would make dating easier but at the moment I just want to work on myself.

 

[doubleindemnity]

what did your working colleagues say? friends? family?

im interested

I planned it all carefully but I am surprised at how few people care and how few people notice. For work, I had a few months of work from home due to the pandemic. When I came back with the system I think that only one person's eyes looked up at my head (not my forehead where you might be able to spot something mind you, but to the area near my crown, where it is undetectable). They didn't say anything. With everybody else, including many who have seen me bald for a long time, they really didn't seem to notice. When I first got it, I always wore a hat when I left the house to run an errand or work out or something, to save my anxiety. With friends and close family, they are happy that I feel good about it and that seems to be the main thing for them. There are one or two strangers who I will likely never meet again who I told about the system (e.g. a photographer or when a date went badly) and they told me that they didn't notice anything strange/fake looking about my hair and then they didn't even care and moved on to other areas of conversation. I even once went to work with the system not properly tied down or styled once, because I was still getting used to it, such that if you looked closely at my hairline, you'd see some of the plastic base. Still, nobody seemed to look at my forehead or ask about it. If you go on the hair system section here you'll see that some users noted that my hairline is at the wrong place or isn't well graduated or that I could do it better or something. They're all correct but the amazing thing is that nobody notices any of this except system wearers or us obsessive hair loss types! So sorting out the hairline and getting it in the right place is only an issue for me to worry about.

Take a look on YouTube etc. Systems really do look good and very realistic. They can be styled to be undetectable. That is for sure and shouldn't even be up for debate. The only question is whether you can go through the challenges (costs, maintenance every week or two, anxiety you feel when you first get it) and consider it worthwhile to wear one. For me it's yes. 1-2 hours every 2 weeks of maintenance plus a few hundred USD every month to have hair is an absolute privilege.