What was your opinion of male pattern baldness before you started losing your hair?

[Follisket]

I was terrified of it. It's not that I really even had any reason to suspect I would start losing hair by the age of 25 back then, but it was nevertheless one of my greatest fears. So yeah, obviously I pitied balding men, wondering how the hell they managed to live with it. Now I see they don't.

 

[Dench57]

I didn't really think about, I never thought it would happen to me because my hair was always so thick and full. I didn't think much of seeing bald guys, didn't think of them as losers, just subconsciously knew I was more attractive than them and felt lucky for myself.

 

[Dazzel]

I didn't think much off it, And thought It only happen to men in there 60's, Then when I reached 15 I started to research why some men are bald and others are not and found out that the hairline starts to receded at the temples between the ages of 17-25 and thought"I hope that doesn't happen to me" (And I didn't expect it to) then at 16 my hair started to thin at the front top part of scalp very mild but It was the start of it none the less, I thought at that point in time that it must have been the head and shoulders shampoo I was using, but then I started to realize it was genetic and I had my fathers balding genes. It continued to get slightly worse but I wasn't to bothered by it as it was still thick, Then just before I turn't 17 I noticed that when I shake my hair over to the side it did not seem right as in there was a bit of hair missing from the temples, Still I didn't think I was receding, then when I shaved my head a few months later i saw that my hairline really had receded and was shocked, I couldn't believe I was receding and didn't think it would happen to me. as my father only thinned on top.

 

[F2005]

Before I started balding, I actually thought there was a cure for baldness. lol I thought people who went bald (like full NW7s) could regrow it with some cream or pills

This really is not that silly of a thought. I've confided in some close friends my distress about my hair loss and several of their responses were "there has to be something that you can do". They cannot believe that we have such limited options. And honestly I thought similarly before I researched the topic.

 

[ben760]

I thought it was something that happened when you got really old

same here. my father is bald and i thought it was normal. hell i was wrong

 

[blackg]

This really is not that silly of a thought. I've confided in some close friends my distress about my hair loss and several of their responses were "there has to be something that you can do". They cannot believe that we have such limited options. And honestly I thought similarly before I researched the topic.

The ignorance concerning hair loss amongst general society continues to amaze me.

In this information overload era we live in, and there is still so much ignorance from the average Joe.

I blame all these 'regrow your natural hair' bull**** commercials they show on TV.
Well they do down here (Australia).
Especially during the football. But I've also seen these adverts during "female programs. "

 

[shookwun]

I never thought about balding or cared about others who had it until I first hand experience it. From that day became a Norwood watcher.

I just registered bald men as unattractive but never thought anything of it. Didn't go into deep anylsis or anything.

 

[jnestor481]

Never really thought about it. Privileged with a very thick head of dark curly hair. Or at least I was. My maternal grandfather has a thick head of red hair at 75, so I thought I was immune to it. Yea that myth has been busted for me.

But I didn't think they were losers or anything, just that it sucks going bald. Everyone here can agree with that.

 

[RoyD]

Nice reply

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I want to tell how people who are not bald tell me when they first see me.
People who knows me when they meet me tell me to do something about hairloss.Why u haven't done anything for that.One Uncle who was father of a a beautiful daughter who was of marriageable age(23 y.o girl) told me that i should do something for my balding because it will be necessary to get married.I just blush and stayed quiet and expected that topic to change asap.

haha every time I read your posts I feel like saying I feel you bro. I can totally understand what it must be like being bald in India. Having hair is a huge requisite for an arranged marriage here. Your stock goes down hugely if you don't have hair. I mean you could be rich, successful, have your own house and good looking but if you're bald you're going to struggle. And all this with people constantly telling you you should do something about your hair like as if you can. Don't even get me started on the jokes here. I heard some stupid *** joke on the radio the other day about being bald. It's just disgusting.

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You're right Fred, karma is a b**ch. I wasn't one of those guys who went around making fun of other people's looks, I generally tried to avoid those topics, but I certainly felt I had an advantage over balding guys, probably felt a bit bad for them too. Oh well.
You never think it's going to happen to you, or if it does, it's not supposed to happen until you're old. But it does, and you find yourself a 20 something year old man on hormone altering drugs and rogaine researching hair transplants...
Certainly never expected to spend the tail end of my 20s obsessing over hair loss, but in all likelihood, none of us did when we were younger.

I was playing Batman Arkham Knight last night. The good guys are pretty much all NW1 (Except Alfred), Batman, Robin, Nightwing, Gordon. The bad guys are disfigured, bald or balding. Joker has insane temple recession, Penguin is bald, Scarecrow, who knows, the dreadlocked skullet preacher and Riddler has some temple recession combover going on.

Villains have to be ugly, so usually they're bald, disfigured or both.

We are all meant to be villains.

 

[Agustin Araujo]

We are all meant to be villains.

According to society.

I previously made a post in this thread stating that hatred towards men with baldness is taught, never instinctive. I remember that FredTheBelgian made a post talking about the worst a little kid ever said to him when he was bald is simply "Why do you have no hair?". Same goes with racism, sexism, and countless other situations where hatred is taught, and is impossible for it to be instinctive.

Take a look for yourself in movies, comic books, etc. There are countless bad guys and villains who are bald. How many super heroes are bald? I don't know of any.

 

[IA2015]

Never thought about it.

 

[Isaac Newton]

According to society.

I previously made a post in this thread stating that hatred towards men with baldness is taught, never instinctive. I remember that FredTheBelgian made a post talking about the worst a little kid ever said to him when he was bald is simply "Why do you have no hair?". Same goes with racism, sexism, and countless other situations where hatred is taught, and is impossible for it to be instinctive.

Take a look for yourself in movies, comic books, etc. There are countless bad guys and villains who are bald. How many super heroes are bald? I don't know of any.

some stuff unfortunately is instinctive. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn6355-babies-prefer-to-gaze-upon-beautiful-faces/

super young babies prefer to look at their own race http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2566511/
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2566514/

the latter stuff with the babies could have been learned very early in life or instinctual, the researchers thought it was learned

 

[Bottlecap]

Never even noticed balding in other men until i was suffering myself. I also thought that if i ever would start losing my hair i would be fine with just buzzing it, turns out im not fine with it.

I was the exactly the same.

I was so oblivious to it that even when I was receeding towards a NW2 I saw someone who went to my school at 23 who must have had very aggressive balding as he was NW7, I wondered why he had shaved the top of his hair off. For a split second I thought he must have done it for a joke.