Been on Finasteride for 9 years, Shedding again

[GoingBald34]

Hey GoingBald34.. it's been a long while since I've last posted. I've been on Finasteride since I was 19 and am 32 now. Overall it's helped me and the fear of losing some ground got to me too about 7 years ago. My recommendation is not to jump in with full Dutasteride. I do, however, do a combination of both Finasteride and Dutasteride where I take 5mg of Fin Monday - Friday and then on Saturday I do one 0.5mg Dut tablet. The reason why I only do DUT one day a week is because of the long half-life (weeks) whereas the half-life of Finasteride is only like 4-6 hours.

Beyond that there are a few other options that I do as well:

-Lasercomb.. I feel as though some efficacy has been clinically shown and published in some medical journals. I don't believe it can hurt you and you can find a cheap used Hairmax Lasercomb on ebay for less than $120. Just to let you know, I've been using a lasercomb since I was 19 and only needed to replace it once so far.
-Dermaroller - I get mine from owndoc (dot) com where there are shown to be good quality and good prices. You can see comparison reviews on there as well. I don't dermaroll very often anymore but there is efficacy.
-Check out some of the articles at perfect hair health (dot) com that shows to be very scientific and interesting and can't hurt
-PRP with Dr. Greco. There's published data on medical journals about PRP and it's effectiveness as well.


Please don't obsess about this topic. I get it, but in the end it's not worth it and you WILL regret it later. Just do what you can... and Remember even there can be hair transplant in the future if it gets that bad. I feel as though you will always have hair and won't go a full NW6 or NW7... and with hair transplant technology and you throwing the kitchen sink at hair loss you can make this manageable and now things like SMP / Dermatch can make you appear to have a full head of hair. Don't stress over this.

One last thing, regardless of what people say, I have seen when changing to eating mostly organic whole food plant based diet (I do have some meat though)... my hair health has improved a lot. Also, I believe there's some evidence of natural anti-cancer therapies and improvement of hair such as a small amount of Turmeric with a small amount of black pepper and oil every so often.. in addition to Sulforaphane from Broccoli Sprouts and maybe DIM, which has been shown to downgrade androgen receptors in the prostate.

All in all.. live your life and don't sweat this. You're at the BEST time in history to have hair loss.

Thanks so much for this reply. You are right, obsessing will only make things worst..as It appears to be in doing so. Couple of questions for you, you state the “fear” of losing ground made you start on DUT, did you actually notice that you were losing ground or did you do it as a pre-cautionary thing? Did you experience any shedding when starting DUT? Also, you state you take 5mg of finasteride..any reason for such a large dosage? I had been taking 1.25mg of finasteride daily for the past 9 years before I lost ground. It’s also a possibility that I may have been losing some ground for a couple years now but didn’t pay attention to it until I noticed a visible change after my last haircut.

Thanks for the words of encouragement. You are right, I probably won’t go full blown NW6 or NW7 but its a scary thought nonetheless. I honestly don’t want to chase hair transplants all my life, hoping there is a better treatment available soon!

[iwannakeephair1674]

Overall, I think I'm still better than where I started but might have lost a little ground from my peak. I was a great responder to Finasteride. I only was on the named brand Propecia (1mg Finasteride) for the first year but then I switched to 5mg Finasteride (Teva Generic from Walgreens). Since I was in college the cost of Propecia at the time $65 a month was kind of high for a college kid. I also knew about the stories of how people switched to generic and lost ground... so my thinking at the time was that since the Generic 5mg version was really cheap and that Teva was a respected generic company.. I figured that there would at least be truly 1mg of Fin in the tablet. Also, the studies show that the 5mg inhibits slightly more DHT than the 1mg.. so I figured to just go for it.

I added the 0.5mg of generic Dut in 2014 while I was working and attending Grad School. I thought I was losing ground (but it was probably due to the stress and sleepless nights of trying to get a Masters degree and working constantly at a full-time corporate job). I had made a backup plan years before that if I started losing ground I would have started adding Dut. so I just took the plunge.

I had also started dermarolling three times a week with 1.5mm dermaroller. I stopped doing it that frequently about 3 years ago and would be lucky if I did it once a month now. I've been getting a little lazy with my hair lately but I'm still doing well. I still think the treatments I described above are effective.

I do travel to Sarasota, FL every year and get PRP from Dr. Greco. I've been doing that since 2009 (so 10 years time). I'm a believer and Dr. Greco is extremely smart and a pioneer in general beyond hair. It's like my mini vacation to spend a few days in FL every year with just me.

I'm very happy with my hair and feel like I know what I need to do to maintain it. Here's my Hair Regime and backup plans:

1. M-F take 5mg Generic Teva FIN, Saturday take 0.5mg Dutasteride, Sunday nothing
2. lasercomb at least once a week
3. dermaroll once every 2-3 months (although I used to do this 3x a week that was probably too much,however, I should probably should do it more often than I do now (but I'm a little lazy with this for some reason)
4. Nizoral Ketoconazole 1% and alternate with the generic Ketoconazole 2% shampoo a few times a week
5. I'm going to start doing a modified version of the hair stretching and massages that the science is talked about at that perfect hair health (dot) com site
6. PRP once a year
7. Turmeric + Black Pepper + Olive Oil twice a week by mouth. (Turmeric is great for you but your body can't absorb it well, however, there have been studies that show your body can absorb the turmeric up to 2000% (yes, 2000) by adding a small amount of freshly ground black pepper and a little bit of olive oil)..
8. One tablet of BioResponse DIM 150 Supplements. DIM has been shown to be a 5-alpha-reductase inhibitor as well as down-regulation of androgen receptors in the prostate. I'm assuming this potentially work with hair follicles as well. The reason why I mainly add it though is that it metabolizes estrogen and I have a feeling that since I take so much Fin/Dut that I could have been increasing my estrogen so I wanted something to take care of that. Plus there are a lot of peer-reviewed studies on the effect of DIM in treating hormonal cancers. I've had email exchanges with the CEO of the company about very pointed questions and concerns I had with it and they were very open and shared other studies I had not seen and made me convinced that it was safe to take
9. Also, I'm convinced that part of the problem is calcification in the scalp and it's shown that fully bald men have that issue. There's also some suggest of inflammation's role in MPB.. so I stick to a mainly anti-inflammatory whole plant-food diet (although I eat lean organic meat like Turkey and Fresh Fish just on limited basis. Besides hairloss, I'm very interested in an anti-cancer lifestyle. If you get the opportunity check out Dr. Michael Gregor's research.


If I started to lose ground I would do this:
1. Be dedicated more to the hair stretching and massages everyday
2. lasercomb every other day
3. dermaroll more frequently with Minoxidil (a lot of peer-reviewed studies show high efficacy)
4. See if I can hide it with Dermatch or Toppik

I've seen things like Toppik do dramatic improvements on very advanced balding people. From what I've seen is that most people on Fin do not go fully bald and still keep a lot of hair... so adding a little bit of Toppik everyday wouldn't be a big deal since it's low maintenance and has immediate and dramatic results.

If things did not improve, I would consider a hair transplant and get measurements of my hairloss through a magnifying digital camera to come up with a master plan. I do think we will have it solved in our lifetime.

Again, don't stress about this... just have a plan in place and follow it. Fortunately, I have a very committed wife with 2 beautiful children and a strong faith. The most important things in this world is your faith and family... everything else is non-fulfilling in the long run. I've really come to grow in this as I lost people I have loved within the last few years. Take care of yourself to the best of your ability and show people genuine love.

-Destin

[GoingBald34]

Thanks for the detailed response. I know that encouraging positivity is a good thing, however I feel my hair/hairline is getting worst every day to the point I feel like just giving up and conceding to mpb . Just 2 days ago before starting DUT i was a NW 1.5 and now I’m almost certainly a NW2 on my left temple and its thinned out horribly. Jeezus, Could DUT have done this to me just on the 2nd dose? Smfh this is why I was hesitant to start a new hair loss med. Now i must either commit to it or continue losing big on propecia.

[iwannakeephair1674]

When you change something, shedding is a common side effect. I had some shedding on new treatments, but it was going back to think about it some years ago. Again, my advice is to mainly use Finasteride and supplement at a certain frequency.

[GoingBald34]

Thanks for the reply. In the past 4 days, Ive taken 4 DUT capsules and 1 finasteride. I figured it was better to let the DUT kick in sooner than waiting awhile for it to lower DHT levels. Is it too late to do the 5-6 days propecia and 1-2 DUT per week? So far I havn’t washed my hair in 2 days because of the emotional roller coaster of counting hundreds of hairs. It’s made my life a living hell.

[mrclean]

Do you have any pictures? I bet it is not as bad as you think.

[GoingBald34]

Just an update. It’s now been about 16 days since I started taking DUT. It’s really hard to tell if it is doing anything yet, as I’m still shedding hundreds of hairs daily from all over my scalp (behind my ears, sides, donor area, etc). It’s difficult to assess this early because when I got on Avodart I was already shedding. On September 7th I foolishly applied Minoxidil to my hair line, and after speaking with multiple doctors I’m convinced that it triggered acute TE. However, thats not to say that fin didn’t lose its effectiveness for me, because it certainly did. The signs were there before the Minox application.

My hair has thinned out substantially so I was forced to buzz down my hair to a 1/4 inch. Even then, while shampooing or applying almond oil to my scalp, I still shed a great amount. At this point I’ve decided to stay on DUT and weather the storm even though I’m emotionally done. If all fails and I become bald, I may just look into shaving my head completely and go the scalp micropigmentation route.

I am clinging on to whatever little hope I have left. I’m still a NW 1.5 approaching NW2 pattern but losing density all over my head. As far as sides are concerned, DUT is def stronger than fin. Brain fog, testicle ache, headaches and depression are the main sides I’m experiencing. Fin had them too, but not as elevated. I’ll update in about another 2 weeks.

[coffeestain]

Any update?

[totalnerd]

Just an update. It’s now been about 16 days since I started taking DUT. It’s really hard to tell if it is doing anything yet, as I’m still shedding hundreds of hairs daily from all over my scalp (behind my ears, sides, donor area, etc). It’s difficult to assess this early because when I got on Avodart I was already shedding. On September 7th I foolishly applied Minoxidil to my hair line, and after speaking with multiple doctors I’m convinced that it triggered acute TE. However, thats not to say that fin didn’t lose its effectiveness for me, because it certainly did. The signs were there before the Minox application.

My hair has thinned out substantially so I was forced to buzz down my hair to a 1/4 inch. Even then, while shampooing or applying almond oil to my scalp, I still shed a great amount. At this point I’ve decided to stay on DUT and weather the storm even though I’m emotionally done. If all fails and I become bald, I may just look into shaving my head completely and go the scalp micropigmentation route.

I am clinging on to whatever little hope I have left. I’m still a NW 1.5 approaching NW2 pattern but losing density all over my head. As far as sides are concerned, DUT is def stronger than fin. Brain fog, testicle ache, headaches and depression are the main sides I’m experiencing. Fin had them too, but not as elevated. I’ll update in about another 2 weeks.

I figured it was better to let the DUT kick in sooner than waiting awhile for it to lower DHT levels. Is it too late to do the 5-6 days propecia and 1-2 DUT per week?

[totalnerd]

Just an update. It’s now been about 16 days since I started taking DUT. It’s really hard to tell if it is doing anything yet, as I’m still shedding hundreds of hairs daily from all over my scalp (behind my ears, sides, donor area, etc). It’s difficult to assess this early because when I got on Avodart I was already shedding. On September 7th I foolishly applied Minoxidil to my hair line, and after speaking with multiple doctors I’m convinced that it triggered acute TE. However, thats not to say that fin didn’t lose its effectiveness for me, because it certainly did. The signs were there before the Minox application.

My hair has thinned out substantially so I was forced to buzz down my hair to a 1/4 inch. Even then, while shampooing or applying almond oil to my scalp, I still shed a great amount. At this point I’ve decided to stay on mouse clicker DUT and weather the storm even though I’m emotionally done. If all fails and I become bald, I may just look into shaving my head completely and go the scalp micropigmentation route.

I am clinging on to whatever little hope I have left. I’m still a NW 1.5 approaching NW2 pattern but losing density all over my head. As far as sides are concerned, DUT is def stronger than fin. Brain fog, testicle ache, headaches and depression are the main sides I’m experiencing. Fin had them too, but not as elevated. I’ll update in about another 2 weeks.

I figured it was better to let the DUT kick in sooner than waiting awhile for it to lower DHT levels. Is it too late to do the 5-6 days propecia and 1-2 DUT per week?