Bucky O Hair

I tried sleeping upright but gave up after the second or third day. The travel pillow is critical though. You don't want to roll over in your sleep and rub your recipient area all over your pillow during those first five days. The travel pillow will keep you stabilized. The incline thing (as mentioned above) is moreso about preventing swelling in your face from the local anesthesia that still remains and is working its way out of your body.

Well, I just got a HT and I've never take Finasteride or any other medication (so we'll see what happens to me in a few years as the guinea pig experiment on this site, haha). But there are actually quite a few people on this forum that are drug-free as well. But like everyone already said, if your safe zone has healthy hair and you're harvesting from there, then you have a good chance that those transplanted hairs will last a very long time. To be honest, if your one of those guys whose donor is thinning drastically as well, Finasteride probably won't do anything for you either. It tends to not work so well in those severe hairloss cases. Finasteride is more about slowing down the rate of loss in your native hairs (rather than your transplanted hairs), specifically in the crown.

Smoking is considered a comorbidity. Just like diabetes, obesity, etc. It will hurt your surgical outcomes, no matter what the surgery is (whether it's a hair transplant or whatever). Not sure what the "time range" is to quit before your hair transplant, but I would assume that you would definitely have to quit smoking entirely until your full results have grown through.

Doing research is good, but remember, people will have their biases. So you'll have to take that into consideration. People will always recommend the places they went to, but their reasons for choosing it will be different than yours. Also, this forum is just as much a "support group" as it is a "research hub", so there will be people posting their best postop photos in the best possible lighting to get positive comments (and probably avoid posting anything negative, like a depleted donor from extracting massive amounts of grafts in one session).

This is actually my plan. I am a NW5, who is visibly headed to NW6 or NW7. I got 3200 grafts on the front half of my head (to correct the receded hairline and frame my face nicely), and plan to get another transplant on the crown (as I have a pretty large bald area there). The photos below are my pre-op and my post-op (at three weeks). I plan to wear my hair both longer and shorter...but I expect my hair to continue to thin out over time, so that's when I'll opt for the full-time buzzed look. I agree that standalone SMP doesn't look that great (especially at the hairline), but I think SMP is an intriguing option to use WITH a hair transplant. The only drawback with this strategy is any FUE scarring will be more visible. Personally, I have some noticeable recipient scarring on my temple area (whenever I am under bright light), but it's easily covered up when hair is there. I just won't be able to wet-shave my scalp. Also, some people get noticeable donor scarring too, but SMP is a good option to mask that as well.

I'm almost at three months myself, and you look further along than I do. I'm only just beginning to notice a few transplanted hairs growing.

What is your definition of "full density"? Also, did your HT doctor examine your donor, measure your hair caliber, measure the recipient area, and give you an estimated number of grafts and density (in cm2)? All conversations with a HT doctor are pointless without the numbers. If your definition of "full density" is to achieve your original native density (which is usually measured between 80-100 grafts per cm2) then no HT can achieve this definition of full density. The safest density that a HT can provide is usually 50 grafts per cm2, which is (in my opinion) good enough for the appearance of "full density". Not sure if you've ever met anyone with 50 cm2 density, but it could be what you are looking for. 50cm2 is pretty much at full density, but again, we all have differing opinions. I would try and possibly meet people who were NW3 patients like you, who received 40-50 grafts per cm2 in their frontal area to see if it's something that meets your expectation of full density.

Wow. What is Zarev's contact number, lol. I gotta get on the waiting list for my crown.

No, but here are some from week 2, 3, and 7. The first one is from week 2, the next couple photos are week 3, and the last two are week 7 (one in bathroom light, and one in natural sunlight). It's more noticeable in natural light, or any light where the light source is directly above you (as the shadows really show the inconsistencies in the skin). The good news is that I spoke with the clinic and had them look at it in person. They said it's normal to have visible recipient scarring, and that my skin should look better over the next 12 months (as it will relax). I asked if this was "pitting" but they don't think it's that. They said the recipient area may still look uneven like this as the skin will have some points of swelling throughout this healing period. Week 2: Week 3: Week 7:

No, but the clinic took some. I should probably ask them for them so I have them for my records too. I did take some of week 2, 3, and 7. Not sure if that helps.

You could probably test for these as well: DHT (Dihydrotestosterone) Estradiol (17β-estrdiol) Thyrotropin (sensitive TSH) Testosterone (Bioavailable) Albumin Adiol-G (Androstanediol glucuronid) PTH (Parathyroid Hormone) Free T3 Free T4 Thyroid Antibodies Creatinine eGFR Estrone (also oestrone) Mind you, I got a few of these from other recommendations from other sites. You probably won't get a doc to give you a requisition to get all these tested unless it was for a more serious reason (not an elective one like a HT drug). I would assume that getting your DHT and Estrogen tested would be very useful though. Thyroid would be good too.

No. It's not that. I've seen enough of that to know what that looks like. l'll send them photos, but I think this is a case of me being too bored and spending too much of the ugly duckling phase looking at my hairline, ha ha.

Not yet. I'll bring it up with them the next time I chat with them. Under normal lighting you cannot see anything. Just bright lighting that is shone right onto the scalp (like in the photos above). Oddly enough, I have zero scarring in the donor area. Could just be my physiology and having more sensitive skin in one area of my head vs another.

You won't be wonked out from anything. They use local anesthesia to numb your scalp. They're not going to gas you or put you under or anything like that. You probably won't even take the painkillers they provide you after, since most of the time it's virtually painless (I never took anything). You'll be fine. You may be bored, though, so maybe hiring an escort or someone to keep you company is probably a good idea. They can spray the saline too.

You're attractive regardless (so I don't think lowering the hairline will change that). I wouldn't bother with it, but I'll defer to the experts on this board for recommendations. Us guys tend to do it because it actually makes a big difference in our appearance. In your case, it won't make much difference.

Hello all, Got a question about recipient scarring and whether or not it's a thing. Here are my 5-week postop photos below. As you can see, the hairs in the temples have already shed but the skin is rather rough looking, almost as if there are pits and craters all over the recipient area. Looks particularly bad in bright light. Just curious how much this will 'smooth out' (if at all). Or is there a general roughness (or scarring) that will always existing in the recipient area permanently.

It's not really necessary, and you have good density throughout your head. Your more 'mature' hairline (if it bothers you) is easily hidden with hair length. I would just keep the sides short, and frontal length long. It's in style.

How sure are you? I have a friend who is on his second transplant in three years because he thinks the same thing. He thinks he's losing his transplanted hairs, but when I asked him if it's maybe just his existing native hairs that are falling out...then he wasn't so sure. Is your hairline completely made up of transplanted hairs? Or were they a blend of native and transplanted hairs? (where you could be mistaking the native ones falling out, as transplanted ones)

Yea, it all happened for me at week 4. I don't seem to have any shock loss though (in the recipient or donor). But my transplanted hairs have largely fallen off. Oh well.

Looks fine to me. Just wear your hair shorter on the sides.

Hey y'all, I'm in week 5 of my postop recovery, and I noticed that during these past few days I've had a new blood spot on my recipient area in each of the past four days (see photo below). Everything has gone as expected in terms of recovery so far. My scabs came off after my first shower (at the two week mark), I got to enjoy my new hairline throughout week 3, but then my hair started to really shed in week 4 (as expected)...but since week 5 had started, I've just seen some random (though small) amounts of bleeding in the recipient area these past four days. These aren't pimples. They're just small little openings (or cuts) that happened to just open up and bleed. I didn't notice any grafts come out or anything. Just random bleeding. My donor area has been itchy these past couple of weeks (which is also expected) and I largely avoid touching my recipient... Though I wonder if this bleeding is due to possibly dryness of the recipient area, and if this could affect recovery and growth. I did start working out in week 5 (which could be a reason for increased blood flow), but not sure if that would actually cause bleeding. It's not flaking or anything, nor does the skin feel or look dry (though I do have a bit of numbness still, so it's hard to tell if it feels dry). Any thoughts?

Argh. I was good right up until the end of week 3, then in week 4 they all shed.

Diabetes is a comorbidity, and comorbidities do affect surgical outcomes. But it all depends on how poorly controlled your diabetes situation is. It can negatively affect tissue and neurological healing, but if it is your only comorbidity and it's well controlled then it shouldn't be a significant issue. I think it becomes an issue if you're a 30-year smoker, diabetic, are obese, etc.

You are very obviously a NW5 (heading to NW6 or NW7) similar to me. As a NW5 myself, I recently ended up doing a 3200 FUE procedure on the front half, and I plan to do one in the crown at a later date...but man, that Eugenix plan does look tempting. I wish I had transplanted hairs in my crown (it's so exposed now that I've buzzed my head for this first HT procedure) but apparently it's the 'safer' route, lol. In terms of your future hairline, I would do the hairline about 8cm above your glabella. It's conservative enough that you're about 1cm above where a more aggressive hairline would be (so you save a lot of grafts) but at the same time, you're not doing some overly conservative hairline (which takes all the fun out of getting a HT in the first place).

Are you actually losing your hair though? It doesn't really look like you don't have any MPB at all to be honest.