Hey Doc,
I got a question for you. Im 26 years old with no definitive loss yet although i do have the mature hairline. My question is has do with genetics. What is the likelyhood that a male will either take after their father or mothers father in terms of Male Baldness, is it almost 100% that you will take after one or both of them or could you concievably not follow either one’s baldness pattern and instead follow inherit MPB pattern as that to your cousins, uncles, great uncles, grandfathers.This is the reason i ask my father started to bald by the time he hit age 25 and was completely bald by around 35, my mothers father started balding in his late teens and was completely bald by 30 yet here i am at 26 with no apparent loss. With this family history i always figured i had no chance to keep my hair because both my father and mothers father have excessive MPB, so i assumed by the time i graduated High School, i would have some sort of loss.
Also the reason i ask is because generally many of the male family members on both sides (father and mother’s side) namely uncles and cousins have fairly good hair, is it possible i was fortunate enough to escape the MPB gene from 2 of the closest male members (dad, mothers father) and somehow instead inherited the hair of the more distant male relatives?
IN you encounters as a derm, do you think most males take after either their father or mothers father, or is it common for a male to not follow either one of their patterns and instead have a hairloss pattern that of a more distant relative.
Thanks for your response
Basically, we can take after either parent or neither parent. We can inherit genes and not have them expressed, yet pass the balding genes to our children or future grandchildren. I tell all of my patients that the best way to know, is to have a good microscopic examination of your scalp periodically. By the age of 27, you should have an idea of what your possible hair loss pattern is. In your particular situation, the appearance of a mature hair line has no significance for your balding pattern. It is possible that your pattern may have skipped generations or was inherited from others in the family that do not express the gene.