GoliGoliGoli

Not only that, if you message some of these clinics on Whatsapp one time you end up needing to block them because they will forever hound you with messages. Whereas if a Dr is bad or slow at responding back it probably means they're super involved in the process and thus don't have the ability to "scale up", and also aren't hungry for business because they are fully booked.

Maybe it's because I'm a Naderite, but it's always seemed like a green flag when a surgeon gets by with minimal social media/web presence. If you're running a successful HT clinic with little web presence it speaks to the fact that your results are good enough that you're getting enough business on word of mouth and don't need to go fishing for prospective clients.

@asterix0 It's a bit hard to make a judgement seeing as how in the above pic you are 4 days from having 1300 grafts removed. I don't doubt the validity of your point, but it's hard to make a judgement based on this pic due to the recentness of the operation. So as you said in original post, would be good to see some other cases that aren't so immediately post op.

Agree, @asterix0 would be very useful for us all if you could share pictures.

I'm not sure, that's why I was asking you! They both seem pretty awesome, @Grant Giller result with Gur looked really great.

Why Turan over Gur?

Interesting thanks for clarifying. I've been using the slick gorilla seal salt spray but have recently moved to an aerosol based high hold hair spray to "lock" the style in better. Just yesterday I purchased the slick gorilla powder and am excited to give that a try.

Would you mind elaborating on this a bit more? Do you get a bit of the "Birds nest" effect when not styled? I'm about 8 months post-op and also am dealing with some hard to tame hairs in my crown especially when fresh off a shampoo. I know this is very normal for 8 months but I'm curious to hear your experience as far as whether it was all of the transplanted hairs that are hard to tame or only certain areas, and whether it went away with time after your 1st transplant.

This is a very healthy outlook and is generally why I think most guys shouldn't get HT's until they're pretty far gone where what they get in a first pass is a major aesthetic improvement. There was a case of a guy on here who was NW2 and got I think 2000 grafts to fix his hairline and give him temples points, and he ended up being disappointed with the result and feeling like he needed a 2nd pass more density. HT's will not return you to your "heyday" in a single pass. I think people get caught in a trap of chasing the ideal hairline with ideal density and it's really not a great idea unless you have tons of money in the bank.

Have you had a HT? They do not return you to your "heyday", at least not in a single pass.

Any acid reflux in your past?

I think he was replying to jfally's comment not yours. I am a big believer in the nocebo effect. Hell, I'm such a hippy that I even believe in the power on manifesting outcomes via your own thoughts in terms of say your career or your relationships (Shoutout to the Monroe Insitute). On the other hand, I also believe that it's quite possible that it's not a great idea to be taking a medication for baldness that was originally designed for hypertension, only for it to be basically discontinued for that purpose due to side effects (Albeit at higher doses). We walk a fine line here, chumes!

3 months seems excessive but every Dr has their own reccomendation of how long to cease Min for pre HT and post HT. IIRC my doctor told me to stop using a few weeks before, and for a month after my HT.

I've been using the 5% foam for about a year now and have gotten great results. One thing I consider sometimes is moving to a "maintenance schedule" of applying twice per week instead of my usual 5-7 days per week. I'd suspect that once you reach about a year of daily use you've reached your full "regrowth potential" and that you can maintain your gains at a lower overall dose. No one's studied this obviously but I'd be willing to bet money that it would work.

I was wondering the same thing from looking at the pictures. Always hard to tell in photos if it was transplanted hair that was lost or hair around it, but it does seem that some of the 2005 hairs were lost.

I mean, what do you want them to do? Literally decide for you whether you should take finasteride or not?

I would think average number of hairs per graft is a more important factor

I'm a bit confused, you say "I have seen so many dense looking hairlines that just look awful. Lots of hair but frankly a bad look overall and also destroying donor area" Then later say you went back to add more density to your hairline? Are you just saying in the first quote that it isn't the denseness that makes it look unnatural, but other factors?

Something to add about the topical Dut/Dalton/molecular weight discussion: The scalp is known to be an extremely good area for topical absorptionof any chemical due to the high amount of hair follicles. The follicle basically acts as a channel to carry substances applied to the epidermis into the dermis and then into the blood supply. So who knows, maybe despite the higher molecular weight of Dut, the fact that it's being applied to the scalp allows it to have some effect whereas if it was applied to say the foot it wouldn't absorb at all. The hair follicle "opening" might also allow for absorption of higher molecular weight substances.

I agree that blood flow and scalp massages aren't going to make as big of a difference as hoping on an anti-androgen, but I don't agree that it's correct to outright dismiss the potential benefit of these things either. After all, Minoxidil is thought to work by bringing more blood flow to the scalp. Keto shampoo is thought to work by reducing inflammation in the scalp. So it's perfectly reasonable to deduce that scalp massages could improve blood flow and reduce inflammation in that area and thereby be of benefit. There is a lot we don't know about hair loss. I don't think it's as straightforward as "Some people's hair follicles have a genetic affinity for DHT and this and this alone causes hair loss" (Not that you are saying that necesarilly). No one has really been able to explain why DHT works to grow hair follicles in literally every other area of the body whereas on the scalp it has the opposite effect. People just kind of theorize that there is some gene in the hair follicle that interacts with DHT to cause hair loss - but it's not like this gene has been identified. I do think DHT is the main culprit in hair loss but we should be open minded about different modalities for combatting it.

You got a great result, personally I wouldn't not go back for a 2nd pass. Why spend the money on what is going to be an improvement that only you will ever notice? If I look closely I can see a few spots that maybe are the ones you're talking about, but it's not a bad thing to have some appearance of very slight thinning in a transplanted hairline. If you continue to lose (despite the strong stack you're on) it will be a bit more natural that way. I always err on the side of resisting hair greed and postponing any potential 2nd surgery for as long as possible.

Dads side. My dad and his younger brother actually have full hair to this day despite being in their early/mid 60's. However their older brother is Norwood 4.5 in late 60s (Maybe 70s?) and their father (my grandfather) also progressed to NW 5 by his 70s/80s. Both of them progressed veeery slowly though with gradual hair loss that started young but never "exploded". My grandfather was a huge photo taker so I'm able to track his hair loss at different ages through the years. He started losing his hair in his mid 20's (Around same time I did) but by 55 was still NW4. My uncle seems to have followed a similar path of slow gradual loss. I'm hoping that I'm on that same route as it at least makes me a good candidate for HT's. My moms side has basically no hair loss - at least none in her father or any of her 4 brothers. My older brother (Who looks like my mom's side) has a great head of hair - literally NW0 at 37. I look more like my dads side and seemed to have inherited their pattern of hair loss as well.

Really a tremendous bargain for his quality of work. Gur will be high on my list for whenever I decide to get my 2nd HT.

You have had like 10 or more surgeries right? How many grafts did you have planted? TBH I'm shocked that your hair would look like this even after so many grafts... Maybe post some with similar length to compare apples to apples?

If I get some time I'll take some pictures in direct sunlight and post them. People often only post their best pictures (Flattering lighting/angles/sometimes even hair fibers in) on here and it's actually kind of a problem because it creates an unrealistic expectation for what HT's are capable of. Clinic posted results are useless too 95% of the time. I wish more guys were willing to post unflattering pictures side by side with their flattering ones so that people can better understand what they're diving into, but posters like that on here are relatively rare.