Ceee's Story (26)

[ceee]

I'm 23, had short hair for a good deal of my life, just decided to grow it out last year. It got pretty long, and looked really good. Everywhere I went I was getting compliments on my hair. It was down to my shoulders all the way around when I didn't hairdry it (naturally curly), and longer if I dried it and pulled it back. I noticed two months ago or so the part appears to be getting larger. Way too much of my scalp was visible. I wasn't sure if I was causing it (had an semiconscious habit of aggresively running my fingers through my hair), but after I curbed that I noticed that I was losing a lot in the shower. My family has a large history of male pattern baldness, and I'm quickly realizing that I was only hoping the damage was self inflicted.

I got it cut a week ago so that it isn't parted in the middle and that helped a lot when it came to appearances, although if you look closely you can see a couple areas of thinning. Also, the area on the back of the head (vertex?) seems a little large. Only comments I've gotten were from the woman who cuts my hair and my mother (who I pointed it out to), although a girl I know was messing with it last week, did a double take, and stopped, without saying anything about it. That was awkward.

I made an appointment to see my dermatologist, but couldn't get in till the 23rd. Apparently he's good, or takes lots of vacations. This site has been a great resource when it comes to research. I hesitant to jump on something like dutasteride or finasteride, I work out a ton and am not willing to risk my body, which without hair I would probably be needing. If my derm, who is the consensus champ in my city, greenlights it and shares the same enthusiasm for it as you all do, I would probably be willing to give it a shot.

So far I've started revivogen, the shampoo and conditioner are great, thickened me up quite a bit. The treatments were stinky and troublesome the first night, but significantly easier and less offensive to the nostril tonight. Still trying to decide on what type of growth stimulant to add, going to give it a week or so to see how my scalp reacts to the revivogen.

I hope to get some pics up in a few days. As of now I'm measuring the effect revivogen has on how much I'm losing by collecting the stumps of hair from the drain after every shower. Hopefully nobody stumbles onto my collection, that would require an explanation.

Anyways, I'll be updating this.

 

[ceee]

Well, I was feeling impetuous today and buzzed all my hair off. It looks pretty good, actually. I notice it's thinner than it was because I can see frickles on my head that weren't visible last time it was this short. Also seems like more of my scalp is visible than should be, you can see the outline of my head. So far people have told me it looks good (liars?)

Anyways, now it will be much easier to get revivogen and minoxidil on than when I had the rock star hair, and also easier to tell if I'm making progress with them. Still planning on posting pics soon.

 

[ceee]

Re: ceee's story

Hard to believe 2.5 years have passed since I first noticed my hair loss. By popular demand, this thread continues.

For about 18 months, I religiously followed a regimen of the Foam in the morning, Foam in late afternoon, and Revivogen before bed. I don't know that I noticed results, other than hair stopped coming out in the shower. There were times when I would look at it and think it was looking thicker, but I started caring less about what it looked like, figuring I was doing what I could.

Well, I continued to care less to the point where I started skimping on my regimen. I spent 10 months growing out my hair, during which time treatments became difficult to squeeze in. I really couldn't use either if I was going to go anywhere, so I began cutting back on my treatments. Before long, I was down to about 1.5 foam treatments per day and 2-3 revivogen treatments per week. I maintained this unmotivated regimen for about the last year, and the hairloss has recently spiked. I'm now rocking a shorter cut, and my stylist has a pretty good thing going where I basically have a comb forward minus the comb. However, I'm making a mess of the shower, and the 'vertex' on the back of my head is finally to the point where it's not fooling anyone. I feel like I'm at a fork in the road. Either I can start bringing out my razor again and say f it, or make a last stand.

So, here begins that stand. I ordered finpecia online. I had major concerns about this early on, mainly because I was training a lot thinking I was the next Kelly Pavlik. Wait, no. Kelly Pavlik with hair. Anyways, with my professional athlete delusion in tatters, I don't give two shits about my hormones. Plus I'm hoping that being a little older may negate some of the importance of DHT. At this point I'm killing the revivogen, I'm not convinced it was doing anything. I will continue with the revivogen shampoo and conditioner for now because it works well and I just got some more this week. I'll probably be prowling the forums for a replacement on that front as well.