(17) I took a single pill of finasteride 4 months ago and I'm going through hell

Member Stories
#9

I find it crazy a kid so young would actually take Propecia

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#10

I find it crazy why these mother fuckers are still selling this rat poison

4 Likes
#11

Piece of shit doctors that are dumb and don’t know the dangers of it man, this kid should have never been given this shit

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#12

Yeah I took it just twice at 17 and I’m still fucked up from it over a year later. Whoever still claims this poison is harmless needs to be physically castrated tbh.

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#13

How you doing in terms of recovery 1 year later?

#14

I got pfs last November but the crash fucked me up pretty badly so I couldn’t really exercise or start any protocol until around February, which is when I started the cd protocol. I live a pretty normal life nowadays, with some depression, emotional blunting and sexual stuff that comes and goes. I also seem to have some sort of depersonalisation, as in I don’t really “feel” like my old self.

So, I’m doing much, much better but not back to normal, at least yet.

#15

Oh shit, are you cycingTY on swolesourc? I’ve been trying to hear people on the “not feeling themselves” part - It’s a pretty scary experience, and i don’t know how it’ll last. My derealisation has become much better, but still not feeling myself aswell.

#16

Luckily my depression has reduced substantially, still get down once in a while when i acknowledge the things that has happened in terms of skin and dick still feeling funky, and obviously the feeling of not completely being myself, but hopefully we’ll get there man.

#17

I’m currently on my second cycle of androhard and my “zest” for life is pretty much back in full force, which is a strange feeling after not having it for almost a year. I look forward to things in my life again, and it feels great.

Yeah the depersonalisation sucks, but I’ve had moments during my recovery journey where I feel like myself again, but it always fades after a couple days. Maybe this is part of the “ups and downs” that cdnuts talks about.

EDIT: Jesus, is swole source really not allowed here anymore? I tried to write the words swole and source together and it wouldn’t let me post it. Guess all the improvements I’ve had are fake and “pseudo science”.

#18

Dude, that’s great. I hear a few people mention not feeling themselves, but if you’ve had days where you’ve felt like yourself, that’s reassuring. Happy that you’re doing much better, and hope to see you back to baseline soon.

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#19

Can’t open the link though.

#20

Yeah the guys on swole source seem to recover in about 1.5 to 2 years. I’ve only been doing cd’s stuff for 7 months and I’m already much better. I’m feeling optimistic that I’ll eventually recover, but not trying to get my hopes up in case I don’t.

Good luck to you as well bro.

#21

Hey man,

Hope your symptoms are resolving.

Any update on reflex-hyper andro? Has your shedding stopped?

Im dealing with the same thing.

#22

What’s is CD staff, bro?

#23

The only thing that’s gotten better are my way of coping with this and my mental health. For everything else, I’d describe it just as a process of rapid aging. My skin lost a shitton of collagen, turned much looser, more lifeless, basically much older; my body got much hairier everywhere, and what were just tiny hairs when I first posted here are now covering my back (still okay, but I’m sure it’s going to get worse), upper arm, shoulders while the areas where I only had a little hair turned much thicker and denser like my abdomen. A tiny happy trail up to my navel is now turning into a rug. I hadn’t got any new body hair from when I was 14 to 17, and suddenly this happened. Pretty fishy.

But by far the worst issue is my skin. Along with my decreased libido and manageable ED, it all points to the same effects that aging causes. What especially improved my mental health was to acknowledge just how fucked I am, not to pretend it’s not as bad, etc… If I felt that something was off for my age and puberty, then it probably was. Of course I get depressed, quite a bit actually, but it’s done wonders to just be honest with my current state.

But no, I don’t think the shedding has stopped. My hair’s still diffuse thinning, and I believe much worse ever since I took that single pill, maybe the fin even caused it even though my hair was A-ok or maturing before all of this. It’s why I’m considering hopping back on fin again, because going bald is something I definitely won’t be able to cope with.

#24

Hi, papajohns.

I have similar issues as you do but slightly milder.
My hair used to shed a ton 1-2 weeks after quitting finasteride. My scalp still itches, but I’m hoping it goes away.

You can try reading this post

Hey everyone,

Just come out of a 7 month dark hole caused by finasteride induced hair shedding, blue tint in corner of eyes, and perhaps also anxiety (maybe it was just me, but a new one). So thought I would post to (kind of) reassure everyone. So here goes:

Mid April
Started taking finasteride

May
Started shedding like an absolute mo fo (275 hairs counted once after rubbing my hair for about 1 minute-- madness), but didn’t bother me.

June
Started being unable to sleep, then noticed the corners of my eyes going blue (https://www.hairlosstalk.com/intera…part-from-sunken-dry-eyes-anyone-else.106409/) so quit on the 17thth of June.

Mid - July
Eyes improved and the blue tint disappeared within weeks. Although, I did think for a while that finasteride made the fat around my eyes atrophy, however, today i believe maybe I’m just growing older (im 25).

(NB) part of me also thinks finasteride aged me, i have nasolabial folds now and just look older…but, i can’t say for sure as there are only another few reports out there and only one anecdotal remark in a study - believe me ive looked - so im inclined to believe everyone’s bugging out)

Mid July - Mid-September
Around this time all over my scalp became SUPER itchy, constantly and hair would be falling out like crazy. This lasted for 3 months. No signs of irritation on the scalp, but impossible to not itch. In early Sept hundreds of hair falling out every day. Surreal, and very scary.

Mid-September-October
My scalp started to itch less but this was substituted for inflammation on the top of my scalp and a strange burning sensation. By this point my hair was thinnnnnnnn. I would say I lost 40% of my hair density. Doctor prescribed me ketoconazole, it kinda helped but thought best not to irritate my skin any further so only washed twice.

October-December
I started noticing a marked decrease in my shedding. In this time, a shower went down from producing hundreds of hairs in my hand whilst i washed, now, to around 15 - which is not just normal but rather low I believe. I started noticing very short thick hairs falling out (weeks after a hair cut fyi), and this according to an internet search are thought to be called ‘intermediate hairs,’ signalling the end of a telogen effluvium.

December-Today
Hair is doing well, shedding at totally normal levels, and hair starting somewhat to look thicker. I don’t expect to recover everything I lost, but there is certainly some improvement.
It is strange though that the other day I scanned my scalp to see if i could find any of these small hairs but I couldn’t… so who knows? All i know is that it looks thicker to me.

I am rather hopeful I will completely recover from this. The only medical statement I’ve said to this effect is that it takes 9-12 months to heal after quitting during a shed. This seems to be correct given my situation. So for anyone out there who’s stressing the f*** out like I did, I hope this makes you feel a lot better. You have not permanently accelerated your male pattern baldness as alot of people have posted.

One love

xxx

#25

Hi there papajohns

I’m speaking as a much older guy who started to lose my hair in my mid 20s. Propecia was successful in that it delayed any significant shedding for about a decade, but as you know I also wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t taken it. I was getting diminished returns on it along with aged skin. All it did was delay that point that most bald/balding men come to when you realise that styling your hair to cover up your baldness isn’t working and taking clippers to it feels like a release. I never thought that I would clipper my hair into a relatively close crop. I carried the belief that a lot of us carry that I didn’t have the head shape for it and wouldn’t suit it so because of propecia I unnecessarily carried this belief for years whilst causing myself significant harm. If propecia was never on the market I would have discovered that a close crop ain’t that bad and is actually pretty good. Although I appreciate where you’re coming from to lose your hair at such a young age, I would suggest taking advantage of the current lockdown and do what other guys are doing by giving it a go to see how you feel. Even if it’s not for you, it will grow back, and you are young enough that other solutions will come along in future that won’t throw you under the metaphorical bus. I just wanted to respond because you presented going bald as an absolute with regards to not being able to cope. I have had many upsets and set backs in my life and can tend to catastrophise with all or nothing thinking. I just wanted to say that although you feel this way strongly just now, hair loss isn’t the end of the world, and it is possible to view things from a different perspective. Time and circumstances change.

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#26

Please don’t do this. Several patients have worsened their situation considerably by exposing themselves to an antiandrogen again. Re-read your member story in the opening post here and ask if anything is worth going through that or even worse again. Get a hair transplant/get a hairpiece/shave your head and wait for safer treatments. Just don’t take Finasteride again.

And please help yourself and everyone else here out by taking our Post-Drug Syndrome Patient Survey.

The data generated has already sparked interest from world class researchers who could help us find a solution to this problem. You adding your data by doing the survey further strengthens that data.

The survey can be accessed through the bar-graph icon at the top of your screen after you have posted a member story, and remember, the survey can be halted at any time and continued at a later time/date.

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#27

Why would you hop back on FIN? Wasn’t that the reason that gave you hair-sheds? Or did you have good results with FIN?

#28

I can only second what @Scotsman said. I once thought that losing my hair in my youth was the worst thing that could happen to me. Boy was I wrong. Today I am bald, but have never felt more comfortable about my looks. Guess what, when you get in shape, dress well, maybe have a slight tan and, most importantly, carry a good attitude, your lack of hair doesn’t matter. In fact, with a decent physique and a nice beard, it might make you look manly and attractive.

Going back on Fin, though, might destroy you at a whole other level. We have people who are completely impotent, have no libido, cannot sleep, cannot experience positive emotions at all, cannot focus, cannot work, have constant pain, get numb skin, very dry skin (including eyes), loose muscle, loose weight to an unhealthy degree and many other things. Try to cope with that! And you might still loose your hair. Your previous experience shows that you are sensitive to this kind of medication. Many people have gotten significantly and life changing/destroying worse when going back on Fin. Don’t make this mistake!