Space Ace

Thank you, mrjb. I've really been fretting over my hair lately, but reading "success posts" like yours genuinely gives me hope, takes some of the weight off my back.

Sandip, high. I am not Bill, nor am I a doctor. (All of my knowledge is second hand!) However, maybe I can still be of some help. I have read some posts on other forums that suggest taking a 1 mg pill only twice a week still could indeed have some benefit. Here are the reasons why it could still be helpful. 1) Supposedly the dht-suppressing abilities stay within the body for three days after taking the drug. 2) I think the official study by Merck (the manufacturer of the original Propecia) found out that a mere .25 of a mg a day is nearly as effective as 1 mg a day. However, having said that, perhaps it might be better to ingest a more steady stream of the medication, rather than be taking pills only two days a week. Have you ever considered splitting your pills up into halves or even quarters? That way you could still be taking a dose every day, yet be knocking down your overall intake. I gather from reading various forums that splitting 1 mg Propecia pills isn't that uncommon.

I believe that does address my question, Bill. Thanks again. I guess I'll probably start on Propecia soon enough one of these days. (Have to work up the courage first, I guess.) Here's to hoping that it has a positive effect for me.

I'm bumping my own thread here to pose another Propecia question. First of all, before I get into anything, I just have to applaud Bill for being so awesome. I can't imagine the amount of time he spends responding to all the people that he does. Also his helpful positive attitude is a breath of fresh air. I say this in comparison with other hair loss forums that have a vaguely negative vibe to them. Anyway, my question has to do with a thread I just read at the hairlosstalk site. 2 months, still losing hair The original poster asks a very specific question toward the end that no one really addresses. It's in the next to the last post of the thread. You know the Propecia claim that it helps you maintain the hair that you have? Well, does that take into account the crazy amounts of hair that is sometimes shed when one first starts Propecia? For example, lets say you have x amount of hair when you start the drug. Am I correct in thinking that Propecia (if it's working properly) is supposed to help maintain that same x-amount over the years? (And maybe even add a little to that amount?) But this guy asks about the amount/density *after* the dreaded Propecia shed. Let's say the Propecia triggers a disturbing shedding period in someone. (Which I guess is fairly common, from what I've read.) And then, after 6 months the shedding stops. So, what hair-amount is the Propecia maintaining? The x-amount the guy had before the shed, or the amount after the shed? Is your hair now doomed to be "maintained" at the sad post-shed amount? I would hope that once the Propecia kicks in, all those Propecia-induced shed hairs come back, but I'm not so sure. P.S. I realize my questions are probably unnecessarily wordy. Sorry about that; it's just my style. I hope they at least make sense.

ctmd brings up a concern I've always had about myself. I myself have suffered from quite persistant adult acne, starting in high school. And with the acne came the things often associated with acne, a face that was constantly oily/greasy. (BTW, my hair has always seemed to get "dirty" awfully quick as well. I always assumed this was due to my body producing freakish amounts of sebum.) Here's my concern about hairloss. Isn't there some correlation between dht and sebum? I think I read that somewhere. And if someone produces tons more acne-causing sebum than most people.... wouldn't that also translate to hair loss problems at some point in their lives as well with all that dht in the sebum? I am currently experiencing diffuse thinning in my hair, and I can't help think that there might be a relationship between people that have experienced excessive acne and people that develop hair loss problems. I wonder, has there ever been a study or poll on this? You know, asking a thousand guys with hair issues if they've experienced worse-than-normal acne problems in their lives as well?

Thanks for the responses guys. Sorry I haven't checked back in a while. I am aware that mpb will resume if one stops taking Propecia (assuming you were on the pills for a while). I guess I just wanted to confirm that it wouldn't be as horrible as I'd feared. For example, calvinmd wrote above in regards to quitting Minoxidil... So basically, stopping Propecia is less devestating to one's hair than stopping Moinoxidil? In the above quote, you list two ways that your hair goes to hell upon stopping Minoxidil: 1) The "original loss resuming" And 2): Additionally losing all the hairs that only stayed on your head during the years you were on Minoxidil because the Minox blocked the dht's effects on those hairs. Except now that the Minox is gone, the dht is free to "kill" those hairs. But if one were to go on just Propecia for 5 years, and then for whatever reason, had to come off of it. Even after coming off of it--while your hairloss resumes at its original rate (the rate you were losing before starting Propecia) you will never have that freakish fallout that occurs if one were stopping Minoxidil. Right? I mean, if someone were to take Propecia for 5 years, get the benefits of that, and then stop... even though the hairloss will resume, they still will have permanently set back the progress of where their hair loss naturally would've been (had they decided to never take drugs) by about 5-years. Is that correct?

Hi everyone. This is my first post ever to a hair loss forum. I noticed my hair thinning about 5 or 6 years ago. I haven't ever done anything about it, but recently I've been considering taking "steps," as my hair has gotten kind of sad. Taking pills always seemed like an easy thing to do, however something about Propecia has always terrified me. I was always under the impression that if one starts taking Propecia, then you are basically "chained" to it for life. Like, let's say I took it for 5 years, and it helped me maintain my hair (and even maybe helped thicken some of the tiny/thinner/miniaturized hairs I currently have) during that time. But then, let's say after several years I'm forced to stop taking the pills. Maybe because the side effects prove too great. Or maybe because something crazy happens and they pull the pills off the market. I don't know. But anyway, am I correct in thinking that within months of stopping Propecia, that I'll lose tons of hair within a very brief time--basically all the hair that it had helped me maintain over the years? Am I correct in that, or am I misiniterpretting something? The reason I ask is because I just read a post on this forum that negated this assumption of mine. It's in a thread called "After taking Finasteride does hair stop growing?" At the end of the thread, a poster named "calvinmd" wrote this: Is this true? could someone elaborate on this? If this is true, then that makes the idea of trying/starting Propecia less terrifying. Am I understanding what calvinmd wrote correctly? Right now, I'm 30. Let's say I start taking Propecia, and am on it for the next 6 years. Then, for whatever reason I have to stop. At that point, I will NOT suddenly lose all the hair (in some horrifying months-long "shed") that the Propecia helped me maintain. But rather my hair loss would basically just pick up at the same leisurely pace that it was at when I started taking the pills? To put it another way, let's say there are two version of me: VERSION A: This version of me never tries Propecia pills, ever. VERSION B: I start taking Propecia pills at my current age of 30, I'm on them for 6 years, then for whatever reason I stop taking them at age 36. The Version "B" Me at Age 42, six years since stopping the Propecia: Should this person basically have the same hair density as the Version "A" version would've had at age 36? I hope I've made sense. Thanks for any responses.

Hi everyone. This is my first post ever to a hair loss forum. I noticed my hair thinning about 5 or 6 years ago. I haven't ever done anything about it, but recently I've been considering taking "steps," as my hair has gotten kind of sad. Taking pills always seemed like an easy thing to do, however something about Propecia has always terrified me. I was always under the impression that if one starts taking Propecia, then you are basically "chained" to it for life. Like, let's say I took it for 5 years, and it helped me maintain my hair (and even maybe helped thicken some of the tiny/thinner/miniaturized hairs I currently have) during that time. But then, let's say after several years I'm forced to stop taking the pills. Maybe because the side effects prove too great. Or maybe because something crazy happens and they pull the pills off the market. I don't know. But anyway, am I correct in thinking that within months of stopping Propecia, that I'll lose tons of hair within a very brief time--basically all the hair that it had helped me maintain over the years? Am I correct in that, or am I misiniterpretting something? The reason I ask is because I just read a post on this forum that negated this assumption of mine. It's in a thread called "After taking Finasteride does hair stop growing?" At the end of the thread, a poster named "calvinmd" wrote this: Is this true? could someone elaborate on this? If this is true, then that makes the idea of trying/starting Propecia less terrifying. Am I understanding what calvinmd wrote correctly? Right now, I'm 30. Let's say I start taking Propecia, and am on it for the next 6 years. Then, for whatever reason I have to stop. At that point, I will NOT suddenly lose all the hair (in some horrifying months-long "shed") that the Propecia helped me maintain. But rather my hair loss would basically just pick up at the same leisurely pace that it was at when I started taking the pills? To put it another way, let's say there are two version of me: VERSION A: This version of me never tries Propecia pills, ever. VERSION B: I start taking Propecia pills at my current age of 30, I'm on them for 6 years, then for whatever reason I stop taking them at age 36. The Version "B" Me at Age 42, six years since stopping the Propecia: Should this person basically have the same hair density as the Version "A" version would've had at age 36? I hope I've made sense. Thanks for any responses.