Al - Moderator

I always say it depends on whether you are OK shaving your head or not. If you are the type of man who just doesn't like a shaved head on yourself then the answer is yes the transplanted frontal half will look better than not transplanting the frontal half. If you are OK with shaving your head if you have to, but would much rather have hair then it gets much harder to decide. I tried to find a few NW 6 transplant patients who only had the frontal area done. I'm posting the links below. I tried to find some from a range of different Drs

It would be nice if we could see how it looked at around the 2 week mark, so we could see if the strategy to attempt to go as unnoticed as possible worked out or not. Obviously I realize you can only show pics if the patient either sends some or makes a visit.

If you are staying in NY over night then take advantage of True & Dorin's free cleaning and checkup the morning after the surgery. Knowing they took a look at it will make you feel better in the weeks afterwards. I hate driving in NY, so I took a bus to the Port Authority bus terminal on 40th st. The cheapest hotel in the area is usually Candlewood Suites on 39th. From there I just walk a few blocks to the Drs office near the corner of 37th and 7th.

I think pimples usually happen around the 3 to 4 month range as the transplanted hair starts to grow, but since you would still be having some new hairs popping up at 5 months I don't think it would be too unusual to have a few pimples at that time frame.

It's coming along great. You can't worry about where every hair should be placed or should be growing from. You have to look at the overall picture.

Try this search link for this site. He posts a lot of his results on this forum. https://www.hairrestorationnetwork.com/search/?q=Dr Lindsey&quick=1&type=forums_topic

There's also the fact that when some guys start balding they tend to start growing out their beard more.

Excellent. Complete change in appearance.

If you are looking for a Dr in that area there is Dr William Lindsey in McLean Virginia.

I find it interesting that so many men use products in their hair other than hair growth stuff like minoxidil. I have never used any hair product.

Past 6 months it's mostly maturing at this point for the next 6 months. What that means is all those transplanted hairs will thicken up and create more density and coverage due to their thickening shafts. That also means it will start to blend in more with your existing hair.

How many grafts did you get? I was paying $18.50 per graft in 1989. My first session was 60 grafts and a scalp reduction. The graft size was 3.75mm. They weren't punched out from the donor though. I had a strip cut out with a triple blade knife.

Those are some very high prices.

There wasn't a choice for mid teens in the poll. I had noticeable thinning in my crown by 15. Noticeable meaning people were commenting that I was going bald or losing my hair.

Redness can take 6 months or more to disappear in some men. I never had FUE taken from my scalp, but I did have some taken from my chest. The chest donor area took 6 months for the red dots from the FUE to fade away, but the redness in the recipient area fades away in a few weeks on me. I also had FUE grafts taken from my beard and the red dots from that fades in a few weeks, so it definitely varies, not only in each person, but even depending on where they wee taken from. Hang in there a few more months and the redness will probably (hopefully) be gone.

As Melvin said, MikeV is doing something like that. You can check out his post here.

One of the rare side effects of minoxidil is that it can actually cause hair loss rather than hair gain. I'm not a Doctor, but If your beard and body hair loss started after you began taking oral minoxidil then it seems like it's a real possibility that you are experiencing that hair loss side effect. You may want to try stopping minoxidil for 6 months and see if you start getting some of the growth back.

Taking hair from the midscalp to place in the front is a bad idea because you will only be speeding up the time it takes to be thinning naturally in the midscalp area since you are taking some hair out of the area already. You hair looks pretty good. I'm actually leaning towards telling you to do nothing, but you do have some thinning in the center of the hairline. You only need minor work along the front to thicken that area up a bit. Don't lower the hairline. I put your picture below with an area in green where I think you should thicken it up a bit. Disregard the red line. That was the one there before. You may be able to do this with 1000 grafts or less. Just do a regular FUE from the normal donor area.

I will add that you look like you'd be a very good candidate for the finisteride and micro needling combination because you have a good head of hair except for a lot of thin, shorter hairs along the front. Since those hairs are still there I think there's a very good chance that many of them will thicken up and grow longer.

Some shedding often happens when you start on finisteride. Stay with it for a few months. It may take another 4 or 5 months to start seeing any improvement because it takes time for the hairs that shed to being growing back longer, stronger, and thicker. I'd keep doing the micro needling too since you are already doing it because there's been some good improvements in some people who have posted here doing that.

How big was the cyst? It could be that the scar stretched from the tension if it was either a big cyst or if it was deep. There's also the fact that scars on most areas of the neck may stretch due to constant pulling in all directions as you move your head in a normal day every day. So that scar may not be how you would normally heal in other areas of your body or other situations.

Since you have your choices down to a small list and you need all frontal hairline work done, you should really go back and look at multiple hairline results from each of the Drs on your list. Most Drs seem to have a certain hairline style that they almost always create with minor modifications (I don't know about these Drs in particular), so I always tell people to find a Dr who regularly creates the type of hairline that you are looking for. This includes the temple points as well if you are thinking of adding some hair there. The hairline most people are looking for is usually something similar to what they previously had, so if you're not sure what you want then I'd suggest you look at some older pictures of yourself when you had a better hairline and then compare that to the hairlines you see from the different Drs on your list. It's much more likely, in my opinion, to end up happy with your final look if you choose someone who regularly creates hairlines that you are hoping to get rather than try to get a Dr to create a hairline that he/she doesn't normally do. You also don't want to go in not knowing what you want thinking the Dr is good at this, so he will do a good job. Yes, he may do a great job, but it may not be the result you imagine yourself with.

Don't feel bad. If you did FUE the entire donor area could be itchy for months.

I was stuck looking like that for over 30 years. Anyone who says people don't care about what your hair looks like have no idea what they are talking about.

I guess it could be both. It's possible that the hair transplant didn't turn out so well, so he ended up using a hair piece for a while. That actually makes some sense because if the hair transplant went well why would he shave now?