Shedding timeline!

[wesleyBelgium]

11 months on dutasteride (avodart)
1 year on minoxidil 5% (and before that one year on minoxidil 2%)
added also other products like you can see on my regime below... the startdate is by each product...

Month 1 - Not much shedding
Month 2 - Shedding increased
Month 3 - extreme shedding
Month 4 - extreme shedding
Month 5 - Shedding slowed slightly
Month 6 - Shedding slowed right down
Month 7 - Shedding increased
Month 8 - Shedding slowed slightly
Month 9 - Shedding slowed right down
Month 10 - Not much shedding
Month 11 - stable, 0% shedding and regrowth,also frontal...

as far as i know i had 2 sheddings : at 3 & 4 months a big one, and at 7 months a little one...
now everything is stable and i see lots of regrowth...
so dont give up on duta... you just need time..

got with adding spectral to my regime regrowth in my frontal area, little hairs with pigment... (black)
now more then a month on flutamide and xandrox 12,5% and i see clearly that the regrowth hairs get thicker and longer...
when i completed my laserhelmet (150 diodes) and recieved our hw topical 3 ,there will be more regrowth... to the company to make our custom topical...

 

[optimus prime]

Month 1 - Not much shedding
Month 2 - Shedding increased slightly
Month 3 to 4 - Shedding increased even more, but not extreme
Month 5 - Extreme shedding (300 +)
Month 6 - Extreme shedding (300 +)
Month 7 - Extreme shedding (300 +)
Month 8 - Shedding slowed slightly
Month 9 - Shedding slowed right down
Month 10 - Not much shedding

Overall thickness has improved.

UPDATE:

Month 1 - Not much shedding
Month 2 - Shedding increased slightly
Month 3 to 4 - Shedding increased even more, but not extreme
Month 5 - Extreme shedding (300 +)
Month 6 - Extreme shedding (300 +)
Month 7 - Extreme shedding (300 +)
Month 8 - Shedding slowed slightly
Month 9 - Shedding slowed right down
Month 10 - Not much shedding
Month 11 - Not shedding
Month 12 - Shedding has increased, not quite extreme

Overall thickness is better than this time last year, even though I spent most of the year shedding.

 

[Larrikin]

1 month: No shedding
2 months: Slight shed
3 months: moderate shed
4 months:Stopped shedding and hair thickened up more than base line
5 months: started shedding again

Seems to be about every 2.5 months I experience a shed (so far anyway).

Regime: Big 3 (5% minoxidil twice daily, Finpecia 1mg once a day and nizoral every third day)
L-lysine, silica

I recently had a break from minoxidil for about 10 days and I suspect even such a short break did harm. Perhaps returning to the twice a day routine from the break may have shocked the hairs into a shed similar to when you begin treatment.

Has anyone else had a short break from minoxidil and noticed any detrimental effects?

 

[Da Bears]

1. Moderate Shedding
2-3. No Shedding
4. Light Shedding
5. Light-Moderate Shedding

 

[makocloud]

Month 1: shedding
2: less shedding
3: stable
4: stable
5: noticeable improvement in hair
6: noticeable improvement in hair
7: some shedding
8: more shedding

I thought that shedding only takes place at the beginning when the new hairs are ready to come out. Not sure why I am shedding 7-8 months in.

 

[Larrikin]

Haha i hear ya! I hadn't heard of this "second shed" until it happened to me. Things were going great and then wham! :woot: I was suddenly regressing and quickly. Ive done a bit of research since then and apparently it should be expected.

One thing I've discovered is that there are a tonne of people on here blaming various changes in their regime for what appears as lost ground. For example, changing from liquid minoxidil to foam, or switching from merck finasteride to generic finasteride. I think the reality is that the sheds are cyclical and although your hair gets worse for a while, over time it is clear that overall there is improvement. I have recently noticed I am recovering from the 2nd shed and it is definitely getting thicker than it was after the recovery from my 1st shed.

I imagine that after a year your hair will be thick enough to not notice the sheds. Time will tell...

 

[Obsidian]

Yeah watch out for the third shed, although it is not as devestating as the 2nd shed was for me. It hit my hair pretty good and I think I may have one more shed in me.

I think, personally, you may be proned to more sheds or even more devestating ones if you have been going through hairloss longer than 1 or 2 years. I had been thinning for almost three years when I got on Propecia and I have to say I have been shedding pretty good from late in month 5 to month 8 but I won't lie I have seen some improvements on my hair.

Then again I could be wrong and it just be a nasty tug of war between male pattern baldness and finasteride. :smack:

 

[mj9]

Month 1 - not much shedding
Month 2 - Shedding increased
Month 3 to 4 - Shedding slightly but at a low constant rate
Month 5 - Extreme shedding (~100 hairs everytime I apply minoxidil)
Month 6 - Shedding even worse (easy ~300 hairs when applying minoxidil)
Month 7 - Still shedding but might have slowed down a little(difficult to tell)
Month 8 to 12 - Stable
Month 13 - Shedding incread
Month 14 - Extreme Shedding, never had this much shedding EVER

 

[Nighthair]

Month 1 - not much shedding
Month 2 - Shedding increased
Month 3 to 4 - Shedding slightly but at a low constant rate
Month 5 - Extreme shedding (~100 hairs everytime I apply minoxidil)
Month 6 - Shedding even worse (easy ~300 hairs when applying minoxidil)
Month 7 - Still shedding but might have slowed down a little(difficult to tell)
Month 8 to 12 - Stable
Month 13 - Shedding incread
Month 14 - Extreme Shedding, never had this much shedding EVER

hey MJ9, aside from the shed, how does the hair on your head look though?

 

[BodyDysmorphic]

month 1 alot of shedding
months 2-5 hardly any hair fallout

cheers mate

i hope i never shed as much as i did the first month

 

[fluffy123]

Does this sound like a valid timeline?

Month 1: Heavy shedding
Month 2: Moderate Shedding
into Month 3 and part of month 4: Lack of shedding/Good Growth
Month 4 into 5: Fair shedding, leading to the good growth I've had in month 3 to go backwards a little bit.

Can I take a positive from this slight backwards step from what I had a month or so ago?

 

[casken]

This is a good thread so I decided to bump it to see how many of you are still here and are still shedding.

Here is my shed timeline since starting finasteride exactly one year ago.

March - No change
April- No change until a slight reduction in shedding
Late April - Shedding almost completely stopped
May – Heavy Shed #1. Increased oily skin and scalp. Facial Acne. Major Scalp Acne. Itchy scalp. Hair from all over is sheds. At this point I added topical spironolactone
Late June- Slowdown in shedding
Late July - Almost complete stop in shedding
Late August – Heavy Shed #2 Same as first shed except temple and front hairline is severely affected. Crown and vertex not as much. Pulling a lot of hairs that have color and are thick at one end, but thin and colorless for anywhere from last 20% to 50% of the strand. A lot of short, small, damaged hairs shed here too.
September - Heavy shedding continues - I switch to 1/5 Proscar.
October - Shedding continues
November - Slowdown in shedding - At this point I added Fluridil and Oral spironolactone ( started on 25mg, now on 100mg)
December - Longest slowdown in shedding yet
January - Heavy Shed # 3- Same as others, but crown and vertex is MAJORLY affected this time. Pull many strong thick healthy hairs from the crown. Quite a few hair bulbs are covered in a hard clear substance. I upped Fluridil to twice a day here
February - Heavy shedding continued - hairline takes another hit here
March - Heavy shedding continued - Major scalp acne throughout the entire month - hairline continues to degrade, and area right in back of my widow's peak takes a major hit for the first time. Major Volume loss over entire head.

This third shed is by far the wost.

So three short breaks in hair loss followed by 3 massive sheds. During the sheds, my hair gets noticeably worse week to week. During the short non shedding times, my hair stays almost the same week to week.

The full story in more detail here:
[url="http://www.hairlosstalk.com/interact/viewtopic.php?f=61&t=57644"]viewtopic.php?f=61&t=57644[/url]

 

[question7]

Month 1:Shedding like i was pre finasteride.
Month 2ecrease in shedding
Month 3:Increase in shedding
Month 4:Continue increase in shedding
Month 5:Major increase in Shedding
Month 6:Currently in, it is at its peak. I can run my hands through my hair at any time of the day and will have hairs stuck to my hand. My overall density, especially in the front has thinned quite a lot and a bald spot in my crown is developing, which was not there before.

I'm also using nizoral 2% and Minoxidil 5% along my hairline.

 

[cantdecide]

I'm very glad someone set this thread up!

My story:

Initial regimen:
5% minoxidil twice daily, for 5 years. Itching started after 3 years. Initially responded well, but after itching started hairloss seemed to continue.

(June/July 2009) Shedded first time ever- really heavy- ran my hands through my hair and hair just fell out. Had only receded in front before, but was now thin/really thin on top. WTF?

(Month 1) Started 1/5 Proscar (August 2009) and nizoral (every 3 days)
(Month 2) Shedding halted, nizoral helped itching.
(Month 3) Noticed good regrowth, possibly even on front hairline- very fine hairs.
(Month 4) Hair thicker, scalp feels better.
(Month 5) Hair thicker, feeling good.
(Month 6) Hair seems thinner, scalp feels different, slight itchiness
(Month 7) Massive 2nd shedding, scalp itchy. (possible front hairline fine regrowth?)
(Month 8) Shedding stops. Scalp no longer itchy. (possible front hairline fine regrowth?)
(Month 9) To be continued...

So far, heavy shedding lasts between 7 & 9 weeks. Not sure if it is completely related to Proscar.
//////////////////////////////////////////////////

I just wanted to update this post (19/06/2010)

(Month 9) No regrowth, unlike before.
(Month 10) Still no regrowth, shedding seems normal i.e. ~50-100 p/d
(Month 11) Still no regrowth?
(Month 12)Still no regrowth, and it seems heavy shedding (3rd) is starting again, WTF?

/////////////////////////////////////////////////

I'm updating as changes occur. (28/07/2010)
I'm still in Month 12,and my shedding has pretty much halted. This is earlier than expected, making this my shortest shed period yet at about 6 weeks (as opposed to 7-9 weeks). Now, I'm not sure what is going on at all, but I thought to mention that I have now started to add washing my hair with an egg twice a week before using Nizoral. The shedding stopped within one week of doing this, so I have no idea if it is related. However, I plan to continue with this regimen since using egg in your hair is apparently great for the follicles- I would love to see if it helps with shedding in any way.

Will keep the updates coming.

(01/09/2010) About 4-5 weeks later. Heavy shedding is still minimal, if not halted. Hair loss seems normal now i.e. 50-100 per day. But it is so nice to not see hairs in my fingers every single time I run my hands through my hair!!

I'm not sure if anyone is tracking this, or if the egg regimen is helping, but I'll keep at it for another 6 months. The really good news is that I have regrowth, and I haven't had any since September/October last year. It's not much, but it's definitely there. I'm going to observe if I shed again, how intense it is, and if the regrowth occurs again- then I will assess if the egg regimen helps or is just a coincidence.

If I'm going to shed again, it should start in about two months.

Over.

///////////////////////////////////////


Okay, have started shedding again. 10/09/2001.
Will keep up the egg regimen and see if it helps at all. Shedding has started about one week after my last entry, which makes it several weeks ahead of schedule. wtf.

Over.

///////////////////////////////////////////

 

[pwnien00b]

hey, haven't been on finasteride for long, only 3 months..but I went through this blog and havent seen much shedding in the first three months.. so heres mine

month 1- Shedding
month 2- Shedding
month 3- shedding

i'm starting on month four..we'll see how that goes.

Im a diffuse thinner, and shedding is only in the affected areas- dunno if that is a good indication or bad since i've been reading a lot of people have it all over.

 

[rdf217]

I guess i started propecia the same time as you pwnien. I started on 1/17/10. I wash my head with a bucket so i can count the hairs i lost. Pls note the following numbers only represent the front to top to vortex. I can't wash the back of my head with a bucket.


Month 1-avg 85-90
Month 2-avg 85-90
Month 3-avg 90-100
Month 4-avg 90-100

Now I'm at the 4.5 months mark. I start using Rogaine liquid 5%.

It seems like I've always been shedding around 100 hairs just from the front to vortex. But I do remember 2 years I ago I used Rogaine Foam and Spectral DNC for like7-8 months without success. And I was shedding 140-160 hairs just from the top per day. It was very scarry. So I dropped everything for 6 months. Shedding reduced back to 100 hairs a day from the top. I start on minoxidil this time again because I remember like 3 years ago, Rogaine -LIQUID, used to give me regrowth in the mid-front scalp. A lot of 1/2" long hairs grew, but then I remember I switched to FOAM thinking it was a lot better because of all the commercial, and ofcourse, I shed like a cat eversince that. Than I switched to Spectral DNC thinking it'll be better but the shedding continued. On the 7th month mark I was still shedding 140-160 just from the top, I quit. Hopefully this time with Rogaine LIQUID , I'll get the same result as I did couple years ago. I read a lot of posts saying liquid is better than foam, and that seems to be what happened to me.

 

[what]

Month 1 (minoxidil +nizoral) moderate shed
Month 2 (minoxidil + nizoral) moderate shed beginning to slow
Month 3 (minoxidil + finasteride+nizoral) No shed

Month 4-9 (minoxidil + finasteride + nizoral) Hair loss stable, not noticing any regrowth but, scalp is healthy and hairloss has stopped...feeling positive about treatment.

Month 9-10 (minoxidil +finasteride + nizoral) shedding quite a bit again, Scalp itching, hair is thining at alarming rate. Noticed serious degradation in past two months, honestly, noticed big difference between haircuts spaced 4 weeks apart. Rapid change. Hair is worse than it's ever been.

Feeling pretty low at this point. Don't have much hope for a treatment anytime soon...doesn't look like anything for at least five years. Maybe histogen but i'm doubtful. Big three doesn't appear to be working. What to do? Will be 39 at end of summer. Currently Norwood 2.5ish but the thining on top is progressing rapidly. Could easily see myself heading to Norwood 4 territory in a year or maybe two if lucky. This sucks. Anybody out there considering a transplant? I would jump on it if i knew a HM treatment was definitely going to be available - but nobody is saying anything.

 

[KeepTheHair]

Month 1 - Started as normal male pattern baldness sheds and then a massive shed for about a week or so, suddenly stopped as I went into month 2
Month 2 - Very little shedding
Month 3 - In progress.

 

[ohnomyhair]

Week 1-2 no shedding
3-4- Shedding like crazy
week 6-8- shedding even more, to the point my roomate asked me if i was going through chemo once he saw all the hair in the bathroom.
8-10 continued shedding.
12-18- shedding has stabilized, no shedding at all.

Hopefully the shedding does not return since my scalp is easily visible whever the monixidil was applied.

I used minoxidil and propecia combo to combat frontal and temporal baldness, so far some very small hairs can be seen on the temples!

 

[spmorgan]

Just finasteride:

Month 1 - Some shedding
Month 2 - Lots of shedding
Month 3 - Lots of shedding
Cut down to 1 finasteride every other day
Month 4 -slowdown for a couple weeks and now massive shed

My hair wasn't bad, but finasteride has really destroyed it lately, especially in this latest shed. My hairline is really taking a beating at the front and temples. It is really thinning up.

finasteride seems like a terrible idea right about now...

UPDATE: 01/30/2010
My shedding let up for a couple of months, maybe month 6-8, but has resumed with a vengeance since November:
Month 9 - Heavy shedding
Month 10 - Heavy shedding
Month 11 - Heavy shedding

This latest shed has led to major diffuse hair on the top of my head, and can now easily see the scalp in light with my normal hairstyle. I've had to switch hairstyles to try to hide and now am using Toppix on the whole of my head. Still thinking I made a terrible decision to start finasteride.

Shawn