Finasteride help

[Ab93]

Hi all.

Been on finasteride a little over three months now. Felt fine up until 2 weeks ago. Started on a low dose and worked up to 3mg a week. Now feeling mild sides mainly slight ED. Maybe take a little longer to get going, feels ‘strange’ downstairs almost like blood flow is less. Not sure what to do now, whether to persist with it, drop dosage or go to topical. Not sure how effective dropping the dosage would be as it might not be enough for my hair.

Could really do with some advice. Feeling quite down about it now. Was looking forward to the future as I was finally doing something about my hair loss.

Thanks all

[Curious25]

3 approaches:

- Persist with your current regime, and according to some, ‘your body will adapt and overcome’.   

- Wean yourself gradually off the oral, by lowering the dosage and/or frequency . .  and try a topical. 

- Wean yourself gradually off, and look into other forms of hair loss prevention methods, eg. LLLT, micro needling, minoxidil etc. 
 

Depending on you as a person, eg your risk adversity, and your priorities (sexual health vs hair loss) . . You should make the decision based on what you feel most comfortable with. 

 

[Ab93]

@Curious25 thanks for the response. I was thinking about maybe trying a smaller dosage. My pattern currently is NW3V with a diffuse component so not sure it’d be worth doing a smaller dosage. Have thought maybe topical but read that goes systemic too but have seen people who had sides on oral have success with topical. Not sure really 

[TorontoMan]

May I ask how you've felt just generally during this time? Have you recently dwelled on certain aspects of your life for too long, perhaps your hair or the fact that you're on finasteride?

In my own experience, when I was able to balance all the trauma that surrounded all decisions we have to make concerning our hair, and my mind was clear, I never had any side effects. I'm sure this won't be true for everyone, before someone comes on here and attacks me for downplaying the potential for it, but even while I was dating I realized that sex with my gf was far better once I was finally free of all these thoughts. It leads me to believe that those individuals who go on to take finasteride with success for many years are the ones who could "relax" themselves about the idea of doing so. 

So my suggestion for you is; create a journal, I use my notes app on my iphone, and each day just observe what you've felt and be honest and objective, writing down the positives that you've felt is just as important as it is to write down negatives as well. Observer if there are sides in accordance to your self esteem and how you felt about yourself. Secondly create a timeline for you to test this, you do'nt want to do this forever either.. just tell yourself I will try to see if sides from finasteride get better by the end of the year (perfect 3 months until then). And you will generally have a better understanding how whats really effecting you. 

My opinion anyway and not medical advice of course.