- Where are you from (country)?
the Netherlands - How did you find this forum (Google search – if so, what search terms? Via link from a forum or website – if so, what page? Other?)
Google search: finasteride side effects - What is your current age, height, weight?
24, 189 cm, 78 kg - Do you excercise regularly? If so, what type of excercise?
Yes, football and weight lifting - What type of diet do you eat (vegetarian, meat eater, raw, fast-food/organic healthy)?
I eat everyting, although recently I’ve been eating healthier the past year - Why did you take Finasteride (hair loss, BPH, other)?
Hair loss - For how long did you take Finasteride (weeks/months/years)?
2,5 years - How old were you, and WHEN (date) did you start Finasteride?
20 (06-07-2013) - How old were you when you quit, and WHEN (date) did you quit?
23 (01-02-2016) - How did you quit (cold turkey or taper off)?
Cold turkey, started shortly after to stop cold turkey again - What type of Finasteride did you use – Propecia, Proscar, Fincar or other generic?
Generic finasteride - What dose did you take (eg. 1 mg/day, 1 mg every other day etc.)?
5 mg cut into 4: 1,25 mg per day - How long into your use of Finasteride did you notice the onset of side effects?
2 years - What side effects did you experience while on the drug that have yet to resolve since discontinuation?
Put an X beside all that apply:
Immediately after quitting
Sexual
[X] Loss of Libido / Sex Drive
[ ] Erectile Dysfunction
[ ] Complete Impotence
[X] Loss of Morning Erections
[X] Loss of Spontaneous Erections
[X] Loss of Nocturnal Erections
[X] Watery Ejaculate
[X] Reduced Ejaculate
[ ] Inability to Ejaculate / Orgasm
[ ] Reduced Sperm Count / Motility
Mental
[X] Emotional Blunting / Emotionally Flat
[X] Difficulty Focusing / Concentrating
[X] Confusion
[X] Memory Loss / Forgetfullness
[X] Stumbling over Words / Losing Train of Thought
[ ] Slurring of Speech
[X] Lack of Motivation / Feeling Passive / Complacency
[X] Extreme Anxiety / Panic Attacks
[X] Severe Depression / Melancholy
[X] Suicidal Thoughts
Physical
[ ] Penile Tissue Changes (narrowing, shrinkage, wrinkled)
[ ] Penis curvature / rotation on axis
[X] Testicular Pain
[ ] Testicular Shrinkage / Loss of Fullness
[ ] Genital numbness / sensitivity decrease
[ ] Weight Gain
[ ] Gynecomastia (male breasts)
[ ] Muscle Wastage
[ ] Muscle Weakness
[ ] Joint Pain
[ ] Dry / Dark Circles under eyes
Misc
[ ] Prostate pain
[X] Persistent Fatigue / Exhaustion
[ ] Stomach Pains / Digestion Problems
[ ] Constipation / “Poo Pellets”
[X] Vision - Acuity Decrease / Blurriness
[ ] Increased hair loss
[X] Frequent urination
[ ] Lowered body temperature
[ ] Other (please explain)
Currently
Sexual
[ ] Loss of Libido / Sex Drive Recovered
[ ] Erectile Dysfunction
[ ] Complete Impotence
[ ] Loss of Morning Erections Recovered
[ ] Loss of Spontaneous Erections Partly recovered
[ ] Loss of Nocturnal Erections Partly recovered
[ ] Watery Ejaculate Recovered
[ ] Reduced Ejaculate Recovered
[ ] Inability to Ejaculate / Orgasm
[ ] Reduced Sperm Count / Motility
Mental
[ ] Emotional Blunting / Emotionally Flat Partly recovered
[X] Difficulty Focusing / Concentrating Still struggling
[X] Confusion Partly recovered
[X] Memory Loss / Forgetfullness Partly recovered
[X] Stumbling over Words / Losing Train of Thought Part. Rec
[ ] Slurring of Speech
[X] Lack of Motivation / Feeling Passive / Complacency
[X] Extreme Anxiety / Panic Attacks Partly recovered
[ ] Severe Depression / Melancholy Recovered
[ ] Suicidal Thoughts Recovered
Physical
[ ] Penile Tissue Changes (narrowing, shrinkage, wrinkled)
[ ] Penis curvature / rotation on axis
[ ] Testicular Pain - Recovered
[ ] Testicular Shrinkage / Loss of Fullness
[ ] Genital numbness / sensitivity decrease
[ ] Weight Gain
[ ] Gynecomastia (male breasts)
[ ] Muscle Wastage
[ ] Muscle Weakness
[ ] Joint Pain
[ ] Dry / Dark Circles under eyes
Misc
[ ] Prostate pain
[ ] Persistent Fatigue / Exhaustion - Partly Recovered
[ ] Stomach Pains / Digestion Problems
[ ] Constipation / “Poo Pellets”
[X] Vision - Acuity Decrease / Blurriness Partly Recovered
[ ] Increased hair loss
[X] Frequent urination Still present
[ ] Lowered body temperature
-
What (if any) treatments have you undertaken to recover from your side effects since discontinuation of the drug?
Not much except letting time pass and small lifestyle habits. Cut carbs, suger, caffeine and alcohol, but not completely. Especially alcohol is difficult to stop completely. Food supplements like Omega3, Magnesium, Calcium and Zink everyday together with increased fruit intake (apples and bananas). Finally weightlifting 2 times a week. -
If you have pre or post-Finasteride bloodtests, what hormonal changes have you encountered since discontinuing the drug (pls post your test results in the “Blood Tests” section and link to them in your post)?
-
Anything not listed in the above questions you’d like to share about your experience with Finasteride?
-
Tell us your story, in your own words, about your Finasteride usage and side effects experienced while on/off the drug.
At 19 I started to notice how thin my hair was already getting and it made me feel very insecure and frustrated. Determined to fight my baldness, I went to the doctor to get finasteride, which I successfully obtained on July 2013 at 20 years old. As the price for propecia was too expensive for me, I managed to get generic finasteride I could cut in 4 (1,25 mg) and take everyday. The first tablet that passed my lips, my body was already protesting and warning me with a sharp stinging pain in my balls. As I got told these side-effects would fade over time, I kept taking the medicine. After a few months I also had trouble maintaining a proper erection which lasted about 2 weeks. At first at panicked, but again assumed this would the side-effects would fade away If I would continue the medicine. The ED also faded away, never to return again. The results I got from the medicine were amazing, my hairline returned and my hair was thicker than it has ever been. I regained my confidence and one year later I got my first girlfriend.
It was the second year on the drug that things started to deteriorate, although I didn’t notice it at the time. I took an extra year to finish my Bachelor at university, with only one class and my final paper on my to-do-list. I was lazy and unmotivated that year, mainly enjoying partying and being with my girlfriend. Eventually I finished everything on time with half efforts, being unable to concentrate.
It was in the second year (2 years into finasteride) where everything started to fall apart. My girlfriend moved to Germany for a few months to do an internship, while I started my masters. Determined to do better than past year, I got frustrated that I could not concentrate and process information as well as I could before. My grades for my papers will still good, but I didn’t get the same satisfaction from them anymore. I felt slow, stupid and unhappy although at the time I had no reason to be. I was doing well at university, I had a great supporting girlfriend, a great group of friends and a caring and supportive family to fall back on. Yet why did I still feel unhappy and like something was out of balance?
This only got worse the following months, as I got increasingly anxious about my capabilities and my future, which eventually led to a panic attack in November (2 years and 3 months into finasteride). Thinking it could be the finasteride, I stopped taking it for two weeks as a test. After nothing changed I started taking it again, afraid to lose my hair. This could have been one of the biggest mistakes of my live, because a few weeks after I completely fell apart mentally during my 23rd birthday. I got very anxious and depressed, couldn’t concentrate on anything anymore, became afraid to leave my house or meet my friends because I could not handle it mentally and everything around me felt fake like I could not process what was happening around me. I got stuck in my own head with my negative thoughts, the future seemed like a black hole. I even started to develop suicidal thoughts. Depression runs in my family, and already as a kid I was prone to anxiety and stress, but never in my life had I experienced anything beings close as how bad I was feeling at this point. This was different, dark and painful.
I started google finasteride side-effects and found this side, which completely shocked me. The mental side effects listed described my situation perfectly! I started to look back on the past years how I could have been deteriorating that entire time without noticing it. On the first of Februari 2016 I threw away all my remaining finsteride pills and shaved my head as a way to ‘accept’ my balding, praying the symptoms would go away. This was the darkest period of my life and I would sacrifice all my hair, never to return there again, which luckily I didn’t, although the recovery process has been slow.
3 months after quitting finasteride, the severe depression lifted and anxiety only seemed to pop up every once in a while (anxiety still pops up sometimes). This was a period when schoolwork was relatively low, so it was a great time to get some rest and recover. I slowly started to enjoy things again, like meeting my friends and listening to music. A special experience was when I was listening to music and got goosebumbs for the first time in months. However they felt different as before, as a shock went through my spine to my brain, but only very weakly, as if the nervous system forgot how to transfer these feelings to my brain. Luckily this also slowly improved over the following months/year, as the shocks became stronger and my brain seemed better able to respond to them.
After this I went to study abroad for 4 months in Germany. Although the depression and anxiety were gone, I still noticed problems in my concentration and cognitive thinking. Around this time a new symptom showed up for me: severe head pressure. I had migraine attacks as a kid, but this was completely different. Like a part of my brain was numb when It required active thinking. I also noticed at this time my hair was getting less and thinner. Although the vanity in me was sad to lose my looks, I was mainly happy to see this a sign of things still going back to normal.
After the semester and summer holiday, I started an internship in Brussels to figure out what I want to do after study. I was very anxious to live on my own and about my cognitive abilities at this point. The position required a lot of reading and writing. Although doing a bit better, I still had problems concentrating for longer periods of time and the head pressure kept lingering. Luckily also the head pressure seemed to fade away during my months in Brussels. I finished the intership with good feedback, although I had to finish my research at home because I could not finish it on time due to concentration issues. Another problem also appeared during this period: during sex with my girlfriend I started more frequently to experience premature ejaculation, which never had been an issue before.
I returned home in February this year (1 year after quitting finasteride) and finished my research at home, while also writing some other papers from Germany. Although I was happy I was ‘functioning’ again I still noticed it took me a lot of strength to concentrate and hated that I didn’t feel as smart as I used to be. In March my girlfriend left for an internship in Africa for a few months while I started writing my Master Thesis. Unfortunately a few weeks after her return we broke up (a few weeks ago) as she wanted to keep travelling but I wanted to settle down and stay at one place more. While this hurt, this gave me the opportunity to focus on graduating and finding a job. However I still have trouble concentrating now and then and am worried about whether my cognitive sides would ever fully recover. The much described brain fog has partly lifted as I feel more and more receptive of my surroundings, but cognitive thinking is not yet what it used to be. I’m able to experience things again, altough not yet 100%. I feel im so close to recovery but it has just been out of reach. That’s why I wanted to ask help of the community of those that have mental sides:
- Are there those that had only mental sides?
- Did those sides fade away and over what time?
- To what extent (%) did the mental sides improve?
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Did anybody come (close) to a 100% recovery? - Are you still able to function in a white collar job that requires active thinking?
I believe I have always been prone to depression and anxiety, but finasteride definitely had a part to play in it. I feel I made huge progress, but I only need a few more steps to recover mentally/cognitively to fully enjoy life again.
For the sexual and physical aspect, there are almost no side effects anymore. Over the past 1,5 year, my balls started to hurt less and less, my ejaculate slowly got bigger and thicker again, morning erections returned and spontaneous erections partly returned. This all took months however. Premature ejaculation is the only side-effect I still experience, although I’m not sure its PFS related. I always have been horny as a teenager and during that time I also feared premature ejaculation as my penis was very sensitive and I never felt in control while masturbating (I was a virgin at the time). When I lost my virginity while being on finasteride there were no performance issues, neither in the following months. Only about three months after I quit finasteride, premature ejaculation first happened, only becoming more frequent over time.
- Has anybody else experienced this?
- Could my PE be related to a weak prostate, or would a more positive explanation be that the connection between my brain and penis is becoming stronger again?
I wish everybody hear the best of luck in fighting this poison that has affected our lives so negatively!