If I Damaged My Follicles, Why Aren’t They Repairing After a Few Years?

So a few years back i had a scalp problem that involved flaking and i got into the habit of picking the flakes which also led to hair loss because of it. The hair never grew back but when i decided to shave my hair due to having patchy looking hairloss i noticed that in fact the hairs had grown back (well kind of). It was the exact same colour as the other hairs and not the blonde vellus looking hair i would have expected when damaged hair was growing back. But they were much thinner looking than the surrounding normal hairs and they also never grew past 1/2 a millimetre in length.

From what i have read once a hair follicle has been damaged it takes a long time for it too repair and that is why the hair is thinner and not growing like normal hairs ….. But these hairs have been like this for well over a year and have shown no signs of growing back any thicker and longer? but at the same time haven’t disappeared and left the areas bald.

So what is going on? are they gonna grew back or is the damage done and if so why are they still growing to half a millimetre

thanks

The normal hair cycle is somewhere between 2-4 years, so if your hair can recover, it might take that long to see it in its next hair cycle. Also, it is possible that the damage produced by picking has irreparably damaged these hair follicles (traction alopecia), so what you are seeing are miniaturized hair as a step towards total loss of these follicles.

Hair transplants can work very nicely in these areas if you do not have a massive hair loss, as the grafts would be transplanted from the back of the scalp and not subject to the old damage you caused from the picking. Have you seen a doctor for an examination?