My HT and Propeica Experiences

[mattsd]

Hi guys,

 

My name is Matt. Many, many, years ago I was a heavy lurker on this site. I gleaned nearly all my hair loss/hair treatment information from here from which I then exhaustively researched to come to my own conclusions on how I’d go about stopping my hair loss and then ultimately improve my hair’s appearance. The few people I let privy to my hair loss experience over the years all say I’m obsessed with my hair, (they are all chicks) but honestly they have no clue, so I rarely bother to expand on the topic further with them. But in general, for a women to say that they don’t care about a guy losing his hair or even to say they are attracted to bald men does little to help the physiological situation, even if it is sincere. But that is just me.

 

Anyway, I’m quite excited, almost 8 years ago for my 25th birthday I “gave” my self my first HT gift, and in a few months when birthday #33 comes around, I will treat my self to HT numero dos! If you don’t mind I’ll share my hair loss, hair transplant, and finasteride journey because they have all affected my life in the last 10 years for better, or in some cases, worse.

 

Probably like every one else here, I had awesome hair as a teen. I could do what ever the hell I wanted with it. When I entered my 20’s, I didn’t think any thing would change and MPB wasn’t even on the radar despite having a grandfather and uncle on my mom’s side bald as hell! Alas, when I was 22 I noticed some moderate thinning on the right side of my hairline. While slightly alarming, it wasn’t that bad and didn’t really detract from the overall atheistic of my hair so I just shrugged it off. Needless to say, I would absolutely love to have my hair back to this slight/moderate receding condition! But the receding steadily continued. By the time I was 24, I did not have what I consider a hair line, my temples were nearly gone, and the vortex on my crown was thinner and clearly developing into a bald spot. Luckily I had (and still continue to have) a very formidable forelock and the rest of my hair on the top of my head remained quite thick with minimal thinning. Think Jude Law in his heyday!

 

The condition of my hair caused me great turmoil inside since I did not have accomplished acting skills like Jude Law. lol. But in all seriousness, I knew there were far worse things in life, but hey, this was my thing I dealt with. Most of all, I didn’t appreciate losing my hair like this at my age. Sure it happens to people even younger, but most guys, especially in my experience, have plenty of hair in their mid twenties. It was vain and childish thinking at the time, but I just didn’t think it was fair that I was losing my hair and others around me where not (or at least not yet!) so I was determined to fix it and thus my journey began…

 

First thing I did was get on Propecia. Finasteride is controversial, and for good reason. In my experience, it works great but there is a cost. The good, I have been on finasteride for nearly 9 years and the hair on my vortex has thickened to the point to where it is as thick as the hair near my donor area. I have also experienced no further receding or thinning of hair any where on my scalp. Now I guess that is not completely accurate, all of the small, dying hairs that were left as survivors struggling along in my former hairline and temple areas have long since thinned to oblivion, but honestly they don’t count, so I am very pleased with the performance of finasteride. Some of the side effects, well… I could do with out, but ultimately I make the choice to continue to preserve my hair at the expense of the (mostly sexual) issues that have resulted from my finasteride consumption.

 

The good news, I can still get a boner and have sex. The bad news, it is not spontaneous or on-demand like it used to be, like not at all. Unfortunately, even if there is a beautiful women naked before me, it would take a little time and effort to get my little guy ready for action. I have to be extremely relaxed and as annoying as this sounds, do a lot of foreplay, LOL. Needless to say, it takes a very patient woman to be willing to go through this with me and then want to see me again, no matter how great the foreplay! The sensitivity on my penis is significantly duller. It takes a lot longer for me to ejaculate during sex, this in its self is not a bad thing as it is no less pleasurable for me, but more than a few times I have been prone to losing my erection during intercourse and sometimes it is just too difficult to get back again in that particular session, which really sucks, and why I mentioned that if I come across a patient and understanding women I try not to mess things up! In addition, it is impossible for me to perform with a condom, so when I meet some one new this always presents a challenge. My semen is also very thin and runny, it is defiantly not like it used to be pre-finasteride, so I can only imagine my sperm is not as potent or numerous as it would otherwise be with out finasteride all in my system for so long. This isn’t an issue for me because I currently have zero plans to have children. But I also can’t speak for my self 5 or 10 years from now, so it is possible this will be an issue in the future, especially since my partner would also likely be at least in her thirties so then there could be some significant difficulties getting pregnant given her age and in such a scenario my weak sperm will make things even worse. But anyway, the damage is done and there is no looking back. I manage to get by and honestly, this border line sexual disfunction may all sound incredibly terrible (and it is not awesome, trust me) but once I get everything going properly I can still have sex successfully just like an eighteen year old say 7 out of 10 times. I’d simply rather preserve my hair in it’s current state so for me it is worth the cost. This is the choice I make as I am under absolutely no illusion that finasteride doesn’t do this to my libido.

 

So I take the good and the bad with finasteride. I must say my HT has been an overwhelming positive in my life. The depression and anger I experienced with my hair loss is completely gone, this in itself made all the costs involved worth it. My doctor was Dr. Brandon Ross in San Diego, he did +2000 grafts on me. At first I wasn’t too impressed, and unless I really worked with it, my hairline looked like a birds nest constructed of pubic hair! But as time goes by the hair settles down and more or less mimics the the native hair surrounding it. If you currently pull my hair back to reveal my hairline, people who are familiar with HT’s will know I had one, but they would also say that the hair line was constructed properly and that there is pretty good coverage, especially with 2000 grafts. The good news is, virtually every one I meet has no clue I had this procedure, even if they ask about that scar on the back of my head I just say it was some jet ski accident. Which is half true, because I had actually been in a jet ski accident! Anyway, I used to be super sensitive about having the donor scar show if say the hair stylist shaved too close in the back, but now I don’t care, I get my hair cut high and tight in the back and just rock the scar until the hair grows out in a few weeks. The scar, while visible if shaved with a 2 or lower, is not really that bad.

 

My HT is for sure no replacement for a natural hair line, and the fact that I have such a strong forelock actually can work against me with certain hair styles because the forelock is dense and natural and the transplanted hair completing my new hairline is the opposite. That is not to say that I don’t think Dr. Ross did a great job of blending the transplanted hair around my existing forelock, he did, but now as I plan my second procedure I want to find a doctor who is very comfortable further filling in Dr. Ross’ work and working a bit extra on the right side of my head and temple which experienced more receding and thinning then the left side. For the most part I prefer to wear my hair down, so I do not think this 2nd HT will drastically change my appearance, but it will give me more hair upfront, especially on my right side which will make me very happy. And that is why I do this, to have my appearance best match how I feel I should be looking at my age and life style. It is that simple!

 

So if you have taken the time to read this far, I appreciate you giving me a chance to vent/rant! It is nice to be back!

[Spanker]

Welcome back. Good luck.

[kamalmalik]

welcome

[BaldingBogger]

Nice write up and good luck. Kudos for your honesty also on your fin experience.

 

There are a ton of guys out there in the same boat who are in denial about it.

Or just don't have that active sex life's and notice those sides.

[BaldingBogger]

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