Great Success After 4 Months On Finasteride/minoxidil

[Red October]

Thanks, Red.

I heard about derma-rollers but the thought of piercing my skin with those needles is too scary

To answer your question: I was too happy with my life with or without hair to consider any change. As mentioned before, I found out about hairloss treatments by accident.

I was born in a war and have seen things no child should ever see. We lived in a shack with no running water and with intermittent power. The only clean drinking water was rain. I was hungry most of the time. I was faced with situations where death was almost certain and my life was full of hardship and setbacks. But I fought my way out. Nothing was given to me but now I finally live a very comfortable life.

I'm saying all this to give a perspective. I'm very happy about my hair success but if it hadn't worked out, so what. There are so many things that make life worthwhile.

I really hope I'm not coming across as a smart-***.

Yeah, that puts things in perspective. You've got incredible results in a short time-frame. Really encouraging.

 

[SaigonBlues]

What's almost more important to me is to encourage those who do NOT have success.

I see a lot of desperation in forums. It sucks to lose your hair, especially at a young age. Believe me, I know how hard life can be. I was a refugee and the whole process of running, hiding, and escaping was hell. Half of my family died on the way. It's devastating.

But as long as you are alive, there's a chance to improve your life. You have to find aspects of life that make you happy. I did, and see every new day as a gift.

 

[Red October]

What's almost more important to me is to encourage those who do NOT have success.

I see a lot of desperation in forums. It sucks to lose your hair, especially at a young age. Believe me, I know how hard life can be. I was a refugee and the whole process of running, hiding, and escaping was hell. Half of my family died on the way. It's devastating.

But as long as you are alive, there's a chance to improve your life. You have to find aspects of life that make you happy. I did, and see every new day as a gift.

Yeah. It's easy to lose perspective. It's tough when a lot of western society is so focussed on looks. I would say I was a pretty good looking guy when I was younger. But losing hair really changes your looks and can really change how people view you. Your confidence can plummet. It seems crazy but when it happens you feel the reality of it.

I thought it wouldn't make much difference to me but as my hairloss got worse I felt my confidence drop and I started to not care about anything. Now that I can see some progress I'm starting to feel much better. My confidence is returning. I'm excited to see if I can continue to get results and get back to something resembling normal hair.

 

[Red October]

Calchas, I love your comment about the son. Sounds like I look a lot younger now. Nice!

No, no concealer. Until last August, I wasn't even thinking about doing anything for my hair at all. As I'm aging, I'm actually ok with losing hair. Back in August, I was browsing a deal site and saw a sale for Minoxidil at a large national store. I didn't know what it was but it triggered my curiosity so I researched and found out about Minoxidil and Finasteride on this site. Thought I could give it a try.

555, I have no idea how to prove that all the pics are me. Here are some more pictures, with my forehead. First one is from September, still little hair. I looked up at the camera so my forehead is wrinkled. In the second picture from today, I did the same to mimic the first picture. I guess you can see that the wrinkles and eyebrows are absolutely identical. You can actually see a small round mark, a blemish, above my left eyerbrow, towards the center of my forehead. Third picture is again today but looking straight.

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Hi @SaigonBlues ,

Does your hair still look thin under harsh lighting? It looks great from the front as per your photos above.

 

[SaigonBlues]

Hi @SaigonBlues ,

Does your hair still look thin under harsh lighting? It looks great from the front as per your photos above.

Red, it's been a few weeks since the last photos. My hair has further improved and is thick and healthy now. There's no more thinning under any lighting.

 

[manda]

Red, it's been a few weeks since the last photos. My hair has further improved and is thick and healthy now. There's no more thinning under any lighting.

Damn man that sounds amazing. Can you please post current pics? I'm following your journey since I joined this forum and it motivates me a lot to stick with the treatment

 

[Red October]

Red, it's been a few weeks since the last photos. My hair has further improved and is thick and healthy now. There's no more thinning under any lighting.

Thanks Saigon. I didn't mean to imply that yours looked thin. I was just wondering because mine looks good from some angles but thin from others .

 

[SaigonBlues]

Damn man that sounds amazing. Can you please post current pics? I'm following your journey since I joined this forum and it motivates me a lot to stick with the treatment

manda, I'll try to post some on the weekend.

 

[SaigonBlues]

Thanks Saigon. I didn't mean to imply that yours looked thin. I was just wondering because mine looks good from some angles but thin from others .

No worries, man. I wasn't taking it that way at all.

My hair was thinner under certain angles and lighting until about a month ago. But now there's so much hair all over my scalp. Another nice side effect is that the new hairs are all black, no greys.

 

[SaigonBlues]

Damn man that sounds amazing. Can you please post current pics? I'm following your journey since I joined this forum and it motivates me a lot to stick with the treatment

Here you go, manda.

The first picture is how I look normally. Based on this, nobody would ever guess how my hair was back in August. Some people tell me that my appearance "has somehow changed" or ask me if I "have lost weight"

In the second picture, I gave my best to expose as much thinning as I could.

This is my natural hair, no products. Actually both pictures are taken right when I got up this morning before the shower.

 

[manda]

woooow. This is crazy. I'm not doubting that your hair will keep getting better within the next months. I think this is the kind of result everyone is looking for here. You probably look like 20 years younger now haha. Enjoy that thick head of hair. You definitely won the battle against male pattern baldness!
I just started with finasteride and this is helping me a lot to stick with it..especially in these days where I'm thinking more about my hair..

 

[SaigonBlues]

woooow. This is crazy. I'm not doubting that your hair will keep getting better within the next months. I think this is the kind of result everyone is looking for here. You probably look like 20 years younger now haha. Enjoy that thick head of hair. You definitely won the battle against male pattern baldness!
I just started with finasteride and this is helping me a lot to stick with it..especially in these days where I'm thinking more about my hair..

Thanks!

BTW: I'm going towards 6 months on Finasteride and Minoxidil and never had any side effects or sheds. Have you?

 

[manda]

I'm approaching week 6 and no sides so far. The only difference so far is that my hair is less oily but this could come from nizoral as well.
My hair status is still quite ok and I caught it early. I'm a diffuse thinner. Therefore, I want to give finasteride 6 months to see how it's working for me and then most probably I'll add minoxidil as well.

Did you have an inital shed? Did you have scalp itches prior to treatments? At which month did you first recognize an improvement?

 

[SaigonBlues]

I'm approaching week 6 and no sides so far. The only difference so far is that my hair is less oily but this could come from nizoral as well.
My hair status is still quite ok and I caught it early. I'm a diffuse thinner. Therefore, I want to give finasteride 6 months to see how it's working for me and then most probably I'll add minoxidil as well.

Did you have an inital shed? Did you have scalp itches prior to treatments? At which month did you first recognize an improvement?

No, I didn't have any initial shed. Or if I did, it was so insignificant that I didn't notice it. I think I did have scalp itches at some time but I don't remember if it was consistent or if it happened right before I started the treatment.

On the timing of the improvement, if you go back to the initial post, you'll see that the was no difference after the first month, but somewhere between 4/5 and 8/9 weeks, the improvement started.

I don't know if this makes a big difference but I was very consistent, never missed a dose. Even on my overnight flights to overseas, I applied the Minoxidil in the plane.

 

[manda]

Thanks for the informations my friend!

I'm sure it takes longer to see a difference if someone is only on finasteride and not taking minoxidil. Results from minoxidil seem to come a lot earlier than fina resutls. Therefore, I'm assuming that most of your regrwoth at the beginning was due to minoxidil.

I am sure you will get most of your lost hairs within the next months. I'm happy for you, enjoy it and please keep updating this. It helps a lot of folks out here

Best of luck!

 

[Derelict]

Insane progress, congrats on getting your hair back.

 

[manda]

@SaigonBlues any updates my man?

 

[RudaSync]

Awesome, I'm happy for you.

 

[SaigonBlues]

@SaigonBlues any updates my man?

Hey manda (and All),

Sorry I've been so quiet lately. The reason is because there's not much to update. It's been 8 months since I started Finasteride/Minoxidil. I still haven't experienced any sheds or any side effects. My hair is growing like crazy and I'm pretty much back to where I was at 18.

I'm taking 1.25 mg Finasteride per day, never missed any dose. The same goes for Minoxidil. I'm also making sure I get enough protein and vitamins every day.

I used to have long hair all the way down my back (college!) and am letting my hair grow to at least shoulder length now. Attaching a picture that shows me in the "awkward stage" between short and long hair. The hair is a lot longer than it looks. I'm styling it so it's not too puffy. I know it's a nice problem to have. I'm not trying to show off, just responding to manda's request for an update.

The bottom line is that a full recovery is possible, even if you're an old guy like me. So if you ask me, it's definitely worth giving Finasteride/Minoxidil a try. After I showed my progress to a friend, he also jumped on the same treatment and his progress is very promising.The question for me now is which med is responsible for my success. I might experiment with lowering minoxidil and see what happens.

Anyways, I wish you guys all the best. Try to stay positive (I know that's not easy). Let me know if you have any questions.

 

[SaigonBlues]

I'm approaching week 6 and no sides so far. The only difference so far is that my hair is less oily but this could come from nizoral as well.
My hair status is still quite ok and I caught it early. I'm a diffuse thinner. Therefore, I want to give finasteride 6 months to see how it's working for me and then most probably I'll add minoxidil as well.

Did you have an inital shed? Did you have scalp itches prior to treatments? At which month did you first recognize an improvement?

manda,

I just looked back at the thread. You were at 6 weeks. How are you, man? Were you able to halt the loss or improve your situation?