My genes boggle the mind. I looked like I was 9 years old until I turned 17, which was the year I started puberty. That's not an exaggeration. I have pics but will never show them. After that, I looked like I was 15. You can imagine how this panned out in high school trying to get dates. When I was in my early to mid twenties I was getting carded when buying tickets to rated R movies. Everything was a painful reminder of how I didn't look like I should have. Wonderful.
At 25, I started to look like a man. That same year, my hair began to fall out. I lost my temples first, and then I noticed over the next year that the hair on the top of my head was getting wispy. At 27, I started minoxodil twice a day, every day for a year. Nothing happened. No shedding, no vellus hairs, nothing. I went to the barber and said, "Hey, I'm going bald, should I just shave my head and get it over with?", and he told me no, because I have the kind of head shape that looks terrible with a buzz cut. I have a huge nose and a weak forehead. Great.
So I went to a hair doctor at 28, and he noted that I had already lost a sizeable amount of hair, to the point where you could see a circle of hair on the front of my head, with the rest of the hair on top thinning diffusely. It looks like a Norwood 5A, sort of, but not slick bald yet. I asked about a hair transplant, and he quoted me $12,000 for a FUE, but said it would be a stupid idea because with diffuse thinning, you run the risk of damaging the neighbouring follicles. Fantastic.
He recommended starting finasteride and going on min (again), which I reluctantly did, even though I told him how poorly I had responded to min before. I started the big 3, and made a laser hat device for my regimen, which I have stuck to since this past January. I also used a very shallow dermaroller (very lightly and taking all precautions) to help the absorption of the min. I've had testicle pain with the finasteride, which concerns me greatly, but overall the regimen was doing it for me. 5 months in, the hair was filling in where it was diffuse, especially in the front. The before and after pictures are actually quite impressive, and I was even getting ready to post in the success stories thread.
Now suddenly, in the past few weeks I have reverted to about where I started from. Massive shedding, and I can once again see the patch of hair in the front while the rest of it falls out. I'm frustrated with everything right now. My lack of options, the ineffectiveness of the medicine we have available... just everything.
tl;dr version:
1. Started losing at 25.
2. Min doesn't work for me.
3. Can't shave my lumpy, peanut head without looking like a non-stop loser.
4. Was told hair transplant wasn't for me because of diffuse pattern loss.
5. Big 3 regimen worked for a few months, now seems to be reverting to pre-treatment condition.
6.
At 25, I started to look like a man. That same year, my hair began to fall out. I lost my temples first, and then I noticed over the next year that the hair on the top of my head was getting wispy. At 27, I started minoxodil twice a day, every day for a year. Nothing happened. No shedding, no vellus hairs, nothing. I went to the barber and said, "Hey, I'm going bald, should I just shave my head and get it over with?", and he told me no, because I have the kind of head shape that looks terrible with a buzz cut. I have a huge nose and a weak forehead. Great.
So I went to a hair doctor at 28, and he noted that I had already lost a sizeable amount of hair, to the point where you could see a circle of hair on the front of my head, with the rest of the hair on top thinning diffusely. It looks like a Norwood 5A, sort of, but not slick bald yet. I asked about a hair transplant, and he quoted me $12,000 for a FUE, but said it would be a stupid idea because with diffuse thinning, you run the risk of damaging the neighbouring follicles. Fantastic.
He recommended starting finasteride and going on min (again), which I reluctantly did, even though I told him how poorly I had responded to min before. I started the big 3, and made a laser hat device for my regimen, which I have stuck to since this past January. I also used a very shallow dermaroller (very lightly and taking all precautions) to help the absorption of the min. I've had testicle pain with the finasteride, which concerns me greatly, but overall the regimen was doing it for me. 5 months in, the hair was filling in where it was diffuse, especially in the front. The before and after pictures are actually quite impressive, and I was even getting ready to post in the success stories thread.
Now suddenly, in the past few weeks I have reverted to about where I started from. Massive shedding, and I can once again see the patch of hair in the front while the rest of it falls out. I'm frustrated with everything right now. My lack of options, the ineffectiveness of the medicine we have available... just everything.
tl;dr version:
1. Started losing at 25.
2. Min doesn't work for me.
3. Can't shave my lumpy, peanut head without looking like a non-stop loser.
4. Was told hair transplant wasn't for me because of diffuse pattern loss.
5. Big 3 regimen worked for a few months, now seems to be reverting to pre-treatment condition.
6.
