Early Stage Hair Loss (with Photo)
I thought I’d send you the picture of my current hair situation for use on your Blog because it’s hard to find pictures of men who are truly in the early stages of balding. And not just a maturing hairline or are in the more advanced stages. It’s also hard to find any good pictures on the internet because of camera quality, lighting and such.
This is a picture of me three and a half months ago when I went to Dr. Bernstein for a consult. He put me on Proscar and said to comeback in a year.
So far, I’m starting to see small hairs growing out above my temples in the 1/2″ area of my hair above my temples that I lost about two and a half years or so ago when I was 22. This loss caused a more pronounced widows peak and moved me from a NW2 to a NW3. You can also clearly see the thinning in the anterior mid-scalp. I’m not sure when this started because I used to use gel and leave my hair wet which made the loss undectable. But you can better explain what is going on in this picture, so I’ll let you do it. Do you normally see a good response from Proscar with this type of thinning? Thanks for all the great help this Blog offers!
Thank you for allowing me to publish your photo. Click it to enlarge.
It is difficult to assess your hair loss from the photo you provided, but if Dr Robert Bernstein found miniaturization during an in-person exam, then it is there. Since your hair loss is quite early, finasteride should do wonders for you. I should note, however, that if you were prescribed Proscar (finasteride 5mg), you are only to take 1/4 tablet a day to treat your hair loss. After a year on finasteride, another miniaturization exam will show whether the medication was beneficial for you in halting your hair loss. I suspect that it will be.
I’m the guy in the pic above. If anyone has any questions for me, post them here and I’ll check back one in a while to answer them.
Just getting to the end of five months on Proscar (cut into quaters). All the hairs I started seeing grow in the frontal area that receeded, are continuing to grow. My frontal area is regrowing to my mature hairline. I’m treating this as a science experiment. I wish I had a digital camera. My anterior mid scalp is still thin and it seems the hair on the left side of my head has thinned overall compared to when I started. Recently, I was shedding twenty hairs from the top of my head everytime I would touse my hair over the sink. I also noticed that during the first three months, that there were little hairs everywhere. Mostly after blow drying. When I “tested” for shedding, I made sure to only test the top of my head. If I toused the sides and back, I would get a lot more loose hairs.
I’m now at the end of month six and my hairline continues to fill in. I can see the hairs that started growing a month or two ago getting to be about a half inch long. Interestingly, the right side of my head is back to being as full as it was before I started minaturizing. It looks thicker then in the above photo. But the left side of my head is thinner then in the photo. At least the curl seen in the photo isn’t there. So I’m thinking that it’s thinner. I double and tripled checked that the above photo wasn’t mirrored, and it’s not. I have a picture of my hair when wet and geled, and you can see the area that is thinner then the rest. It looks like a tear drop starting at the front left of my head and running back. The larger part of the “drop” being at the back of my head. I can both see and feel the hair in that area is less dense. But the right side is almost as dense as my sides and the ring around the vertex. I’m soo glad that I started on Proscar. (Finasteride cut into quaters.) It took a lot of work to get my hair to look as good as it does in the above picture. Now my only problem is that the right side is so thick, that when I comb my hair, I have to come it a bit forward and to the left to blend it with the thinner hair on the left side of my head.
Thanks for the continue updates, Matt!
I’m at 7.5 months now. My hair line continues to fill in. Mostly on my left side. It’s always been farther back on my left side, even as a kid. Overall the front and left half of my head are thinner then the right. I recently had my hair cut, and I can see it more clearly. No major shedding, but some days more hair will stick to my hands if I’m running gel through. All the hairs have the sebum at the base, so I’m assuming from other posts on this blog, that if there is sebum at the base, then it’s just normal shedding.(Correct me Doc if im wrong.) I’m also think that since I’m a diffuse thinner, getting noticable results will take longer then other forms of loss, because most of the hair on the crown of my head will have to cycle through before it can appear thicker. Whereas many guys you see on the message boards are worse off, and so any results are noticable and are an improvement.(Correct me Doc if im wrong.) So I think this underscores the fact that many of us have to wait it out, and not expect to see a reversal in 3mo or 6mo. I’ve been thinking of adding Rogaine foam, but I want to wait to see what the finasteride will do. When I use a comb to pull up the hair over my left temple, I can see many little hairs coming up where my hair line used to be. About 3/8 to a 1/2 in from the receeded line. I don’t know how dense the area will become, bu anything is better then nothing. Sometimes I think that my hair is less dense then it was before I started treatment. But I think I remember reading here that it is possible to shed a bit before seeing an improvement.
Thank for the updates. I have just started taking proscar. Ive been using 6% minoxidl alone for a few months. i did notice improvements, but now it looks like my hair is falling off at a faster rate (i use it in the front). I hope i get good results from proscar.