Al - Moderator

It should smooth out more over time. If you see some improvement since last month then it's on the right track even if it's only been minor improvement so far. Check again in another month. In any event, once the hair grows in, any minor bumps or indents probably won't be noticed anyway because your hair will be covering it. The only issue at that point is if you have bumps or indents right along the hairline because those may be noticeable, so that's the only area I'd be concerned about. If they aren't on the front row of hairs then it shouldn't really be an issue in the long run. I'm actually more concerned about the donor area. 1.25mm seems like a rather large punch size for these days. How is the donor looking?

I think there are several reasons why you see a lot of men comb their hair back after a transplant. 1. It seems to be a popular hair style these days even in men who haven't had a hair transplant, so you're going to have more men using that style after a hair transplant. 2. A lot of men want to show off their new hairline. They don't have to spend an hour trying to style it just right to cover their receding hair and it seems like kind of a waste to not show off the fact that you do actually have a great hairline now. 3. Sometimes the hairline becomes the main focus of the transplant because "that's what everyone sees" and you end up with a nice band of hair in front, but some thinness behind it and you end up with getting the best look if you comb it back to cover the mid scalp thinning. 4. Growing hair long and combing it back can help cover a thin or bald crown that hasn't been transplanted or maybe only transplanted very thinly. With all that, there is really no reason why you can't pull off other styles depending on how much hair you have. Try different styling options and pick what you like.

At 4 months you should be just starting to see some growth. Expecting to have most of the growth already is not realistic. Not wanting to wait is not a reason to get more work done so soon. You need to wait.

Looks very good at this early stage. You need to wait at least 6 months (sometimes longer) for the donor area to fully recover.

The problem with trying to come up with an average is that there is a large range and it all depends on each persons hair type and amount of hair loss. Some people will have a maximum of 3000 grafts that can be taken while others will have 10,000. The only way to know how many there are for you is to have an in person consultation with a qualified Dr. Even then you will not get a definite answer. Everyones hair changes over the years. The amount of estimated grafts you have available today may be more than you will have in 10 or 15 years.

He looks like a million bucks.

It looks like he still has a lot of beard grafts left to use. With one more session to thicken everything up, this could be an extremely amazing transformation.

As aaron1234 was saying, if the hair on the sides and back (the donor area) is wavy like the front is then the transplanted hair will be wavy as well.

At a little past 5 weeks you are probably past losing any more from shock loss. Now you just have to wait a few months for it all to grow back in. It's called the ugly duckling stage for a reason.

Wow. This is going to look like a completely full head of hair once it all grows in. How many beard grafts did you do in total now?

This looks great. Isn't it so much better to have real growing hair and not have to deal with a hairpiece any more? Even if the transplanted hair is a bit thinner than the hairpiece was it's still so much better, in my opinion, to have real hair.

Do not go back to the same place. They did not do a proper job. If they can't do it right when you are paying them, then there is even less of a chance they will do it right if you are not paying them.

I really like this. It looks great.

I've heard scalp stretches do work if you do them regularly for a few months prior to the surgery. Not only does it allow the Dr to get a wider strip (and thus more grafts), but it also makes the closure easier with less tension which results in thinner scars. Hopefully that will give you some motivation to do them. Just do it while watching TV or something where you won't even really think too much about it while doing it.

This is looking great for only 4 months. I wouldn't worry about any thin areas at this point. Just let it grow for a few more months.

Here are a few examples of men over 60 getting some decent results. I'm not endorsing any particular Drs here. I'm just trying to give you an idea of what may be possible if you are able to get enough donor grafts. You may not need too many grafts to get a decent frontal area.

How much beard and chest hair do you have? I also had hair transplants done 30+ years ago, starting in 1989. A few years ago I began fixing it using beard and chest hair because I didn't have any scalp donor left. I had over 5300 beard and chest grafts done so far and it's turned out OK considering the large area I had to cover and all the scars that were there. I put a lot into my crown because that area really bothered me, but if I had concentrated all of the crown grafts into the frontal half the way you say you want to do, then the front half would be basically completely full of hair. Whether this is possible for you really depends on how much beard and chest hair you have.

Also, it's going to end up bare looking because all of the transplanted hair and probably a lot of hair that was there before the transplant will fall out from shock loss. That's normal. It will all start growing in again in a few months.

You should be OK except that you may end up with a few new scabs that will take some time to come off because of the bleeding. Don't be rubbing too hard. You don't want to be picking at them or forcing them off too soon. I think your first problem probably was that you were too gentle on the scabs earlier. You should have started letting the shower run over them around day 5 or 6 and just let the water run over them for at least a few minutes the first time you shower and not try to rub them off at all the first time. At this point, for your next shower, let the water soak the area for about 5 minutes and then gently shampoo your hair while rubbing the scabs. Don't scratch at them with your finger nails. If you have an aloe vera gel put some of that over the area before you shower and let that stay for about 5 or 10 minutes before your shower.

Bloxham has been doing great work and getting some very fine FUT scars from what I've seen, so I would be OK going with him for FUT. I think 4500 grafts that HLC recommended may be a bit too much because you still have a lot of hair in the midscalp and even in the frontal center. You don't want to use up too many grafts now and then run out of donor if/when the rest of your hair falls out and/or the crown widens at some point in the future. Looking at your crown, I personally would want to get at least some grafts into that crown, so I would probably rule out Bernstein if it were me. Don't base your decision too much on specific graft counts. These are all just estimates. You may get more or less grafts during the actual procedure especially with FUT and you can always adjust how many grafts go where. It's not like you have to stop at 500 in the crown just because that's what Dr. Bloxham estimated. You could end up with a few hundred less in the front and a few hundred more in the crown depending on how the operation goes and exactly where the hairline ends up being.

The good news is that it looks like all of the transplanted hair is growing, so there wasn't any wasted donor grafts. Look at it like you have a nice base of transplanted hair to work with that just needs more grafts added to it. Wait a few more months to let everything grow in fully and then go to a better clinic that will finish it the right way.

If it's just a general thinning after 20 or more years because you are getting old then you won't notice any scars because you will still have most of the transplanted hair. The transplanted areas will just be thinner than they were at the beginning. If you completely lose hair past some of the donor area then you will have dot scars in that area of your donor. How bad they are depends on a lot of factors, so it's impossible to say what it will look like. The recipient area will probably not have a defined area of balding (unless you really lose a lot of the original donor area) because the grafts taken from the donor area will be spread out throughout the recipient area. What I mean is you won't have grafts from one specific donor spot all placed in one specific recipient spot, so you will still have a general overall thinning in the recipient area, although it will be more thinning at this point and may not look very good as far as trying to get coverage. In extreme cases where nearly all of the hair eventually falls out, the recipient area scars are less visible than donor area scars and probably will not ever be noticeable if you even have them at all. They are so minor as it's just a small slit or poke hole that was made.

your hair looks very good for age 42.

It should slowly smooth out somewhat over a few years.

Legend007 had 2500 grafts if I remember and you said you are looking at around 1500, so I'm guessing you should end up somewhere between what MachoVato showed and what Legend had.