so a little over a year ago i noticed that the hair on the corners of my temples had stopped growing at any noticeable rate. my forelock area (i'm probably about a norwood 2ish) had thinned out ever so slightly, but not to noticeable to anyone but myself. about a month ago, i came back from a really stressful trip and noticed the the hairs going in toward the middle of my forelock area had shrunk and thinned out. still not really that noticeable to others. it seemed a little dramatic to me, though, seeing as how i just kind of expected a slow recession. so i started using rogaine foam as a precautionary method, hoping to stop or slow it down. i've also been doing some scalp excersizes that i read about on another site. it's been about a month now, and i knew to expect some shedding. i had never actually noticed any shedding before using rogaine, and i definitely am now. but more extreme than the shedding (which is mostly tiny looking hairs and not long hairs), is the appearance of my hair. i'd be lying if i said i wasn't distressed, but i'm sucking it up and sticking with it. i did kind of freak out one day and ordered generic propecia from a site that i'm not totally sure about. hasn't arrived yet. the way my hair is thinning now seems sort of bizarre. i still have my hairline, and complete coverage, but the shrinking (miniaturized?) hairs have spread further towards the middle of my forelock, especially on the right side. and the whole area i've focused on is much thinner. it's still possible to cover up, but much more difficult. now, it's difficult for me to be totally sure that this is just the rogaine shedding i've heard about and not just the natural progression i would have experienced. it seems absurd that it would be happening so quickly and so strangely all of a sudden. but then again, i sort of set myself up to not except such significant results, seeing as how i've read so much about the frontal area being tricky. it's a tough call, because maybe it's still not that big a change relatively, but it certainly seems like it to me. sucks, because i'm supposed to see an old girlfriend in a couple of days and i'm really in no good shape to do that at this point. luckily, it's winter so i've just been wearing a hat all the time.
anyways, i guess my questions are as follows:
1. does this progression seem normal or sound familiar to anyone else that's been using minoxidil as a treatment?
2. i'm really ok with a slightly receded hairline, in fact i've grown to embrace it and actually enjoy it quite a bit. i'm completely ok with a class 2 and even a progression to class 3 would be alright with me. what i'm absolutely not ok with is a thinning or non-existent forelock or the vertex/crown thinning. i began the rogaine regimen as a precaution to prevent these things from happening or at least slow them down. does this seem like a reasonable course of actions/goals? in other words, are my chances a bit better to maintain my forelock than to fill my temporal hairline in?
3. was starting with rogaine a bad idea? should i have just went straight to taking propecia? rogaine was an easier buy, so i kind of just more or less blindly went with it to see how it would go and kind of keep things in check before eventually going with propecia. i'd rather pop a pill than go through the application motions.
anyways, i guess my questions are as follows:
1. does this progression seem normal or sound familiar to anyone else that's been using minoxidil as a treatment?
2. i'm really ok with a slightly receded hairline, in fact i've grown to embrace it and actually enjoy it quite a bit. i'm completely ok with a class 2 and even a progression to class 3 would be alright with me. what i'm absolutely not ok with is a thinning or non-existent forelock or the vertex/crown thinning. i began the rogaine regimen as a precaution to prevent these things from happening or at least slow them down. does this seem like a reasonable course of actions/goals? in other words, are my chances a bit better to maintain my forelock than to fill my temporal hairline in?
3. was starting with rogaine a bad idea? should i have just went straight to taking propecia? rogaine was an easier buy, so i kind of just more or less blindly went with it to see how it would go and kind of keep things in check before eventually going with propecia. i'd rather pop a pill than go through the application motions.
:lol: