Hairfall is a phenomenon that impacts a lot of people, and quite a number of people are affected by the long terms results of it. I have experienced the journey first-hand.
More often than not, whenever a person notices some sort of hair thinning or hair fall, they initially think that it is not major. It seems to be like losing 10-15 strands a day instead of 4-5 strands.
That feels like a very small delta. What we fail to notice is that the hairs are not just falling, they are also thinning. But the process is so gradual that by the time it actually becomes visible, they feel like it is already too late and nothing can be done.
My journey
Initial days
Yes, I am talking about my personal journey itself.
I started losing and thinning of hair during my early college days.
I had a pretty good density before this started, and naturally, I was losing some strands, earlier. Just that the number increased, but I didn’t pay much attention.
By the time I actually took notice, I realized that I have lost quite a bit of time, and started to panic.
Without wasting much time, I contacted a dermatologist nearby.
That was one big mistake, I didn’t do a proper research before going to the doctor. When I reached his clinic, he noticed the pattern, and asked to see a photo of my parents. Note: my father is completely bald from the top.
As soon as he saw the picture, his response was “nothing can be done. You have it in your genes, you will definitely go bald”
And that’s where I stopped. I started convincing myself that nothing can be done, and I became pretty good at it.
How it progressed
I continued losing hair, I would notice, but not register in my mind anymore. The initial few years were difficult.
I was also talking to some other friends who were also going through a similar phenomenon. Some were taking active measures, and some were dealing it like I was, and there was not much visible difference between these two groups.
At that point (during college days), I had given a thought to having a hair transplant, but not done much research. And all I knew was that the procedure is expensive, and that I won’t be able to afford it. Thus, that idea was also parked.
I had also read about some non-surgical procedures of hair restoration, but didn’t pay much attention to it.
Finally started looking for options
It had been like this for the past several years, and as you can imagine, I had lost quite a bit of hair, so much so that I was a norwood 5 candidate. It was at this point that I again started looking for options of getting my hair restored/regenerated.
And what I figured was that the best way to find out something was to go to the doctor, and so I did. I started looking up hair transplant doctors, calling them up and asking them for a consultation. Whichever doctor sounded like they are trying to get me enrolled into their program no matter what my condition was, they were immediately ticked off.
Non-surgical options
During the same time, I also started figuring out what are the non-surgical procedures out there. Some sounded painful, some with a not-so-good efficacy, and some with side-effects. They respectively are:
- Platelet-Rich plasma: this is a process where platelets are collected from your blood and injected into the hair, as a nourishment for the existing hair.
- Minoxidil: this is generally a topical solution which increases the blood flow on your scalp, with chances of increasing blood flow to your hair follicles.
- Finasteride: this is most commonly available as a pill, which works as a DHT-blocker. DHT is responsible for the male pattern baldness which is a common cause for pattern hair loss in men.
Out of which, what I understood from multiple blogs is that Finasteride is a medication that requires a prescription. It has gotten the chance of the maximum side-effects, but also the chance of highest efficacy. It has chances of increasing the density of existing hair, which in turn would make it feel like the head is much fuller.
After talking to multiple doctors, I realized that I should have started with finasteride and minoxidil much earlier. That would have at least slowed down my hair fall speed, and also had a chance of halting it for a very long time. And also, all the side-effects that it had are reversible. Thus, at any point if I felt like I was getting affected, I could have stopped consumption, and the effects would have gone within a month.
My suggestion
- Talk to more than one dermatologist immediately, and at least start getting their opinions.
- Don’t wait until you have completely lost coverage, because that might actually be too late.
- Do your research on the surgical and non-surgical procedures, and then decide whether you want to go with any of the route at all.
- Basically, stay informed. My mistake was I took a decision based on consultation with one doctor, and not doing enough research myself.