Jayman - I know the pictures are bad, but I still think you can see a difference. I never took any pictures of my hairline before avodart. I only took ones of my baldspot. And the back hasn't changed much at all since I've been on avodart.
I understand where you are coming from, and I know my logic is weak, but I still think you are being a little too positive about avodart here.
"you think because a bunch of people on a hair loss board say that avodart permanently worsened their front that it means avodart does that for a lot of people, or even anyone?" - Yes, I do think so. Besides those quick trials Glaxo did, this is the only information we have to go on.
" i went through that "nasty shed" and i "responded well" to avodart, so yeah" - Do you have any pictures?
"there are plenty of people who come to these boards, have success with the products(including avodart), and never return. they have no reason to because their hair loss has stopped and some have gotten regrowth" - What are you basing this statement on? Sure, it seems plausible, but people don't have success with avodart overnight. Most success posts I've read say it took them a year to achieve acceptable results. I doubt these people just started popping avodart and then ditched the forums because they were successful. What was going on during that year? Based on looking at archived posts, it seems some come back at least once more to declare their success. And I would guess that most people who started avodart/dutasteride found out about it through one of these forums.
I've seen the testimonials that "medical wellness center" posts. Those are great and all (if they are real) but I can find you just as many people who say it screwed up their hair more then helping it. And I've read all the technical data from you, Bryan, CCS and others. Heck, even CCS is posting about the front 1/3 thinning out now. And he's been on dutasteride for six months now? It was all that technical data that helped convince me to start taking dutasteride. But as I see my front getting worse, I have dug deeper and searched archived message on this forum, regrowth.com and hairsite.com. That's when I starting seeing that the frontal shedding is more widespread then I thought.
It would be great to here more stories like yours of people who suffered a tough initial shed and who came out better in the end. I understand these people may have left the forums long ago. But I feel if we keep this issue on the front burner, hopefully some people who had success after shedding will come out and respond.
