dutasteride My 12 Month Dutasteride Journey

[NARMAK]

Today officially marks my 12 months of having started Dutasteride and i wanted to share my experience using the medication. 

Firstly i always felt like i was more conscious of my hair loss from a younger age when my temple points began to recede in my mid teens even if i didn't always understand what was happening until now in my late 20s and 30s when i began to research more around hair loss. 

I think like many i learned about  Minoxodil in my late teens/early 20s and tried it but i didn't want to Finasteride because i was swayed by the horror stories at the time of your pens no longer working if you get side affects. It basically took me almost a decade later to do research again and realise the proper clinical studies and data. 

Side affects are a concern and i am not going to sit here and tell you i didn't have any. I did, HOWEVER this was during the phase where i literally crashed my body serum DHT circa 90% by taking Dutasteride 0.5mg everyday from the get go. I felt like i'd already left it late enough to start and went very aggressive. As a result, my initial experiences were noticing more brain fog, my libido took a noticeable hit and tbh, i think there was mood swings there too but i cannot fully associate that to the medication because i had some stress in my personal life at the time that could have been a reason too. 

After 2-3 months, my body was much more adapted and levelled out to the lower DHT levels in my body and i no longer can say i feel brain fog is an active concern at all. My libido has rebounded and normalised to maybe 85-90% of where i think it was. My moods more normal but also my life situation is significantly different. 

Full disclosure too, i had a Vitamin D deficiency identified via blood test which was addressed by prescription level Vit D ampules and then regular Vit D tablets of 1k to 4k IU. I also did Microneedling during this time but i was not very strict with doing it every week or so as i wanted to. I started with a 0.3mm derma roller but then purchased a larger size and eventually went to 1.5mm for once a week. Also eventually got a Derma Pen but like i said, i haven't been using it regularly enough. 

So, that's enough of that. Here's the pictures. May 2021 (Age 31) when i started and now May 2022 (Age 32).

Sorry for the different lighting but i don't think it stops you seeing a difference from when i started till now. The brightest pictures are 2022.

My crown area feels thinner, but i feel it's my hair loss paranoia exaggerating my feelings on it however i do think that Dutasteride should hopefully continue to help me. 

In terms of medication, i would always say to somebody if you have concerns. Do a full blood work test for yourself, taper your use to allow your body to adapt with maybe starting 3x a week and then increasing dosage every month by 1 day till you are comfortable at 1mg everyday of Finasteride or 0.5mg of Dutasteride etc. 

I am going to go for a hair transplant with Eugenix on May 19th 2022 and due to fly out hopefully soon. I will be making a separate thread for this

[ciaus]

Good strategy and advice, guys that read the anti-finasteride propaganda often stop at the first hint of side effects, whether real or imagined. Its important to track your health overall, because around the time hairloss starts becoming really noticeable is often when the body has also started to decline generally from aging. And its tough to hold on to those frontal hairs even with finasteride or dutasteride, alot of us still have to address that area with transplanted hair early on. 

[NARMAK]

9 minutes ago, ciaus said:

Good strategy and advice, guys that read the anti-finasteride propaganda often stop at the first hint of side effects, whether real or imagined. Its important to track your health overall, because around the time hairloss starts becoming really noticeable is often when the body has also started to decline generally from aging. And its tough to hold on to those frontal hairs even with finasteride or dutasteride, alot of us still have to address that area with transplanted hair early on. 

Thanks and yeah, i definitely think as we age, our bodies change and we need to make sure we look after our health a lot better too and that's why i'm trying to prepare myself for after my hair transplant to become even more diligent in my health and fitness journey. 

I think i'm not really going to recover much more ground on Dutasteride than i have over the last 12 months in the frontal area and hoping to hold onto what i have and try to influence it again with Microneedling and continue using the Nizoral that has 2% ketoconazole. 

I also suffered from quite a bit of dandruff and have to still combat this regularly with T-Gel from Neutrogena which helped a lot imo. I try to use it to also manage the inflammation i was getting. 

Overall, i genuinely think people should give medication a go firstly after a blood test if concerned about side affects and keep an eye on their progress and tweak things if they need to or stop. 

[Mike10]

Situation seems stable. How many grafts did Eugenix estimate? 

[RTC]

Nice thread Narmak, I look forward to your upcoming procedure too!

[NARMAK]

1 hour ago, Mike10 said:

Situation seems stable. How many grafts did Eugenix estimate? 

They wrote 1200-1500 frontal hairline and 250 each temple as an optional on images i sent for evaluation. I mean, it's really not optional having temple points imo. It's imo mandatory if you want a good framing lol. 

So, i took that to mean at least 2k grafts and one of the write ups they sent said 1700 grafts for the frontal hairline so i think in the end they listed 2200 but the final number is going to be decided on the day that the doctor gets to see me in person i think. If it ends up higher or lower is anybody's guess but i am hoping they can make it as dense as possible and i am hoping to be a bit aggressive with the hairline design where possible so it could end up higher. 

2200 is the ballpark figure right now. 

13 minutes ago, Aslitarcan sucks said:

Nice thread Narmak, I look forward to your upcoming procedure too!

Thanks! 

I am hoping to post it up soon. I am literally days away from my flight (17th May) and i feel like i still have so much little stuff to sort like what to pack, making sure my passenger declaration forms are uploaded and so on. 

Luckily, the flights are booked, the Visa was approved and in hand on my passport. I have received a physical copy of my COVID-19 Certificate and so the biggest things are done. It's just the little things that always add up and make me feel in a rush lol. 

[GaryStruthers]

Awesome Narmak! Can’t wait to see your results in the thread. I’m over there in August, but wanted to check on your Visa. Most of the latest articles I’ve ready for India still state that a medical - and not travel - visa is required. Is that what you decided on? Also, are you going to shoot for a  6 or 6.5cm hairline?

[NARMAK]

1 hour ago, GaryStruthers said:

Awesome Narmak! Can’t wait to see your results in the thread. I’m over there in August, but wanted to check on your Visa. Most of the latest articles I’ve ready for India still state that a medical - and not travel - visa is required. Is that what you decided on? Also, are you going to shoot for a  6 or 6.5cm hairline?

I applied for a Medical Visa as rules were different but it's best you contact the official Indian Visa authority where you are and see what they advise. If you have access eVisa, this should make things a lot easier 

Regarding the hairline, i think 6cm is a good height because of my mid face being around that length and it will help with being in that rough thirds ballpark. Should also mature well. The final part of it is that i like the look of slightly longer temple points, not the shorter ones so having it set a bit higher allows that visual look. 

We will make the final design though hopefully based on what the doctor input also it. However, it will hopefully be as reasonably aggressive as i can be. 

[drawdownfx]

Looking forward to seeing your journey pan out bro! I am hopping onto the dutasteride train soon.

[Eugenix Hair Sciences]

10 hours ago, NARMAK said:

still have so much little stuff to sort like what to pack

Please do not forget to pack in open button shirts as you will not be able to wear closed neck t-shirts or vests. It is rather hot here so carry light clothes. We will provide you with the post surgery kit where there shall be surgical caps to cover your transplanted area, saline spray etc. And you should carry proper documentation along with your id cards. Nothing else is required. If you have any questions regarding what else needs to be carried then please feel free to connect with us and we will be happy to assist you.

[NARMAK]

19 minutes ago, drawdownfx said:

Looking forward to seeing your journey pan out bro! I am hopping onto the dutasteride train soon.

Thanks and hoping it certainly does pan out the way i want! 

17 minutes ago, Eugenix Hair Sciences said:

Please do not forget to pack in open button shirts as you will not be able to wear closed neck t-shirts or vests. It is rather hot here so carry light clothes. We will provide you with the post surgery kit where there shall be surgical caps to cover your transplanted area, saline spray etc. And you should carry proper documentation along with your id cards. Nothing else is required. If you have any questions regarding what else needs to be carried then please feel free to connect with us and we will be happy to assist you.

Thank you for the advice. I hope i've packed enough lol

[Boomerang]

Good luck Narmak!

looking forward to your post op updates

[NARMAK]

5 hours ago, Boomerang said:

Good luck Narmak!

looking forward to your post op updates

Thank you! Currently here in Delhi at the hotel and hoping to visit the clinic in the afternoon. I have made a thread in another forum section and will regularly be posting updates there. 

[Boomerang]

3 minutes ago, NARMAK said:

Thank you! Currently here in Delhi at the hotel and hoping to visit the clinic in the afternoon. I have made a thread in another forum section and will regularly be posting updates there. 

Are you staying at Doubletree?

have a chat with Mr Kalayan  (asst mgr restaurant) when you go for breakfast. He’s an excellent guy, goes extra mile to help and make you feel comfortable.

ok will checkout your thread

rest up

[NARMAK]

6 hours ago, Boomerang said:

Are you staying at Doubletree?

have a chat with Mr Kalayan  (asst mgr restaurant) when you go for breakfast. He’s an excellent guy, goes extra mile to help and make you feel comfortable.

ok will checkout your thread

rest up

Thank you for the suggestion. I am at the Double Tree Hilton Baani Square. I met @mkrtoday at Breakfast as he was looking to go for his op and had some understandable pre-op nerves much like i would very soon.

It's great to be able to thanks to this forum connect with so many others and help, so definitely will look for that person.