Hi everybody.
Being grateful for all the resources online I want to contribute by posting and updating my story - no matter how it goes.
I am currently a Norwood 3 with some diffuse thinning all over the top. Always had a very high hairline and wore my hair down, which is why I never paid much attention to the fact that I was receding at the temples. The hair on the top of my had has also started getting thinner so it seems like I am sensitive over the whole top of my head and could be facing a bold future.
I've been researching and reading for ages as most of us do when we realize we are in a loosing battle and need to identify the enemy. Looking back, I guess I have always been balding slowly. Extremely slowly. Never feel like I have ever shedded a hair in my life, and still to this day can ever pull out hair when I try. However, my hair loss has taken on the all to familiar pattern of male pattern baldness. Because of lacking family history I never realized what I was up against before lately. I am really grateful for the information that has been available online and I am making this thread to give back, and to let you know my history and how it goes.
Looking back, this has been the reason why my hair early on became so hard to style - slightly receded temples at age 19, but generally thick hair and lots of it. At age 23 it started becoming more evident to me that my hair was a bit ****, and a few comments made me realize that its actually really not as thick as before.
At age 24, knowing that the medication is a life long commitment and still being half in denial (dont understand how), I was still waiting for irrefutable evidence that my hair was indeed thinning. All the whining about these dreaded sexual side effects also caused me to hold of for a while longer, until I read the studies and compared it to for example the medication I take for ADD, and realized that there isn't to much difference and that in any case it will go away when I stop the medicine. Please don't tell me about the ever lasting side effects some people have gotten, I have a bigger chance of getting in a car accident tomorrow. The fact that like 2% of the placebo group also reported sexual side effects says quite a bit about the nature of this problem. I say this in hopes that somebody else reading wont spend as much time delaying a decision while loosing the battle against male pattern baldness.
Btw, has anybody done a study on the correlation between going bald and sexual dysfunction? I think there would be quite a high correlation there as well.
I had a free gene test done before I turned 25 in the clinic where I would eventually have my hair transplant, it was called something like "5 gene test". Basically I had the gene that makes my hair sensitive to DHT. I had low cortisol levels, which I found a surprise because the last few years had been rough for different reasons. Despite having the gene, my testosterone was not very high (medium) and the rate at which it was converted to DHT was apparently in medium range as well, which was supposed to mitigate the speed of which DHT would destroy my follicles and my life. It also showed me amounts of minerals, heavy metals, calcium, etc, that were of the charts and made me think that something is seriously wrong. I spent a lot of time googling this, but basically, mineral tests of hair is still "fringe science". According to the hair test I am high on chromium. And my calcium levels in comparison to some other things were very off the charts. Back in my North European home country I had a blood check of vitamins and found out I was low on vitamin D, which regulated calcium to some degree. Apart from that I dont know how to interpret the rest of the findings, and the doctors at the clinic didn't mention that part of the result. It was more like an additional thing for my own use. I will take away sensitive information and post the whole thing here.
At age 25 I smartened up and started taking propecia. Have taken it for 50 days now and not noticed any side effects at all. Started using minoxidil spray lately as well and was surprised how easy it is to apply, and now that I have come to terms with the fact that I have male pattern baldness, doing that routine every morning and evening is no problem is as easy as applying skin cream or brushing my teeth really.
I also attacked it full on with a FUE Hair Transplant, 3000 grafts, for which I payed 2500$, to fill in the temples. I would of done it earlier but my life was bit of a mess, but now I'm in school again and get my student grant. I live in an Asian country and was scared about the quality of the hair transplant. However, after visiting several times I felt and do feel quite secure that they are in fact extremely professional. The thing that bothered me the most though, was that they did not recommend medicine like finasteride to battle hair loss because of the sexual SE and said that if the loss continued I still had plenty of donor hair to do a few more operations so there was no chance I would go bald in the near future. They did honestly tell me that if my hair was all sensitive and I was destined to go bold, that no amount of hair transplants could save me, but they meant that its more important to look good while your young and still being able to reproduce. I am not sure if their motives were capitalistic or indeed part of their culture, which is very anti chemical types of medicine.
Apart from that my hair transplant experience was great. Their locale was huge, professional, had lots of people visiting and nurses walking around. Maybe about 10-15 different rooms, not sure what they were all used for. Many posters of people with complete top hair loss getting very decent coverage.
They were part of 8 such facilities nationally, and some kind of partnership with cutting edge American experts or facilities in the states, apparently. The whole procedure took about 8 hours. I was the only patient that day. The doctor who drew my hair line, in a much more suitable manner, than the first nurse had done, was very comforting and professional. He, accompanied by 1-3 nurses, did the whole procedure of extracting the follicles, with some kind of machine. They didn't offer my any pain medication or sleep medicine afterwards, but I of course had local anesthesia. I was gonna get some valium so that I could relax better but never got around to it.
I also had signed a form giving some kind of guarantee that there would be a 90% success rate - not knowing or investigating what would happen if that wasn't the case. When they were done extracting, they took them out and counted them in front of me. I think it was to show that I am getting what I am paying for. At that time when I was able to sit up and looked around there was the one surgeon and about 4 nurses in the room. I felt quite well taken care of, which was good, cause I was alone in a country that still is kind of foreign and doing this in language that isn't my native tongue. One of the nurses put them back in after having some food, and this was the most boring part, lying down for another extended period of time - but I'm not exactly going to complain.
After the procedure I was again given some food, a spray, things for my head, advice on how to manage and what to do the next days, a hair transplant manual. I was scared about washing my hair so chose to go back and do it there, which they offered for free the first two weeks after the procedure. They do some weird thing there where it looks like they inject Chinese medicine stuff in to peoples scalp with some kind of high tech tool as part of a general hair care program, which I tried once for free at my first visit to do the gene test. It felt rather nice. But nothing I signed up for though.
I am very happy I didn't shave my hair! Because, it was red about 1 month after the procedure and would of been so noticeable. I have very white skin. Since I didn't shave my hair, I could easily let the donor area get covered by the hair above, and let the temples be covered by hair like I usually do. Now, 10 days short of the two month mark, the redness has mostly dissipated, all though a little remains. I've been waiting for the new hair to fall out like I heard it almost always does. What is weird though, is that 10 days short of the 2 month mark, and most of the hair is still there and growing! There are some areas where a little more seems to have fallen off, and I got now idea if this is 98% of the hairs of it actually only is 70% percent, and the rest have fallen off. I only started using minoxidil spray about a week ago by the way; 20 days short of the 2 month mark.
From my reading online, I thought this was very unormal? The nurse at the clinic who has been following up with me every week by phone said that in any case, its not a bad thing. They said maybe being a foreigner my body reacts a bit differently..
Recovery took about a week, before I felt like I could wash my hair normally, and do most things normally again.
To sum up;
Hair Condition: NW3 with some diffuse thinning all over the top. Not sure if its just hairs thinner or loss as well. Through the magnifying thing at the hospital it was easy to see the hairs were a lot thinner and in bad condition and I took lots of magnified pictures so that I can compare them later. Those pics are not in here yet. Naturally high hairline.
hair transplant + 50 days (3000 grafts to fill in temples, not lowering hair line)
Propecia + 50 days
Minoxidil + 7 days
Ket. Shampoo 3-5 days a week.
Noticeable effects: None so far. My hair has never shedded or fell out so it would be impossible to assess whether or not its even halted anything.
Noticeable side effects: Some itchiness on my scalp, nothing else. Still horny and dick still works fine. Strattera ****ed with my libido way more than propecia.
To answer some question upfront and save time
Q: Why would I do a hair transplant at age of 25 before even knowing if finasteride works for me?
A: Because, finasteride works to hault hair loss in most people, and because even if the worst case scenario happened and it didn't - and all I got was a few years of having decent hair (more with a few additional transplants) - I would be facing a bald future anyway and would be happy with the gained time before I, in the end, shaved my head completely.
I'm not going to sit around and think about anymore.
That said though, my hair loss if of the extremely slow type but persistent type, so I think in any case I would have quite a few more years left.
Q: Arent you scared of the side effects of finasteride?
A: No. I'm more scared of the side effects of going bald will have on my self confidence and libido to be honest - and so far, I feel like I could just as well been taking sugar pills. Still so horny that it gets in the way of what I should be doing some times.
Q: How do you feel about taking finasteride and/or applying minoxidil the rest of your life?
A: No, I actually kind of enjoy the routine to be honest! Because it feels like I am being proactive and it takes so little time anyway, and personally I don't mind the oily effect it has on my hair. The bottle is also little and fits in my toilet bag when I only bring one. I can easily apply it after showering doing my morning routine, and there is nothing about it which would be obvious to any girl or partner if you wanted to hide it. At least in my experience.
Q: Do you regret not starting earlier?
A: Yes.
Q: What would you advice other people considering finasteride or minoxidil?
A: Don't wait! You can always try for 2 months and if you really feel you are having persistent side effects at that point, then consider quitting. All though, if they aren't getting in way of your life, I'd continue, because there is an even bigger chance that after a year they will be completely gone. Consider the fact that a large percentage of the placebo group in finasteride trials also reported sexual dysfunction.
That's it I guess. I hope my information can be of help, and welcome comments, critique, and questions.
Kind regards,
Toonamy
Being grateful for all the resources online I want to contribute by posting and updating my story - no matter how it goes.
I am currently a Norwood 3 with some diffuse thinning all over the top. Always had a very high hairline and wore my hair down, which is why I never paid much attention to the fact that I was receding at the temples. The hair on the top of my had has also started getting thinner so it seems like I am sensitive over the whole top of my head and could be facing a bold future.
I've been researching and reading for ages as most of us do when we realize we are in a loosing battle and need to identify the enemy. Looking back, I guess I have always been balding slowly. Extremely slowly. Never feel like I have ever shedded a hair in my life, and still to this day can ever pull out hair when I try. However, my hair loss has taken on the all to familiar pattern of male pattern baldness. Because of lacking family history I never realized what I was up against before lately. I am really grateful for the information that has been available online and I am making this thread to give back, and to let you know my history and how it goes.
Looking back, this has been the reason why my hair early on became so hard to style - slightly receded temples at age 19, but generally thick hair and lots of it. At age 23 it started becoming more evident to me that my hair was a bit ****, and a few comments made me realize that its actually really not as thick as before.
At age 24, knowing that the medication is a life long commitment and still being half in denial (dont understand how), I was still waiting for irrefutable evidence that my hair was indeed thinning. All the whining about these dreaded sexual side effects also caused me to hold of for a while longer, until I read the studies and compared it to for example the medication I take for ADD, and realized that there isn't to much difference and that in any case it will go away when I stop the medicine. Please don't tell me about the ever lasting side effects some people have gotten, I have a bigger chance of getting in a car accident tomorrow. The fact that like 2% of the placebo group also reported sexual side effects says quite a bit about the nature of this problem. I say this in hopes that somebody else reading wont spend as much time delaying a decision while loosing the battle against male pattern baldness.
Btw, has anybody done a study on the correlation between going bald and sexual dysfunction? I think there would be quite a high correlation there as well.
I had a free gene test done before I turned 25 in the clinic where I would eventually have my hair transplant, it was called something like "5 gene test". Basically I had the gene that makes my hair sensitive to DHT. I had low cortisol levels, which I found a surprise because the last few years had been rough for different reasons. Despite having the gene, my testosterone was not very high (medium) and the rate at which it was converted to DHT was apparently in medium range as well, which was supposed to mitigate the speed of which DHT would destroy my follicles and my life. It also showed me amounts of minerals, heavy metals, calcium, etc, that were of the charts and made me think that something is seriously wrong. I spent a lot of time googling this, but basically, mineral tests of hair is still "fringe science". According to the hair test I am high on chromium. And my calcium levels in comparison to some other things were very off the charts. Back in my North European home country I had a blood check of vitamins and found out I was low on vitamin D, which regulated calcium to some degree. Apart from that I dont know how to interpret the rest of the findings, and the doctors at the clinic didn't mention that part of the result. It was more like an additional thing for my own use. I will take away sensitive information and post the whole thing here.
At age 25 I smartened up and started taking propecia. Have taken it for 50 days now and not noticed any side effects at all. Started using minoxidil spray lately as well and was surprised how easy it is to apply, and now that I have come to terms with the fact that I have male pattern baldness, doing that routine every morning and evening is no problem is as easy as applying skin cream or brushing my teeth really.
I also attacked it full on with a FUE Hair Transplant, 3000 grafts, for which I payed 2500$, to fill in the temples. I would of done it earlier but my life was bit of a mess, but now I'm in school again and get my student grant. I live in an Asian country and was scared about the quality of the hair transplant. However, after visiting several times I felt and do feel quite secure that they are in fact extremely professional. The thing that bothered me the most though, was that they did not recommend medicine like finasteride to battle hair loss because of the sexual SE and said that if the loss continued I still had plenty of donor hair to do a few more operations so there was no chance I would go bald in the near future. They did honestly tell me that if my hair was all sensitive and I was destined to go bold, that no amount of hair transplants could save me, but they meant that its more important to look good while your young and still being able to reproduce. I am not sure if their motives were capitalistic or indeed part of their culture, which is very anti chemical types of medicine.
Apart from that my hair transplant experience was great. Their locale was huge, professional, had lots of people visiting and nurses walking around. Maybe about 10-15 different rooms, not sure what they were all used for. Many posters of people with complete top hair loss getting very decent coverage.
They were part of 8 such facilities nationally, and some kind of partnership with cutting edge American experts or facilities in the states, apparently. The whole procedure took about 8 hours. I was the only patient that day. The doctor who drew my hair line, in a much more suitable manner, than the first nurse had done, was very comforting and professional. He, accompanied by 1-3 nurses, did the whole procedure of extracting the follicles, with some kind of machine. They didn't offer my any pain medication or sleep medicine afterwards, but I of course had local anesthesia. I was gonna get some valium so that I could relax better but never got around to it.
I also had signed a form giving some kind of guarantee that there would be a 90% success rate - not knowing or investigating what would happen if that wasn't the case. When they were done extracting, they took them out and counted them in front of me. I think it was to show that I am getting what I am paying for. At that time when I was able to sit up and looked around there was the one surgeon and about 4 nurses in the room. I felt quite well taken care of, which was good, cause I was alone in a country that still is kind of foreign and doing this in language that isn't my native tongue. One of the nurses put them back in after having some food, and this was the most boring part, lying down for another extended period of time - but I'm not exactly going to complain.
After the procedure I was again given some food, a spray, things for my head, advice on how to manage and what to do the next days, a hair transplant manual. I was scared about washing my hair so chose to go back and do it there, which they offered for free the first two weeks after the procedure. They do some weird thing there where it looks like they inject Chinese medicine stuff in to peoples scalp with some kind of high tech tool as part of a general hair care program, which I tried once for free at my first visit to do the gene test. It felt rather nice. But nothing I signed up for though.
I am very happy I didn't shave my hair! Because, it was red about 1 month after the procedure and would of been so noticeable. I have very white skin. Since I didn't shave my hair, I could easily let the donor area get covered by the hair above, and let the temples be covered by hair like I usually do. Now, 10 days short of the two month mark, the redness has mostly dissipated, all though a little remains. I've been waiting for the new hair to fall out like I heard it almost always does. What is weird though, is that 10 days short of the 2 month mark, and most of the hair is still there and growing! There are some areas where a little more seems to have fallen off, and I got now idea if this is 98% of the hairs of it actually only is 70% percent, and the rest have fallen off. I only started using minoxidil spray about a week ago by the way; 20 days short of the 2 month mark.
From my reading online, I thought this was very unormal? The nurse at the clinic who has been following up with me every week by phone said that in any case, its not a bad thing. They said maybe being a foreigner my body reacts a bit differently..
Recovery took about a week, before I felt like I could wash my hair normally, and do most things normally again.
To sum up;
Hair Condition: NW3 with some diffuse thinning all over the top. Not sure if its just hairs thinner or loss as well. Through the magnifying thing at the hospital it was easy to see the hairs were a lot thinner and in bad condition and I took lots of magnified pictures so that I can compare them later. Those pics are not in here yet. Naturally high hairline.
hair transplant + 50 days (3000 grafts to fill in temples, not lowering hair line)
Propecia + 50 days
Minoxidil + 7 days
Ket. Shampoo 3-5 days a week.
Noticeable effects: None so far. My hair has never shedded or fell out so it would be impossible to assess whether or not its even halted anything.
Noticeable side effects: Some itchiness on my scalp, nothing else. Still horny and dick still works fine. Strattera ****ed with my libido way more than propecia.
To answer some question upfront and save time
Q: Why would I do a hair transplant at age of 25 before even knowing if finasteride works for me?
A: Because, finasteride works to hault hair loss in most people, and because even if the worst case scenario happened and it didn't - and all I got was a few years of having decent hair (more with a few additional transplants) - I would be facing a bald future anyway and would be happy with the gained time before I, in the end, shaved my head completely.
I'm not going to sit around and think about anymore.
That said though, my hair loss if of the extremely slow type but persistent type, so I think in any case I would have quite a few more years left.
Q: Arent you scared of the side effects of finasteride?
A: No. I'm more scared of the side effects of going bald will have on my self confidence and libido to be honest - and so far, I feel like I could just as well been taking sugar pills. Still so horny that it gets in the way of what I should be doing some times.
Q: How do you feel about taking finasteride and/or applying minoxidil the rest of your life?
A: No, I actually kind of enjoy the routine to be honest! Because it feels like I am being proactive and it takes so little time anyway, and personally I don't mind the oily effect it has on my hair. The bottle is also little and fits in my toilet bag when I only bring one. I can easily apply it after showering doing my morning routine, and there is nothing about it which would be obvious to any girl or partner if you wanted to hide it. At least in my experience.
Q: Do you regret not starting earlier?
A: Yes.
Q: What would you advice other people considering finasteride or minoxidil?
A: Don't wait! You can always try for 2 months and if you really feel you are having persistent side effects at that point, then consider quitting. All though, if they aren't getting in way of your life, I'd continue, because there is an even bigger chance that after a year they will be completely gone. Consider the fact that a large percentage of the placebo group in finasteride trials also reported sexual dysfunction.
That's it I guess. I hope my information can be of help, and welcome comments, critique, and questions.
Kind regards,
Toonamy
