1 Pill, Got Sides

General Discussion
#1

Took 1 pill of fin with around a ~2mg dose almost 18 days ago. Got extreme sides the very next day, especially dizziness. Libido went to 0 but I could still get erections but they were soft. The dizziness subsided after a week. The past two days I’ve gotten morning wood and the erections have been hard again whenever I masturbate, but libido is still gone, only had one or two instances where it came back.

I’m still getting headaches that I had from the dizziness though, it’s noticeable that something’s happening in my head. Guess there’s no way to tell but what am I looking at here? I’ve had some ibuprofen since then and an anxiety pill, haven’t drank alcohol or done any other drugs. But I’m gonna start drinking again.

I’ve searched around and have found similar stories but nobody followed up with their recovery past a month.

#2

Thought I’d post an update.

Day 19-21 it seems I’m back to normal. Libido is back completely, erections are hard, the only bad thing is I drank a lot of alcohol and the next day a dull ache appeared in one of my testicles. Two days after and it’s still here, it’s not really painful but it is annoying.

Not sure if this is a temporary recovery. I think I’m in the clear because besides a few days I’ve had morning erections almost the entire time since I’ve taken the pill, just they were soft and now they’re hard.

#3

Not back to normal completely. Seems day 18 was just the flood of testosterone.

Day 45 - Libido is back, it disappeared in the last week but it came back somehow last couple of days and it feels really good. I can get an erection really easy again, but the erections aren’t as hard, biggest downside so far. Balls are still shrunk, penis is slightly bent when getting erect but it’s not a big issue. Some testicular ache present.

#4

give it some time and keep us updated.

#5

It’s been almost a year lol, I’m still not better. Brain fog, insomnia, gynecomastia, genitals still numb, and more.

#6

1 year 7 month update. I’m pretty much fine now, I still have like all the side effects but they’re mostly mild so I can’t complain. All the progress I made was natural, I didn’t use any medication or treatment, I didn’t even exercise or eat anything special. I still firmly believe that trying to improve your side effects with more drugs will just make things worse.

And after this hell I’ve gone through I’m reluctant to say that I’m still mad about losing my hair but I won’t be pursuing any options to treat it, which really sucks, as a big chunk of joy is being taken away from me with the hair loss. I no longer care about stuff like buying clothes cause I’m just gonna be ugly anyways lol so what’s the point. It’s a personal thing mostly cause other people don’t care all that much. Like some girls have tried reassuring me that it’d be fine and I’d still look good bald but when I suggested as a joke that they try going bald they were like hell no lol. So people mainly care about themselves, there will be girls that won’t like my bald head but it bothers me more personally than what other people think.

Side Effect Comments

Insomnia - Recovered completely. I only wake up because of frequent urination problems but it’s only 1-3 times a night now compared to like 20 times at the beginning.

Libido - Feeling still dulled but is okay, spontaneous thoughts never came back

Genitals - Still kinda numb but better. Balls and erections regrew girth/length to respectable sizes but not completely back to normal. Premature ejaculation recovered like 11 months in which was great. The feeling could be better but all my junk works fine.

Gyno - It’s mild and my breasts kinda look like muscles cause they’re not that big, but I think I need surgery to remove it now. I might give it another year to see if it’ll go away on its own but I want it to be flat again.

Brain fog - A lot better, no memory issues anymore but if I shake my head it still hurts so something got fucked up there lol. Suicidal thoughts and depression are gone. The first few months I had trouble remembering basic thoughts and tasks but it got better. I also used to get brain jolts/zaps randomly for months and now it’s gone. I don’t know if that was cause of insomnia or brain fog, but it was pretty scary, I was high at a friend’s house once and it got bad when I got really high.

Bowels - This improved, I used to have to use the bathroom like 10 times a day but now maybe I have to go 1-2 times a day depending on what I eat.

Physical - Eyes still red from insomnia, thinking it will heal when I catch up on lost sleep for year and a half I missed out on. Ears are fine, I don’t get random high pitched noises anymore, I was scared of maybe getting tinnitus but it’s fine now. Chin, jaw are still smaller but my adam’s apple got a little bigger. Body temperature not back to normal but it keeps improving.

Other Factors - About 9 months in my anxiety flared up more than normal. Everyday I would have a period of time ranging from 1-2 hours where it was ridiculous and I’d be on edge the entire time. But now I don’t even have any anxiety at all, it’s completely gone, even before I took finasteride I would have it randomly some days and would just have to wait for it to pass. I’m thinking it flared up due to sleep issues and now that it’s fixed it got better, but I’m not sure why I don’t have it all anymore, if I had to guess I’d say it’s because overall my body functions are dulled so there’s not enough energy for anxiety to do anything.

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#7

God, your chin and jaw got smaller from only one dose of finasteride from a year ago? That’s so terrifying. I had plans for the longest time to get jaw surgery for my sleep apnea before taking that one dose of fin. I feel like I might have already killed myself.

#8

Yeah it’s not that bad but there’s definitely less room in the space between my lower lip and chin now. It’s slightly noticeable in old pictures but you have to be looking out for it to really see a difference. I suppose when I eventually shave my head I’ll look more manlier/uglier though lol.

#9

When did you start noticing bone loss/facial structure changes after stopping fin?

#10

I don’t know about the chin, that was hard to spot, but I remember my adam’s apple being small pretty quick. I didn’t keep a timeline of that. I do remember getting gyno 5 months in though cause I felt pain in my chest.

#11

What about your jaw? What changes do you notice about it? Hopefully these changes will revert like some other posters have reported. I wonder what could safely be done though to help bones to settle back to how they should be. At least the worst is behind you now.

#12

Hi there lbv,

I understand what you’re saying about how you feel you’ll look bald. I just wanted to add my own experience regarding this. Whilst i was taking propecia, I held on to a lot of my hair, although it was still slowly receding/thinning. I don’t know whether this was because of the occasional gaps when I ran out or not. Anyway, when I had reached the point of not bothering to renew my prescription due to both the fact that my hair was diminishing anyway and my major concerns over side effects the hair loss kicked in and what I thought was bad got a lot worse in a relatively short space of time. I still went to the hairdressers and my hair would be styled to cover up the hair loss and then sprayed in place. Over time I got sick of what was in effect a big hairy wig, a Trumpian creation of my own making, and I took to wearing skip caps pretty much all the time. Only this year I ended up buying clippers and rather than go to the hairdressers would trim the back and sides myself and just tidy up the top. The longer term goal was to man up and face the bathroom mirror, which I did in the wee small hours about a month ago. I didn’t like how I looked when I brushed away the various flapping lengths of hair from my pretty much bald head, but this ostensible comb-over, which had to be held in place, was yet another barrier to me moving forward in my life, and I felt that it made me less attractive, as I couldn’t imagine going to bed with someone with this swishing about in all directions, or even going swimming for that matter with my hair trailing behind me. So, I did the deed and lanced the rogue hair from my bonce and I now have a close crop. And the thing is, I am much happier, and it suits me a lot better than I thought it would when my head was silhouetted by these long strands. I think having a very little diffuse hair on top helps, but the change for me had to be a psychological shift in that I had to get to that point where I liberated myself from my failing hair. I don’t know how much hair you have yourself just now, but I just wanted to say that you could try with a shorter cut and if you’re unhappy with it you can always grow it back. You will never be as ugly to others as how you perceive yourself to be, and what to you may make you feel ugly may to others make you look even more attractive. I don’t know whether the hat thing is practical at all for you in day to day life if you were to try a close cut and you weren’t happy with it, but it is a way of controlling how the world perceives you and managing this difficult time. Losing your hair sucks, but it is never as absolutely awful as how we convince ourselves.

And it isn’t just me that’s happier with my hair, friends and family like it and say that it suits me and also clearly prefer it to what I had before. I was maintaining what to others was less attractive but I had to get to that psychological point myself first before letting go.

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#13

When my hairloss became too obvious to ignore over 15 long years ago I thought it was the worst thing in the world. I was already rather irrationally insecure with regard to my looks and girls, and I thought going bald would kill my last chances to ever find a girlfriend again. I hated to look in the mirror and actually cried a lot. Today, I cannot believe that I was such a whiny little bitch. Other young men accepted their hairloss and just went with it. I was so insecure and vain, and that’s how I got into this mess in the first place. I was desperately looking for a cure and found Propecia, while my parents were desperate to help me to get out of my self pity. So they helped me to buy this poison when I could not afford it.

Today, I am as bald as they come and I have never been so confident in myself. I improved my looks in other ways, bulked up a bit, grew a beard and improved my clothing. But most importantly, I largely dropped the self pity, become more confident and outgoing. I now have a beautiful girlfriend and plenty of attention from other girls. But unfortunately, I still pay for my insecurity from 15 years ago with PFS that has unfortunately become much worse suddenly this year. I so wish I could go back in time and kick myself in the behind. I now have the life that back then I irrationally thought I would never have, but my enjoyment of that life is impaired. The irony…

Hairloss is a negative. Some girls will reject you because of it and some people will make fun of you. But what really matters is how you deal with it. My bald head has become somewhat of a trademark. I am tall, athletic and confident, I have a bit of a beard and my shaved head. I actually come across quite manly that way. I do not loose a single negative thought about my lack of hair anymore. It’s just not that important. I wish I had seen that more clearly back in the day. People tried to reassure me as well, but I did not listen, unfortunately.

lbv, you are fortunat to be close to recovery. Make the most out of it, enjoy your life and don’t let something trivial like hairloss get in the way! Get in shape, invest in clothes, experiment with facial hair and few will care about your bald head. Good luck!

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#14

@Mercked my jaw is the same as my chin, just a little bit smaller, it’s hard to notice before and after pics, it’s not really a big deal but it is a side effect that hasn’t healed.

@Scotsman @Northern_Star

I’m not sure I agree with what you guys are saying. I have diffuse thinning and pretty much no recession so I still have all of my hair now but it’s so damn thin and I have to keep it long or it’ll show that I’m balding. I definitely look ugly with a shaved head lol, there’s no getting around it. I’ve shaved it before and it adds years to my face.

I really don’t care what others think that much, it just sucks from a personal standpoint as one of my best features was my hair and I liked being able to style it. I’ve had so many different hairstyles over the years, it made things like buying clothes, sunglasses and going out a lot more fun. I don’t need reassurance, I already know that a lot of my hobbies will become less fun without hair. You can compare hair loss to braces/teeth, people get braces so they’ll look better. Men and women, so I don’t think about hair loss as something I’ve got man up to. It’s dumb that I’m losing it, it’s my damn parent’s fault for having kids with baldness in the family. I’m not okay with it and I’m never gonna be okay with it.

#15

I know you don’t need reassurance but @Northern_Star does strike a really good point, you’d be surprised how you might look if you bulked up and shaved your head and grew a beard. You might actually like what you see in the mirror, and I know many girls (at least where I live in SoCal) are into that type of masculine look.

#16

Dont forget that PFS basically makes it impossible to “bulk up” or even gain decent amount of muscles. I even lost beard density. Its actually very hard to look manly when you got a bad PFS case

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#17

I don’t think I have any major muscle problems from PFS so I could work out but I don’t want a beard or significant muscles. That whole look isn’t for me. Plus I don’t like spending time in the gym, I play sports but that doesn’t build much muscle. Thanks for the suggestions but I’m just screwed so whatever. Fuck everything.

#18

Try to stay positive man… I know easier said then done. This shit really sucks

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#19

Think my immune system is making a comeback.

I’ve caught a cold for the first time since I got PFS. I slept with only one cover two nights ago with the AC at 68 degrees and had a stuffed nose and minor aches/fever the next day and it’s still persisting now.

I’ve mentioned in another thread that not being able to get sick is a PFS symptom. Something is wrong the immune system cause it’s not working properly. I used to sleep in 45 degree weather with hardly any clothes on and with a door open in my room and never got sick. A lot of people have had the same symptoms in the SolvePFS forums. But now I’m actually sick, which is a good thing.

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#20

Can you elaborate a little more on that? How is not getting sick indicitive of a poorly functioning immune system? Im genuinly curious, because I started taking l-carnitine and tartrate friday and I feel like it has been working really good for me. However, I went to a concert over the weekend and now I have a cold.