Does longer hair make thinning more noticeable?

[Light Bulb]

I’ve been growing my hair out and have noticed that my thinning is becoming more and more noticeable, currently almost 2 months on finasteride as well so maybe the shedding phase has started and is accelerating the thinning look. What would be the best move to make it less noticeable? Ive attached some images to show where my hair is at rn. The thinning is noticeable in harsh lighting at the very front of my widow’s peak and in moderate lighting on top of my scalp but is unnoticeable elsewhere unless I tie my hair up.

 

[Will Be an Egg in 5 years]

Depends on your hair type on stage of hairloss. In most cases short is better because it hides thinning. In your case it looks the same. But in my case I'd rather grow it out. My temples and frontal thinning looks worse with shorter hair.

 

[Light Bulb]

Depends on your hair type on stage of hairloss. In most cases short is better because it hides thinning. In your case it looks the same. But in my case I'd rather grow it out. My temples and frontal thinning looks worse with shorter hair.

All of the hair pics I posted are the same length, just different hairstyles. Seems like my top and sides are thinning out so I'm not too sure what to do in terms of hair length.

 

[Will Be an Egg in 5 years]

I also have thinning on sides. It looks better grown out because I can comb over it. Unless you get a 0 guard on sides it will look chopped shorter.

 

[JaneyElizabeth]

There might be aspects to long hair that are protective during incipient baldness but the general loss of hair quality usually makes wearing it long look unbecoming. I had a period where I let it grow long in back with a resultant sort of hobo/unkempt look. You also become a constant victim of wind and end up needing to always have a comb at hand. Yours isn't terrible but it has a patchy aspect on the sides that might be unbecoming.

I bemoan harsh lighting like everyone else, like three-way changing room lighting but the positive aspect of photographing in harsh lighting is that you won't fool yourself about baldness. If we look bald in certain lighting more so than other lighting then there is a hair loss issue. Many of us are finding that what we see in the mirror looks much worse on zoom especially with the reflection of light off our foreheads, making them more noticeable. In the past, I would think I was making ground and then noticed how terrible my hair looked in dressing rooms.

 

[Light Bulb]

There might be aspects to long hair that are protective during incipient baldness but the general loss of hair quality usually makes wearing it long look unbecoming. I had a period where I let it grow long in back with a resultant sort of hobo/unkempt look. You also become a constant victim of wind and end up needing to always have a comb at hand. Yours isn't terrible but it has a patchy aspect on the sides that might be unbecoming.

Luckily the patchy aspect is only if I tie my hair up, which I don’t plan on doing anymore. Here’s what it looks like on the sides normally. It’s only the top that’s an issue.

 

[JaneyElizabeth]

Luckily the patchy aspect is only if I tie my hair up, which I don’t plan on doing anymore. Here’s what it looks like on the sides normally. It’s only the top that’s an issue.

One issue folks with curly hair have is that it can convert to a frizzy aspect fairly easily. Generally, for whites and Semites, as fewer Asians suffer from this, the cuticles can become damaged which is why conditioning can help but there is currently no treatment that I know of that treats this aspect of rough cuticles effectively from within the follicles, so to speak, save increasing estradiol levels:

Inflammation and Hair Loss:

Why do I focus so much on hair quality as opposed to hair counts and mere coverage? It's because of the strong correlation between loss of hair quality and incipient hair loss:

Scalp Condition Impacts Hair Growth and Retention via Oxidative Stress

As can be seen from the summary of scalp abnormalities, the most common manifestation to hair emerged from an unhealthy scalp is an altered cuticle with evidence of surface pitting, roughness, cuticle rigidity, or breakage. In some cases, the impact is manifested as shine reduction. In addition to the physical changes, there are biochemical alterations observed in hair emerged from an unhealthy scalp, with both protein and lipid components affected, most commonly by oxidative damage.[17,61,66,67]

Finally, a number of observations have found that premature hair loss may be caused by the poor scalp health associated with either dandruff and seborrheic dermatitis,[62,63,64] or psoriasis,[68,69] indicating that the effect on the preemergent hair fiber may alter the anchoring force of the fiber with the follicle, as evidenced by an increased proportion both of catagen and telogen,[74,75] and of dysplastic anagen hairs (anagen hairs devoid of hair root sheaths)[75,76] in the trichogram (hair pluck).

 

[Light Bulb]

There might be aspects to long hair that are protective during incipient baldness but the general loss of hair quality usually makes wearing it long look unbecoming. I had a period where I let it grow long in back with a resultant sort of hobo/unkempt look. You also become a constant victim of wind and end up needing to always have a comb at hand. Yours isn't terrible but it has a patchy aspect on the sides that might be unbecoming.

I bemoan harsh lighting like everyone else, like three-way changing room lighting but the positive aspect of photographing in harsh lighting is that you won't fool yourself about baldness. If we look bald in certain lighting more so than other lighting then there is a hair loss issue. Many of us are finding that what we see in the mirror looks much worse on zoom especially with the reflection of light off our foreheads, making them more noticeable. In the past, I would think I was making ground and then noticed how terrible my hair looked in dressing rooms.

I definitely agree, I was pretty over my hair loss for a while and figured that eventually finasteride would take care of it as long as I just wear it down but now I’m worried about the top of my scalp showing major thinning signs.

 

[JaneyElizabeth]

I definitely agree, I was pretty over my hair loss for a while and figured that eventually finasteride would take care of it as long as I just wear it down but now I’m worried about the top of my scalp showing major thinning signs.

Most folks get substantial maintenance protection from min/finasteride but it's not clear whether that includes overall increases in hair quality. If so, it appears to be minimal for those more than five years or so from our pubertal hairlines.

 

[Light Bulb]

Most folks get substantial maintenance protection from min/finasteride but it's not clear whether that includes overall increases in hair quality. If so, it appears to be minimal for those more than five years or so from our pubertal hairlines.

Ah I see, since I started taking it recently (about to turn 20), I'm hoping that finasteride will improve things a bit. I'm very confused by the 'shedding phase' of finasteride tho, not quite sure how long it'll last or when it'll start.

 

[JaneyElizabeth]

Ah I see, since I started taking it recently (about to turn 20), I'm hoping that finasteride will improve things a bit. I'm very confused by the 'shedding phase' of finasteride tho, not quite sure how long it'll last or when it'll start.

I and many probably used to sneer at tiny incremental dosaging of finasteride/min but starting weak like 2 percent rogaine might cause less shedding by being less jarring to the system. It might slightly slow down improvement in the long run but nobody wants to experience a shed to baldness like I did especially without scientifically-assured, more or less for MtF's of future improvement or substantial improvement. Also add at least a mild dandruff shampoo for inflammation which is the hot new thing in male pattern baldness and Telogen Effluvium research.