Mak93

Month 3 Update. shaved the sides down and trimmed some of the long strands off the top. I believing its progressing as it should based on other journeys I've seen. Nothing out of the ordinary to report thus far. Just playing the waiting game lol

Thank you for the response. Yes these are current. I don’t believe I have any of the donor following post op. If is it shock loss, how long does it last? Anything I can do to help heal it faster?

Hello all. I am almost 2 months into recovery on a FUE of 4300 grafts. From my little research I believe this is a sign of overharvesting, but could also be shock loss? Hadn’t even heard of shock loss before today so I’m wondering what you guys opinion is in it? Is it too early to know? If it is overharvesting, is it fixable?

Let me preface this by saying that, even though I personally believe Dr. Cinik's clinic to be above many of the others in Turkey, it is still a hair mill. Meaning there is a good chance you will not have an experience like mine, for better or for worse. Take that with a grain of salt as I blog my own personal journey. So it began by contacting the rep via WhatsApp and all conversation was through that. I got a little frustrated with this because my rep would disappear for days at a time with no update which worried me because I was on a timeline. Eventually I picked the package, set the date of surgery, paid a nonrefundable deposit, and was ready to go. I opted for the “FUE Deluxe package” which was the one where the the doctor opens the channels. Upon arrival into SAW I was greeted by a man holding a sign for the clinic. He verified my info and a cab was on its way. Took longer than I expected but he picked me up and then it was off to the clinic to draw labs and an EKG. Tbh Im not sure why they needed an EKG (more likely to make it feel more legit) but no biggie. After labs I was on to my own hotel. I spent the first few days exploring Istanbul, but I’ll save that blog for a different forum lol. I had got my own hotel for the first few days then transferred to the designated one the day prior to the surgery. The hotel was comp’d and it was amazing. Very high scale with excellent service. The following day I was picked up by another drive from the hotel to go to the clinic. When I arrived I saw a bunch of rather young looking people in scrubs outside smoking and hanging out, which definitely increased my anxiety. I entered and was greeted by a woman who directed me to get the IV nuralock in place and then begin the process of consultation, shaving, payment, etc. The consultation with Dr. Cinik went pretty well. It kinda felt like he was just going through the motions instead of having a vested interest bc he jotted things I said down but I had to repeat myself about them later. He asked for pictures of my hair pre-thinning which luckily I had (I was wearing a pic in almost every pic lol) then examined my head to draw the new hairline. He drew it rather conservatively which is not what I wanted, but he explained that due to my level of thinning, they could only safely pull grafts to cover a certain area. I ended up agreeing as I expect my hair to still recede a little even with fin/min. I do plan to get another HT in the near future to cover up the crown and lower the hairline just a bit. After all that I was omw to the surgery room to begin the process. Let’s start by saying that like every single woman here was extremely attractive lol idk if that intentional or if that’s just the type of woman who gravitates to this field more, but it was nice lol. They gave me some pill that was supposed to be some type of relaxant, but I can’t remember the name. Either way, once I was seated and ready, they began the anesthesia process. I have a pretty high pain tolerance, as I have my feet and both my ribs fully tattooed, but this pain was next level. I opted out of the neddle-less option (HUGE mistake lol) and it was horrible. Like I’m not exaggerating when I say it made me cry lol. Also, the anesthetist who did the back of my head was horrible bc there were many points during the extractions where I could very painfully feel the extraction tool cutting. Luckily a new man took over for the beard area and the top of the head and forehead, which was super painful at the injection point but I didn’t feel a thing afterwards. If you can afford any upgrade, definitely do the needle-less anesthesia one lol In the middle of the procedure they stopped for lunch, which was provided, and looked like something you’d get served in prison, including the trays lol. But it got food in my stomach so whatever. I paid extra to have Dr. Cinik do the opening of the channels, so he arrived shortly after lunch to do that. From that point on it was smooth sailing. The whole process from check-in to check out was about 8 hrs. After completing the surgery I sat down with a woman to talk a little about aftercare and how to make it through the night before returning the next day to wash my hair and get final instructions for how to take care of my newly grafted hair. I ended up having 3700 grafts removed from my head and 600 from my beard. That night I was feeling ok. I popped one of the pain pills and popped the sleep-aid right before bed. They said I had to sleep on my back with the neck pillow provided, which I assumed I would have difficultly with as I never sleep on my back, but I guess the pills were really good bc I slept through the night just fine and woke up fully rested. There was a little bit of fluid on my pillow from the blood and anesthesia leaking out of my head, but that was expected. Day 2 I woke up, ate breakfast (great food at this hotel!) and I was off for the followup visit. The woman took me into a room to go over after care for the next month. They removed the bloody bandages, gave me my first wash, and then the doctor came in for the follow up. He said everything looks good and to follow the guidelines provided. After this they transported me back to the hotel where I stayed until they arrived to take me back to the airport to go home. Week 1 Sleeping has been the biggest obstacle. I was able to sleep on my back just fine the first night, but not at all since. I've been so exceptionally tired this past week but they only recommended sleeping on my back for the first week so I will sleep great tonight I hope lol. I have been conditioning and shampooing my hair with the stuff given to me by the clinic. A conditioning foam for the transplanted area and a "natural" shampoo for the rest of the head. I was experiencing some swelling but its gone by now. I've been experiencing some radiating pain in waves on my head but I've been ok with Tylenol to cope with that. No issues thus far other than that; just the waiting game at this point. Overall I’d give the process at Dr. Cinik’s an 8/10. Of course its way too earlier to tell if it was a successful operation or not, but based on my experience thus far that is where I’m at. I'll be updating every few months from here on out. Comment if you have any questions you'd like me to address regarding my experience thus far and in the future, and good luck to all on they own hair treatment journey!(:

Hey OP I didn't know about Bicer before reading this, so I just sent her a message for a quote lol. Do you have pics of your HT? Would love to hear your personal accounts of her shop before moving forward with her

Thank you for the source. There's so much information that I'm being exposed to by finding this forum, even after I've already done so much research on my own. The biggest crux is finding reliable, factual, reviews and results from actual customers, which is so difficult on the web lol. I'll keep digging and hopefully find the placement that is my perfect ratio of budget to reliability.

Hey thanks for your response. Can you link that post you're referring to regrading that botched afro job at Cinik's?

Hey @Egy thanks for the reply. I liked them bc they have their doctor’s name on their site and their doctor is the one doing the extraction and opening the channels, which I haven’t seen be the case for most Turkish clinics. Idk if that is just a gimmick though or if it actually it common. But you’re right, the lack of discussion about it in here is pretty disturbing. Edit: have you heard news on Dr. Cinik? I’m awaiting a quote from him right now. Seems people in here either love him or hate him lol

Hello all! I'm a 28 afro M who has been really feeling the psychological effects of MPB lately and after recently discovering that HT's were affordable for me I dived into research. Im lookin at Turkey for the budget to quality ratio. I saw two people in Reddit post their month to month results at Gold City in Istanbul but after discovering this forum I haven't seen a single post good or bad about it. Not sure if those were fake accounts (their posting history didn't suggest that, but idk). Could also be due to my poor search skills, but if anyone has info on this place I'd love to hear it. Especially if you've been there yourself. Also intrigued by Cinik who I have seen rather mixed results in here lol.