tjm127

All I can do is shrug, I suppose. Shrug and do what is suggested to me, of course! I'm still quite worried about Propecia and Proscar, I was brought up to not take anything with side effects that severe, so I just started with minox and nizoral shampoo this morning and I'll see how it goes from there. Besides, I'm not even shedding at all right now, and haven't noticeably shed for a very long time, so even if the treatment fails, perhaps I can hang onto my youthful good looks for a while longer yet! At work, where I'm the youngest guy in the office by 15 years, they always poke fun at me for looking like I'm 16. Maybe if I need to shave my head at some point, I'll get some more respect! BTW, what is the deal with saw palmetto? My research (such that it is) shows an internet unsure of whether saw palmetto is effective or not, and also an internet unsure about whether it would give the same side effects as Proscar or not. Does anyone here have any experience with saw palmetto and its benefits and side effects (if indeed either exists)?

Although I'm also wondering if my hair thinning might be due to stress? I've been undergoing MAJOR stress for over six months now (school, family, working two jobs, the works). And yet, I haven't been shedding at ALL, not in over a year and a half, which is kinda what I though stress-based hair loss manifested as. Can it just manifest as new hairs not growing in? If that were the case, wouldn't it also impact the hair on the back and side of my heads, which are healthy as can be? I don't actually know, any insight would be appreciated. If I can kill the stressors in my life, would the hair grow back, or is it permanent? (It might also be dietary, maybe? As an unpaid intern in DC for the summer, I ate a looooot of fast food - I run a lot, so I didn't gain a pound, but that can't be great for your hair. Would altering my diet perhaps give my hair a little boost? I'm stabbing in the dark here).

Thanks for the advice, guys. I guess I'll just do Nizoral/Rogaine and keep it up for six months and see what happens. If it stays exactly the same, I will be pleased. If I start to somehow grow some hairs back, I'll be tickled. If it gets worse, well, all that means is that it doesn't matter and it wasn't meant to be, and I should start figuring out ways to look good with a very short crop. And seriously - it does NOT look bad once my hair grows out...it's been thin for a couple of years, but the hair that grows grows quickly and long and dark and thick, and by mid September it will be impossible to tell I have thinning hair on my crown unless it's wet and the hair clumps together. And I only get my hair cut once every two and a half months or so. Plus, I'm tall, so it's not like people are looking down at my scalp all the time. So I guess I should feel blessed that it's the way it is and not worse! Gotta look on the bright side, I'm young and intelligent and good-looking apart from the hair, I don't got time to overly worry about this. Now I just pray that if worse comes to worse, I look good with a shaved head...

For when I start using Nizoral (which will be when my Amazon shipment comes in:) how often should one use it, precisely? I'm using the 1% shampoo. I know you're NOT supposed to use it every day, but how often? Every 3 days? Three times a week? Twice a week? I looked around the interwebs and there seems to be no real consensus.

And I'm not really thinking of getting a hair transplant. If worse comes to worse, I got the Jason Statham look and I very close-crop my hair. It would be a change, but I think if I had to I could pull it off. Most of all, I want to keep the vast majority of the hair I have. Any regrowth would just be gravy.

Well, hopefully I get started on something immediately and it halts where it's at. It's not nearly so noticeable when my hair is longer, I JUST got a short haircut yesterday, which may be influencing how it looks.

(Shots from in my parent's front yard - it doesn't look nearly so bad in the natural light, thank Christ, but still worse than it was 6 months ago)

I also am extremely wary about finasteride...those possibly sexual side effects, and the recent George Washington University study suggesting they are more common and longer lasting than previously thought, scare the willies out of me...I might be too young to be going bald, but I'm DEFINITELY too young to be having THOSE sorts of problems!

Not particularly concerned with it looking "as it once did," if it stays more or less the way it is I'll be perfectly happy. I can live happily with it being thin, I'll just be troubled if it continues to decrease in volume until it shrinks away!

Hey all, first time poster here, I just don't really know what to do... I just turned 20 less than 2 months ago, I'm about to be a junior in college, and I'm starting to notice a lot of thinning on my crown. When I was a freshman, I had a period of MAJOR shedding - I mean, the hair was falling out on my pillow, on my books in class - but I talked to my doctor and he suggested it could be a number of things: diet, stress, even the water in DC (where I attend school). So I stopped thinking about it. The shedding stopped as mysteriously as it had began, and I moved on with my life. I knew my hair was thin, but I dismissed it...people don't start going bald when they're 18, 19...right??? Wrong. I noticed these last few months that when my hair was wet, you could see way way too much scalp. I just got a short haircut, and I can STILL see way way too much scalp. I took a few pictures and this is what I found: (check images) I'm obviously horrified. I had NO IDEA that it looked like that, it looks better when it's longer and when I'm not illuminating it with a flash obviously, but there's still a LOT less hair than I'd figured...especially up top, where I have a hard time seeing without that camera... So, have I experienced a hopeless amount of thinning? Background, my dad and his whole family have luscious heads of hair (bastards) but my mom's father was mostly bald by 22. I think I'm behind his record pace, but maybe not by much. My sides are beautiful, as is my back, and my hairline's fine I think, but not my top. Is it curtains for me? I'm planning on doing the Nizoral shampoo treatment and getting some Rogaine Extra Strength, and then praying...also some biotin vitamins...should have started this a year ago, I'm kicking myself, but I just didn't notice anything this alarming until it all punched me in the face at once...any advice from the forum on what else to do, and whether i'm salvageable? Thanks!