My story about my diffuse thinning

[Liszt]

Hi guys,

I’ve always promised myself I would share my story about my diffuse thinning with this community. And so here I am. It’s going to be a long read so please bare with me.

TLDR: Thought about balding when I was 16, bugged me every since. Started fin at 22, 8 months later and I need some help.

The thought of going bald all started when I was 16 years old. I was sitting in the schoolyard in direct sunlight when a friend pointed out he could see my scalp through my hair. I styled my hair with styling gel that day so that probably was why he could see through my hair. I shrugged it off and told him its just my hair style,(I’m half Asian and half European) but to be honest that was the moment that would haunt me for a lot more years to come.

Obsessed for a few weeks, (that was also probably the last time I ever used styling gel.) I was trying to gently pull out hairs in the shower (not really pulling, just trying to get the hairs that were already shed) and sticking them to the shower walls. I mean the amount of hairs I was losing wasn’t even that bad if I compare it with the amount of hairs I lose nowadays.

I told my dad about it and he also noticed some extra shedding on my pillow. So we went to see a doctor. She gave me an ointment (can’t remember what it was) It was a very greasy, so getting it on my scalp was pretty hard. I tried it once and after that my dad told me it was probably just stress (he was looking out for me) I believed him and just stopped using the ointment.

I didn’t think about balding for the next two years but when I turned 18 the thought of getting bald got back. I dyed my hair a few times and when I saw my black hair returning it looked thinner than before. I thought I was getting my mad, I checked old pictures etc. (you probably all know this feeling) and tried to figure out if it was really thinning or not. The thing I couldn’t fathom was that my 4 (older)half brothers (two from my dad’s side and two from my mom’s side), all still had their hair and the youngest brother was 29 and my oldest brother just turned 40 (I know I’m a late child). My dad started losing his hair at around 60 so.

After a few weeks/months of madness, I decided that the only way I would know for sure is if I just shaved my hair as short as possible. So I did and I came to the conclusion that my hair volume on top of my head was just the same as my hair volume on the sides of my head. Again I just shrugged it off and went on with my life.

For 4 years everything was fine, I met my current girlfriend and was mostly occupied with friends, schoolwork and just having fun. But when I was 22 years old the damn thought of balding came back. I rocked the hipster tail/knot for a year and after a year I started to notice a bald spot when pulling my hair back. (I didn’t pull it back to tight I’m sure) At first I didn’t think too much of it and tried to comb it so the bald stop would just be covered up. Later that year I was startled when I came out of the shower and looked in the mirror with wet hair. I could just see through my hair. Damn, this was the moment where I was almost sure my hair got way thinner.

This was also the start of a few miserable and depressing months. The stupid thing was that I still wasn’t sure if I was balding. I mean I convinced my self that I was imagining things twice before. So I was thinking about it every ****ing day and almost every hour. I looked in every possible mirror and I was obsessively checking out other people’s hair on the streets and on the public transport and comparing it with my own. I coped through a lot of gaming because it was the only thing that would take my mind of off balding for a few hours a day. No day went by where I didn’t think about balding. It was depressing, I couldn’t look myself in the mirror and smile, and all I saw was a miserable kid that was going to be even more miserable as soon as his hair was gone.

I’m going be honest, suicide was a thought that crossed my mind a million times. But there were also a lot of things that kept me standing(one thing was the thought of my dad hearing of my death). And to be fair, I didn’t look bald at all. I’m a diffuse thinner, but when my hair was dry it looks normal and full of volume. But I knew it wasn’t.

I started checking out forums and looked at the things that could maybe reverse it. (I wasn’t aware of any cures at the time) I read about minoxidil and finasteride. Committing to a topical twice a day was something I wasn’t ready for, and I didn’t trust fin for some reason. So I build up the courage to tell my dad and mom and told them I was going to see a doctor to ask if maybe it was something else.(a fungus or whatever, I was desperate) The doc told me it just looked like I’m diffuse thinning, but he also told me about proscar/fin. He told me to look it up because it had a few side effects.

And so I came back to these forums and read all the success/unsuccessful stories and decided I wanted to get on it right away. Seeing the side effects of Fin/Proscar I was forced to tell my girlfriend of my problem. She knew I was off in the past several months and every time she asked me about it I shrugged it off like it was nothing, but she knew something was up. I told her and she was very caring. Told me she didn’t care if I went bald or not and that if I wanted to take the pills that I should. She’s an angel she really is.

So with this new boost of confidence I went back to my doctor and told him I wanted to start Fin as soon as possible. So I did, and got the 5mg pills that I cut into 4 pieces (1.25mg), seeing it was impossible to cut the small pills into 5 pieces. I have to say this was a very defining and important moment in my life. The moment I started fin all my problems went away. I stopped caring, stopped looking at other people, stopped looking at myself in the mirror with disgust. I just switched it all off. But here’s the sad part of my story. Two weeks after I started Fin, my dad got a cerebral hemorrhage. He died of the repercussions two months later.

In those miserable months before I started fin I was sure there wasn’t going to be anything worse than balding, up until the moment my dad ended up in the hospital. I swear I’d go bald in a blink of an eye to give my dad one last hug.

The two months when my dad was in the hospital were very rough and the months after that were even worse. I’m pretty sure that if I wasn’t on fin that I would’ve thrown myself out of my six story dorm room window, because I would’ve never coped under the pressure of both problems at once.

I’m where I am right now, 8 months into fin. and I’m still trying to cope with the loss of my dad. Slowly the thought of balding is getting back to me. I knew I should give fin a chance and my doctor told me to use it for at least 12 months before evaluating if its working. But here we are and I’m slowly feeling the problem get back at me because I haven’t seen any improvements yet.

Since 1 month I’m also using miconazol 5mg shampoo. And I’m still losing just as many hairs in the shower as I did when I started fin. I’ll post a picture of my hair when I started fin, and a similar one right now 8 months into fin and 1 month into miconazol.

Though I’m almost convinced its AGA, I came across the term Telogen Effluvium just a few days ago. The diffusing is only showing on the top of my head. Not noticing anything on the sides or the back. But as you can see on the pictures, its not effecting the normal AGA spots. Crown still looks intact, and the temples are almost the same as when I was a child. The balding only really occurs directly on the top/middle of my head. Now its been like this for almost a year now, so I doubt that its temporary. Any causes that I might think of is that when I went to live in a student dormroom, I started eating unhealthy. Less veggies, less fruit etc. I did noticed my youngest brother also has thinner hair than I remember, but he shaves his hair short so it doesn’t really show. Is there any chance that it’s still TE, and that that’s the reason Fin isn’t working? And if it is, is Fin even gonna work?

Image below is from the day I started Fin.

[Logan]

If your doctor said it is diffuse thinning then why r u bothered about Telogen Effluvium. Add Minox too ...it is important for hair growth. You can apply once at night if you don't want to apply twice. Many people give 12 months try to fin before writing it off.

[Decough]

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