Why Do Older Guys Lose Hair If Testosterone/dht Decreases With Age?
- Thread starter macaroni
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I think when T naturally lowers by age DHT actually increases. I'm not 100% on that, but it's what I have heard. This is also why older men get progressively more body hair with age like hairy ears, back, and so on.
Sometimes however, old men seem to lose body hair with age too. So, I think it's just how their body reacts to the drop of T.
Sorry just figured I would pop my cherry post. I've been a lurker for years as well with TBT , but that's been dead to me for a good time now.
Sometimes however, old men seem to lose body hair with age too. So, I think it's just how their body reacts to the drop of T.
Sorry just figured I would pop my cherry post. I've been a lurker for years as well with TBT , but that's been dead to me for a good time now.
DoctorHouse
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I remember reading androgen sensitivity to DHT increases with age. I think its mostly genetics that will determine at what age the sensitivity increases. For some men it's teens and other men its 35 to 40's. And some men later.
The androgen damage snowballs over time.
You aren't starting to go bald when you start to notice it.
You have been going bald since puberty. You only notice it at the later stages.
Androgen levels reducing as you get older is like the slope of the hill getting shallower near the bottom. That helps slow down the snowball but it's too late to avoid the problem. You still have a big snowball rolling down the hill.
You aren't starting to go bald when you start to notice it.
You have been going bald since puberty. You only notice it at the later stages.
Androgen levels reducing as you get older is like the slope of the hill getting shallower near the bottom. That helps slow down the snowball but it's too late to avoid the problem. You still have a big snowball rolling down the hill.
KO1
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I think there is probably a (as yet unknown) timing component. Androgens are only sending signals to lose hair, at some point the cells probably become sensitive. I don't think it's cumulative damage as people who get off finasteride have accelerated loss, as do eunuchs exposed to T.
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This doesn't explain why you would experience accelerating hair loss when quitting finasteride (correct me if I'm wrong).
Given your reasoning the snowball should have been slowed/stopped using finasteride and when you stop finasteride the ball should continue at the same speed as it would have been at that age without finasteride. Therefore it should still always be above where someone without finasteride would be. I was not aware this was the case?
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Fullhead1day
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It's about androgen sensitivity. Not so much the levels of DHT.. your genetics determine the age and aggressiveness of this horrid disease
Yes.
finasteride doesn't stop the whole problem, it just reduces levels of one androgen out of several. DHT being manufactured in the follicle does more damage than the rest, but not nearly all of it.
Look at long term graphs of finasteride usage results. There is several years of "stoppage/regrowth" but it looks more like a big long rebound of growth from when you started treatment. I don't think the damage was ever stopped. Once that rebound effect settles down (several years) the hair growth ends up back at baseline and falling. It falls at a shallower rate than naturally without the drug, but it still falls.
If you go off the drug then it comes back hard, probably because years of suppressed DHT have made the receptors more sensitive and that takes time to reduce. There may be other factors but that is likely the big one.
IMO the best thing you can do for your system with quitting finasteride, is to quit the stuff as gradually as you possibly can. Do it over at least 2 months with gradually smaller dosages. At the end, space out more and more days between the doses once you can't break down the dose sizes any smaller (don't skip this last part - it's important because of the dose-independent nature of the drug).
finasteride doesn't stop the whole problem, it just reduces levels of one androgen out of several. DHT being manufactured in the follicle does more damage than the rest, but not nearly all of it.
Look at long term graphs of finasteride usage results. There is several years of "stoppage/regrowth" but it looks more like a big long rebound of growth from when you started treatment. I don't think the damage was ever stopped. Once that rebound effect settles down (several years) the hair growth ends up back at baseline and falling. It falls at a shallower rate than naturally without the drug, but it still falls.
If you go off the drug then it comes back hard, probably because years of suppressed DHT have made the receptors more sensitive and that takes time to reduce. There may be other factors but that is likely the big one.
IMO the best thing you can do for your system with quitting finasteride, is to quit the stuff as gradually as you possibly can. Do it over at least 2 months with gradually smaller dosages. At the end, space out more and more days between the doses once you can't break down the dose sizes any smaller (don't skip this last part - it's important because of the dose-independent nature of the drug).
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Yes, that's right. Eunuchs given testosterone injections in their fifties lose their hair within months, so the "cumulative damage" idea doesn't really work.
(Hamilton, 1951)
Also, DPCs from juvenile stumptailed macaques are insensitive to testosterone.
(Obana et al., 1997)
Baldness is a combination of things. Cumulative androgen damage is one of them. Androgen damage susceptibility probably also goes up with age as well.
Years of finasteride usage does put off some of the damage permanently. Over the last few decades that has become clear.
The older Enuchs getting Test treatment may not have been a normal situation for other reasons related to the long-term androgen deprivation.
On the other hand it's no secret that doing steroids worsens baldness, and that damage won't just revert as soon as the user quits the stuff. The user has "accumulated" more lifetime androgen damage.
Years of finasteride usage does put off some of the damage permanently. Over the last few decades that has become clear.
The older Enuchs getting Test treatment may not have been a normal situation for other reasons related to the long-term androgen deprivation.
On the other hand it's no secret that doing steroids worsens baldness, and that damage won't just revert as soon as the user quits the stuff. The user has "accumulated" more lifetime androgen damage.
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Seems like SHBG goes up and free testosterone goes down with age.
Testosterone and ill-health in aging men
The difference in response is likely peripheral (i.e. within the hair follicle), consistent with the in vitro results with adult vs. juvenile macaque cells.
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This is a different thing entirely (i.e. reversibility). So yes, someone who takes finasteride for five years will be in much better shape than someone who does nothing for four years and then takes finasteride for a year, and more recently lost hair is more easily recovered. Cumulative damage definitely affects that. But the eunuch observations support the idea of a "switch" rather than a "long-acting cumulative effect" responsible for the initiation of hair loss. It may be that long-term androgen deprivation is responsible for this, but that's merely an assumption unless it can be demonstrated, or unless there's any evidence for the "unseen-cumulative-damage-acting-over-decades" hypothesis, in which case the eunuch results would need an alternative explanation.
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I probably shouldn't have described it as a "switch", but maybe more of a sliding scale. Let's say the following represents some guy's left temple at a certain age, with the first number being the frontmost spot, with successive numbers representing spots further and further back. The numbers could represent percentage of physiological androgen levels necessary to trigger balding, which are independent of androgen levels until they pass the threshold (i.e. when balding starts, then damage is cumulative).
Age 15: [1500 1450 1400 1350 1300]
Age 20: [800 850 900 950 1000]
Age 25: [700 750 800 850 900] <-- this is where he loses hair w/ test levels 7x physiological
Age 30: [600 650 700 750 800]
Age 35: [500 550 600 650 700] <- temples become completely bald w/ continued use
Age 40: [400 450 500 550 600]
Age 45: [300 350 400 450 500]
Age 50: [200 250 300 350 400]
Age 55: [100 150 200 250 300] <-- This is where he starts to lose hair naturally
Age 60: [75 90 100 150 200]
Age 65: [60 65 75 90 100] <- temples become completely bald naturally
This is purely for illustrative purposes of course, but something like this was more what I had in mind.
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baldness is very tightly correlated with lower SHBG, I think it's the tightest correlation measured in the blood.
