okw/nofoothold
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Sorry for the long post. Thanks for your patience and good luck to you all.
Age – 35
Pattern – diffuse (norwood doesn’t seem to apply. seems that i’ll go from a “1†to a “3.â€)
Treatment – propecia for two months, nizoral 3x/wk for a little more than 2 months
Efficacy – none to date (loss seems to have hastened over the past week).
I had severe itching and flaking on 9/11/01. Strange day to notice it. I figured that it was simply dandruff, yet it resisted treatment with T-Gel. It cleared-up after Christmas of that year. (Since I’ve become concerned with the topic I’ve read that shedding in fall is common. Perhaps this seasonal thing exacerbates male pattern baldness).
The symptoms appeared around Christmas of the following year, 2002 and persisted through March. I noticed thinning, but it seemed minor. It didn’t register in the mirror so I ignored it.
This October I noticed that the thinning had become more pronounced when the itching and flaking (the worst I’d ever suffered) hit me like a brick. I really studied my hair in the mirror. Now my inflamed scalp was noticeable to me through my hair. The hair loss seemed to be distributed evenly around the top of my head. Additionally, large nests formed in my drain trap with each shower. I acknowledged to myself that I was balding in a diffuse pattern (my hairline is thinning, but retains its old boundaries). I am 35.
I suppose I failed to see or denied my hair loss for two years, because I didn’t think I’d lose my hair. My 65-year-old father is balding at the vertex but has quite a bit of hair otherwise. I have no uncles and my maternal grandfather died with a full head of hair. Paternal grandfather began losing it in his 60s and still had some on top when he died at 90. My brother’s hair is so thick that he has trouble styling it. I’ve always had quite a bit of curly hair, so I never considered that baldness at a relatively young age was in the cards for me (I expected gradual thinning at the vertex). I was wrong. Clearly, the genetics male pattern baldness are quite complex.
I panicked and scheduled an appointment with a dermatologist. He diagnosed stress-induced telogen effluvium (I recently moved, bought a house, and had a kid in the space of a few months). He said that the Telogen Effluvium probably made clear the effects of hereditary thinning and prescribed propecia and nizoral. I started on the shampoo immediately and waited a few weeks on the pills (I was spooked by the possibility of side-effects). Began the propecia two months ago.
Since then, my dandruff has cleared-up, but itching sometimes flairs-up. I’ve read that this is very likely a hormonal thing (see the Keratin site for an article). My hair loss has continued rapidly. I thought I noticed a bit of a slow-down in the shedding from mid-December up until about a week ago, at which point the itching returned (no flaking though) and the loss seemed to accelerate. That’s where I am today. I’m hoping that this is merely the propecia-related shed, but who knows. Also, I’m dreading my next haircut, which I need. I’ve always worn0 my hair a little long, so the thinning is concealed, but I’m looking a little odd, so a chop seems essential. I’m dreading it. The speed and diffuseness of my balding seem to leave me with no alternatives for a graceful transition to baldness. Very frustrating.
A word about the lost hair -- Initially I noticed only thick, terminal hairs with bulbs. Now I see hairs of all thicknesses (some on the road to vellousness) and all lengths. Every hair I’ve seen has a bulb on its end and none seem to be any thinner at the bulb than at its end.
I’m hoping that the finasteride works for me, but I’m not too optimistic. The hair loss will be obvious to others soon and I wonder whether growing back a bit (I assume that Merck’s site means that most propecia users retain what they had when they began treatment, which would require a bit of regrowth for almost all users) after my scalp has outed itself makes any sense at all.
The real challenge will be in coping with this, not in finding the effective treatment regimen. I need to develop a sense of humor about aging and my looks. I never thought I was particularly vain, and I’m angry with myself for caring so much about this, but here I am, dreading the change. Why? Should I really give a hang? My wife says “no.†She says that I should be tough and refuse to let it disadvantage me socially. Seems to me that this balding thing is a special kind of accelerated aging that cannot be concealed (short of buying a wig). It forces sufferers to deal with being human, a hard thing to do in this bizarre, media-obsessed world. Most folks (men at least) deal with aging in digestable dribs and drabs and thus become no more sensitive to their mortality (and others’ suffering) until they get nailed with a real illness. Apologies for the preachiness of what I’m about to write, but perhaps I (and all of us) should view balding as an opportunity to be more compassionate to others and to accept ourselves, including our frailties and the ways in which we fail to conform to the standards presented in TV, movies, print media, i.e., our culture. That said, I'm planning to push on with the pills for a full 12 months.
I’ll close on a note of optimism – my wife assures me that most women (and be advised that this comes from a 33 year-old who probably can’t speak for the teen set) don’t really view a bald head as a turn-off. When pressed, she admits that what woman really care about is money (perhaps we should be more bummed about that than anything else). Fortunately, my wife seems to love me for some other reason (less quantifiable than net worth or hair count).
Thanks for your patience and good luck (and peace) to you.
Age – 35
Pattern – diffuse (norwood doesn’t seem to apply. seems that i’ll go from a “1†to a “3.â€)
Treatment – propecia for two months, nizoral 3x/wk for a little more than 2 months
Efficacy – none to date (loss seems to have hastened over the past week).
I had severe itching and flaking on 9/11/01. Strange day to notice it. I figured that it was simply dandruff, yet it resisted treatment with T-Gel. It cleared-up after Christmas of that year. (Since I’ve become concerned with the topic I’ve read that shedding in fall is common. Perhaps this seasonal thing exacerbates male pattern baldness).
The symptoms appeared around Christmas of the following year, 2002 and persisted through March. I noticed thinning, but it seemed minor. It didn’t register in the mirror so I ignored it.
This October I noticed that the thinning had become more pronounced when the itching and flaking (the worst I’d ever suffered) hit me like a brick. I really studied my hair in the mirror. Now my inflamed scalp was noticeable to me through my hair. The hair loss seemed to be distributed evenly around the top of my head. Additionally, large nests formed in my drain trap with each shower. I acknowledged to myself that I was balding in a diffuse pattern (my hairline is thinning, but retains its old boundaries). I am 35.
I suppose I failed to see or denied my hair loss for two years, because I didn’t think I’d lose my hair. My 65-year-old father is balding at the vertex but has quite a bit of hair otherwise. I have no uncles and my maternal grandfather died with a full head of hair. Paternal grandfather began losing it in his 60s and still had some on top when he died at 90. My brother’s hair is so thick that he has trouble styling it. I’ve always had quite a bit of curly hair, so I never considered that baldness at a relatively young age was in the cards for me (I expected gradual thinning at the vertex). I was wrong. Clearly, the genetics male pattern baldness are quite complex.
I panicked and scheduled an appointment with a dermatologist. He diagnosed stress-induced telogen effluvium (I recently moved, bought a house, and had a kid in the space of a few months). He said that the Telogen Effluvium probably made clear the effects of hereditary thinning and prescribed propecia and nizoral. I started on the shampoo immediately and waited a few weeks on the pills (I was spooked by the possibility of side-effects). Began the propecia two months ago.
Since then, my dandruff has cleared-up, but itching sometimes flairs-up. I’ve read that this is very likely a hormonal thing (see the Keratin site for an article). My hair loss has continued rapidly. I thought I noticed a bit of a slow-down in the shedding from mid-December up until about a week ago, at which point the itching returned (no flaking though) and the loss seemed to accelerate. That’s where I am today. I’m hoping that this is merely the propecia-related shed, but who knows. Also, I’m dreading my next haircut, which I need. I’ve always worn0 my hair a little long, so the thinning is concealed, but I’m looking a little odd, so a chop seems essential. I’m dreading it. The speed and diffuseness of my balding seem to leave me with no alternatives for a graceful transition to baldness. Very frustrating.
A word about the lost hair -- Initially I noticed only thick, terminal hairs with bulbs. Now I see hairs of all thicknesses (some on the road to vellousness) and all lengths. Every hair I’ve seen has a bulb on its end and none seem to be any thinner at the bulb than at its end.
I’m hoping that the finasteride works for me, but I’m not too optimistic. The hair loss will be obvious to others soon and I wonder whether growing back a bit (I assume that Merck’s site means that most propecia users retain what they had when they began treatment, which would require a bit of regrowth for almost all users) after my scalp has outed itself makes any sense at all.
The real challenge will be in coping with this, not in finding the effective treatment regimen. I need to develop a sense of humor about aging and my looks. I never thought I was particularly vain, and I’m angry with myself for caring so much about this, but here I am, dreading the change. Why? Should I really give a hang? My wife says “no.†She says that I should be tough and refuse to let it disadvantage me socially. Seems to me that this balding thing is a special kind of accelerated aging that cannot be concealed (short of buying a wig). It forces sufferers to deal with being human, a hard thing to do in this bizarre, media-obsessed world. Most folks (men at least) deal with aging in digestable dribs and drabs and thus become no more sensitive to their mortality (and others’ suffering) until they get nailed with a real illness. Apologies for the preachiness of what I’m about to write, but perhaps I (and all of us) should view balding as an opportunity to be more compassionate to others and to accept ourselves, including our frailties and the ways in which we fail to conform to the standards presented in TV, movies, print media, i.e., our culture. That said, I'm planning to push on with the pills for a full 12 months.
I’ll close on a note of optimism – my wife assures me that most women (and be advised that this comes from a 33 year-old who probably can’t speak for the teen set) don’t really view a bald head as a turn-off. When pressed, she admits that what woman really care about is money (perhaps we should be more bummed about that than anything else). Fortunately, my wife seems to love me for some other reason (less quantifiable than net worth or hair count).
Thanks for your patience and good luck (and peace) to you.
