Help! Accelerated Frontal Thinning Due Propecia 4 Months, Will It Grow Back?

[Sanchez1234]

Status: NW3

Since taking propecia 4 months ago my hair on the frontal have become thinner and miniaturized. It was ogood but now it is 'see through' and can't style my hair good. I haven't noticed a shedding (like lots of hairs on pillow or shower), but the hair got really worse since starting propecia, especially in the front.

Is this normal? Anybody been trough this? Any advice?

I will ofcourse take propecia the next 14 months before dropping it.

 

[Samson123]

It's been only four months, but, if the individual hairs are getting noticeably thinner then that is not a good sign. In some people finasteride can accelerate hairloss/thinning. I speak from personal experience and many hours of reading of similar negative reactions. The reason this happens in some people is because the artficially low levels of dht can make the hair follicle WAY more sensitive to dht, through the process of AR upregulation, way beyond any protection that finasteride can provide. I've read accounts of people quitting the drug and their hair getting better and also getting worse. I tried to wean off the drug and experienced an insane amount of hairloss/thinning in just a week's time, so I am stuck taking .5 mg ed even though it destroyed my hair everywhere, places I had no problems with started to rapidly thin, even on the sides and donor area!

I started on 1.25 mg ed for 15 months and my hair went to hell at around the nine month mark. I tapered down to .5 mg for six months and didn't notice much difference, good or bad. It was only when I went down to .25 mg when all hell broke loose. If you are on 1 mg or more I would suggest tapering down to .5 mg and stay there for a few months.

 

[jd_uk]

It's been only four months, but, if the individual hairs are getting noticeably thinner then that is not a good sign. In some people finasteride can accelerate hairloss/thinning. I speak from personal experience and many hours of reading of similar negative reactions. The reason this happens in some people is because the artficially low levels of dht can make the hair follicle WAY more sensitive to dht, through the process of AR upregulation, way beyond any protection that finasteride can provide. I've read accounts of people quitting the drug and their hair getting better and also getting worse. I tried to wean off the drug and experienced an insane amount of hairloss/thinning in just a week's time, so I am stuck taking .5 mg ed even though it destroyed my hair everywhere, places I had no problems with started to rapidly thin, even on the sides and donor area!

I started on 1.25 mg ed for 15 months and my hair went to hell at around the nine month mark. I tapered down to .5 mg for six months and didn't notice much difference, good or bad. It was only when I went down to .25 mg when all hell broke loose. If you are on 1 mg or more I would suggest tapering down to .5 mg and stay there for a few months.

If you could go back in time would you avoid finasteride? Did you experience side effects too?

 

[Samson123]

If I could do it all over again I would have started with .25 mg ed. It is possible that that's all I needed. I believe the threshold of dht inhibition is different for everyone and going over that threshold can result in worse hairloss. It may not have done anything but at least it wouldn't have made me start balding in the crown, midscalp, sides and donor area. I can say that for sure.

Everybody is different and the 1 mg 'one size fits all' is wholly insufficient and a lot of guys are going to end up speeding up exactly what they are trying to prevent. I would have thought that the owner of this site, with more than a decade of users reporting accelerated hairloss/ thinning, would express some curiousity about this very real and devastating phenomenon and offer some guidance on finasteride use, but no, he either doesn't believe it, which shows either incredible stupidity or a severe lack of imagination into the mechanisms whereby finasteride can worsen hairloss, or he just doesn't care. I believe it is the former based on my brief exchange with him.

 

[jd_uk]

If I could do it all over again I would have started with .25 mg ed. It is possible that that's all I needed. I believe the threshold of dht inhibition is different for everyone and going over that threshold can result in worse hairloss. It may not have done anything but at least it wouldn't have made me start balding in the crown, midscalp, sides and donor area. I can say that for sure.

Everybody is different and the 1 mg 'one size fits all' is wholly insufficient and a lot of guys are going to end up speeding up exactly what they are trying to prevent. I would have thought that the owner of this site, with more than a decade of users reporting accelerated hairloss/ thinning, would express some curiousity about this very real and devastating phenomenon and offer some guidance on finasteride use, but no, he either doesn't believe it, which shows either incredible stupidity or a severe lack of imagination into the mechanisms whereby finasteride can worsen hairloss, or he just doesn't care. I believe it is the former based on my brief exchange with him.

Not saying i dont believe you because i do, but even the top hair loss surgeons probably wouldnt believe you. If you go on the realself forum then you can ask questions to the surgeons there for free. I think i remember none of them believing that finasteride can speed up hair loss. I expect that hormone fluctuations can just affect everyone differently.

What i will say though is that i think a 0.25mg dose of finasteride surpresses a similar amount of dht to 1mg of finasteride as it has a flat dose response. If it only surpreased a quarter of dht then i might have tried it myself because i am not content with messing with my hormones but maybe that could have been a compromise. Maybe the higher dose just affects you more somehow though or possibly finasteride in itself just didn't work well? Could you maybe have been better off without it?

 

[Samson123]

I would have been way better off either not taking finasteride at all or at a much lower dose. The fact that my shed hairs started to noticeably get thinner towards the root after a few months on finasteride when they didn't before should have tipped me off. The flat dose response, in my experience and those of others, starts at .5 mg, not .2 mg. Have you seen the pics I posted after going from.5 mg to .25 mg? That should show you that this is not the case at all. I will repost them. They were taken two weeks apart.

I went back all the way to the very beginning of this forum on both the shedding and AA sections and I couldn't believe how many accounts of accelerated hairloss/thinning I encountered. I should reiterate the fact that I started finasteride after three or so years of diffuse thinning, primarily in the frontal third, and after just nine months I started thinning EVERYWHERE, but the most distressing thing was the rapid, visible miniaturization of all of my shed hairs.

 

[jd_uk]

View attachment 44942 View attachment 44943 I would have been way better off either not taking finasteride at all or at a much lower dose. The fact that my shed hairs started to noticeably get thinner towards the root after a few months on finasteride when they didn't before should have tipped me off. The flat dose response, in my experience and those of others, starts at .5 mg, not .2 mg. Have you seen the pics I posted after going from.5 mg to .25 mg? That should show you that this is not the case at all. I will repost them. They were taken two weeks apart.

I went back all the way to the very beginning of this forum on both the shedding and AA sections and I couldn't believe how many accounts of accelerated hairloss/thinning I encountered. I should reiterate the fact that I started finasteride after three or so years of diffuse thinning, primarily in the frontal third, and after just nine months I started thinning EVERYWHERE, but the most distressing thing was the rapid, visible miniaturization of all of my shed hairs.

Yeah that is crazy.... Very sad that people who want to take a drug to help them.can actually end up much worse off.

I'm basing the flat dose response on some studies i saw. They suggested that it begins as low as about 0.05mg . Maybe there is some other factor at play...or maybe the studies weren't well done...i don't know.

 

[Samson123]

People put way too much faith in the finasteride studies. No study ever showed anyone going below baseline and then some, but I and many others did and never recovered. I have bald spots on my once insanely thick sides and donor area for Christ's sake. finasteride basically induced retrograde alopecia in me. I started finasteride at the age of 44 and after 9 months on finasteride I start balding everywhere and I'm not supposed to correlate that with finasteride? I would have to be full on retard not to and the denial of this fact on hairloss forums is downright disturbing.

 

[Samson123]

It is very sad that people can destroy their hair trying to save it with finasteride. What is sadder is that there is no acknowledgement of this fact nor recommendations to prevent it from happening when there can and should be. People repeat the canard that low doses of finasteride are just as effective as higher doses and it just isn't true. It should be common sense that 1 mg ed can way surpass the individual needs of someone.

 

[racisturk]

It is very sad that people can destroy their hair trying to save it with finasteride. What is sadder is that there is no acknowledgement of this fact nor recommendations to prevent it from happening when there can and should be. People repeat the canard that low doses of finasteride are just as effective as higher doses and it just isn't true. It should be common sense that 1 mg ed can way surpass the individual needs of someone.

Hi I have same problem, I'm on finasteride for 2 months but I have no gain plus my all hairs got thinning and even shedding on sides and back of my head. So It might be damage my system and should I quit on it?

 

[abcdefg]

Status: NW3

Since taking propecia 4 months ago my hair on the frontal have become thinner and miniaturized. It was ogood but now it is 'see through' and can't style my hair good. I haven't noticed a shedding (like lots of hairs on pillow or shower), but the hair got really worse since starting propecia, especially in the front.

Is this normal? Anybody been trough this? Any advice?

I will ofcourse take propecia the next 14 months before dropping it.

I think no one knows why this happens for sure. It could be the elevated T, or like others say the lower DHT the hairs adapt. Who really knows? No one. Accept one persons guess or another but the truth is we dont know why just like we dont know what causes male pattern baldness

 

[abcdefg]

People put way too much faith in the finasteride studies. No study ever showed anyone going below baseline and then some, but I and many others did and never recovered. I have bald spots on my once insanely thick sides and donor area for Christ's sake. finasteride basically induced retrograde alopecia in me. I started finasteride at the age of 44 and after 9 months on finasteride I start balding everywhere and I'm not supposed to correlate that with finasteride? I would have to be full on retard not to and the denial of this fact on hairloss forums is downright disturbing.

If you dont base your decisions on data what else do you base it off? Random gut instinct guesses? Most people dont go below baseline, but its a drug. No one can explain to you what it ends up doing really or why some things happen. We dont know.

 

[imsupercereal]

I'm a 22 year old male with a light complexion and very fine reddish-blonde hair, been thinning since 17. I started applying minoxidil foam 1.5 years ago (Aug '17) twice a day, and then moved to once a day roughly a year ago. Rate of hair loss for this first year was the same as before I started treatment. 6 months ago (June '18) I added 1.25 mg generic proscar to my regimen, and since then my hair loss has gotten noticeably worse; I now have diffuse thinning all over the top of my head, in addition to hairline recession. I also have had pretty consistent right testicle ache since taking the drug (0/10-3/10 on the pain scale), and my body hair/facial hair have gotten slightly thinner. I added jojoba oil and vitamins K2 and D a few weeks ago, and I've also been using Nizoral 3-4 times a week for a year. Any suggestions? Worried I might have Reflex Hyperandrogenicity, which would suck ***.

 

[Alphalete]

doubt finasteride made your hair worse. you're probably just a non responder

 

[random phone charger]

doubt finasteride made your hair worse. you're probably just a non responder

You've arrived well, and on time.

 

[Alphalete]

You've arrived well, and on time.

are you on finasteride yet?