I Am Obsessed About My Hair Line, Can I Have A Small Surgery?

Dear Dr Rassman

I am a 31 year old male and around 5 years ago I realised that I had some hairline recession at the corners.  I spent 2-3 years obsessing about this and worrying about whether I would be bald before I was 30 and I also worried about my crown too which looks a bit thinner than the centre of my scalp but remains covered with hair.

As I was so obsessed with this at the time, I tracked my hairloss pattern pretty closely and can safely say that it has not progressed much, if at all since then.  The hairline is exactly the same (as is the crown).  Maybe the corner areas which were thinning are a bit thinner but the actual area has not expanded.  I do not take propecia and would prefer never to take it, for medical reasons.

Recently, for some reason, my hairline has started bothering me again, and feel like I would be more confident if I had it restored slightly so that I could spike my hair a bit rather than have the forelock fall flat over the receded areas.  Actually what bothers me is not so much how it looks in the daytime, but first thing in the morning when I wake up.  I guess the area which I would need transplanting is around 10-11cm squared in total…maybe 6 on one side and 4-5 on the other.  This wouldn’t bring me to a straight juvenile hairline (which I don’t want anyway) but would be enough that I don’t look like I have a receded hairline.

My hair characteristics I am guessing are not great for a hair transplant.  I have pretty good density in all other areas but my hair is brown and very fine.  People are often surprised by how soft it is when they touch it – to give you an idea of how fine it is.

My question is, would having a small transplant (FUE) in these areas be a bad idea?  Is it ever possible to perhaps transplant to these areas at a lowish density, just so that I look like I have a hairline rather than a forelock and so that if/when I lose hair elsewhere then I won’t be left with really dense temples and bald areas elsewhere.  I would be happy with quite a conservative transplant which just gave the appearance of some hair in these areas, maybe just enough to style.  I also think that one day, if I do lose a lot of hair elsewhere, I would shave my head down to a grade 3-4, but if I did this I would still want the appearance of a hairline to frame my face.  With this in mind, maybe it wouldn’t be a terrible idea to get the corners transplanted?  If it is not, roughly how many grafts might a 10-11cm squared area need?

Please let me know your thoughts.  I have seen some very good FUE hair line transplant results online but I am guessing that a lot of these are very dense/’packed’ transplants.

There is a very simple answer to your question.  If you are obsessed with your hair line then you need to make an appointment to see a doctor.