My Story: finasteride and sexual sides.

[varmax]

Hi guys, I am not a big poster in this forum but have been checking all the developments for the past one year. This is the story of my fight against hairloss using Proscar.

I started taking Proscar(1/4 rd) about 6 months ago. I still remember the day I went to my doctor and asked for a prescription for Proscar for my hairloss. He just wouldnt give me the prescription. As he knew me pretty well he advised me not to take this drug as he heard pretty bad comments on this drug and its effect on sexual function. He told me that my hair looks fine at the moment and I would be better off trying Rogaine as it is much safer for me. He also told me that his friend who was a psycologist dealt with a few people who got divorced due to reasons relating to lack of sexual intimacy and some them were using finasteride for hairloss and the sides didnt go away even after 7 months after quitting.
I heard all this but it didnt dampen my spirit one bit as I thought I was only 24 and the guys who get the sides are propably in their 40's and experiencing ED from other causes. Anyway I was able to get a prescription and started taking quartered Proscar in april 2005 and about 4 months ago I developed ED with major loss in libido. I just couldnt hold an erection no matter how hard I tried. Now this is completely strange as I always had rock hard erections. SO I came back to this forum and followed the guys' advice that the sides will go away after a few weeks. I was lucky I went overseas by myself for 2 months so I had no pressure to have sex with my Girlfriend. Now from july to september I was trying my best to get an erection by watching p**rn and everything else but I just couldnt get a full one. So I stopped taking finasteride for the last week before I got back to australia and wolla I was able to get an erection after about four days of quitting. About 3 weeks ago I thought I will give it another go and started taking 1/5th of a proscar and guess what, within 3 days my erections were dead. I finally made up my mind that no matter what, I will not take proscar and put my sex life in jeopardy.
Now this is freaky, I called AMI about a week ago which advertises about a special Nasal spray for ED and the guy on the phone heard my story and said that he had atleast 30 calls so far from guys ranging from 20-40 suffering from the same problem. He also said that about 4 guys have quit about an year ago and still suffer from the sides.
I am not trying to discourage anyone from taking finasteride but am just putting forward the facts that I gathered. To me the no of cases suffering from sides seems to be far greater than 2%. Make sure that u quit taking finasteride on the first sign of any sexual dysfunction. If u want to try to see if they go away then its entirely upto u.

 

[biff]

Why don't you try and reduce your dose? This one size fits all deal with 1mg just doesn't seem to work for everyone. Some people can hapilly take 1/1.25mg without any problems but I got sides on just 0.5mg! I have now reduced my dose to 0.25mg and have had no problems. It has only been a couple of months so it is too early to tell if 0.25mg is going to do much for my hair, or if I will get sides in the future. I have heard that some people do see results on low doses so I will give it a go for a year and see what happens.

 

[varmax]

What Im surprised about is that, there are a lot of people effected by the sides and it beats me how a company as big as Merck and FDA can get it so wrong by saying only 2% are affected by minimal sexual sides. Nearly everyone is complaining about loss of libido and inability to hold a strong erection which to me is a major side effect and can lead to major problems in relationships and even suicides. Anyway I still advice people to try it as it might work for them.
At this moment I completely quit taking finasteride and my erections are about 20% better. Still finding it hard to hold an erection and havent got the same sensation when having sex. I m praying to god that eerything goes back to normal in the next couple of weeks.

 

[KiLLuMiNaTi]

its because merk is a lieing drug company ,i dont beleive them 2% results for one second..i reckon it would be 100% lowered libido and about 30% impotence

 

[SE-freak]

its because merk is a lieing drug company ,i dont beleive them 2% results for one second..i reckon it would be 100% lowered libido and about 30% impotence

Yeah. In fact I am sure that it also lowers the libido of people not on the drug, so that 100% is quite optimistic.

 

[jayC99]

its because merk is a lieing drug company ,i dont beleive them 2% results for one second..i reckon it would be 100% lowered libido and about 30% impotence

I agree, their statistics are garbage.

 

[joseph49853]

I believe those statistics are wrong too. I'm just not sure as to what degree. It really depends on the dosage. Finasteride definitely decreased my sexual sensation by a few scant percentage points; although there still is a HUGE 96 percent left. But when you're a man used to a certain feeling in almost the most touch sensitive areas of your entire body, you really take notice.

 

[jblig]

No side effects here and maintaining my hair to boot!!

 

[KiLLuMiNaTi]

jblig your lucky

 

[mogadon]

been on propecia nearly a month, no sides apart from......wait for it................ loss of libido, nearly impotent, cant focus on pussy, its like your brain is detachted from your schlong, im getting off this sh*t,sticking with topicals, spironolactone,nizoral, ect, whats the point of having hair with a dead dick.

merk are full of sh*t

 

[joseph49853]

Mogadon, those feelings subside eventually. Studies have found dosages as low as .2mg to be almost as effective as 1mg, while minimizing any side effects. Try lowering your dosage, and continue to monitor how you feel. I know it's hard the first few months on Proscar/Propecia/Finasteride. Good luck.

 

[mogadon]

cheers joseph,but its really hard hanging in there,i mean maybe this aint gonna go away, i mean even htl moderator had to come off, i just wish there was a drug that a oral drug that was specific and only stopped dht in the scalp,and left the other dht alone,(dreaming) or i wish some super topical anti-annogen would come out,i think i hang in there but,i dont know for how long more,i had a good sex drive before this.

 

[varmax]

HI GUYS. THIS IS THE UPDATE OF MY SITUATION:

Believe me this sh*t is stronger than I expected. I believe it changes something in ur body so bad that the sides still havent worn off. I still cant maintain a good erection, no sex drive whatsoever and worse, sometimes it takes about 4-5 minutes of continous stimulation to get it up in the first place. I really cant believe this can happen to so many people and there are no research being done. This is not the first time for Merck to withdraw a drug after a few years. They withdrew VIOXX when it was found out to be too dangerous to ur heart or something. So , I urge people to look at other options before they try this.