Welcome to our community. Please fill in the following template as a way of introducing yourself, and helping others to understand your background and situation.
Where are you from (country)? Norway
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
What is your current age, height, weight? 29, 180cm
What specific drug did you use (finasteride, dutasteride, saw palmetto, isotretinoin/Accutane, fluoxetine, sertraline, citalopram, leuprorelin, etc…)? Finasteride oral
What dose did you take (eg. 1 mg/day, 1 mg every other day etc.)? 1mg
What condition was being treated with the drug? Hair loss
For how long did you take the drug (weeks/months/years)? 2 months
Date when you started the drug? 01.092025
Date when you quit the drug? 10.11.2025
Age when you quit? 29
How did you quit (cold turkey or taper off)? Cold turkey
How long into your usage did you notice the onset of side effects? 1 day
What side effects did you experience that have yet to resolve since discontinuation? Tinnitus, emotional blunting
Check the boxes that apply. You can save your post first, then interactively check/uncheck the boxes by clicking on them. If your symptoms change, please update your list.
Sexual
[ ] Loss of Libido / Sex Drive
[ ] Erectile Dysfunction
[ ] Complete Impotence
[ ] Loss of Morning Erections
[ ] Loss of Spontaneous Erections
[ ] Loss of Nocturnal Erections
[ x ] Watery Ejaculate
[ ] Reduced Ejaculate
[ ] Inability or Difficulty to Ejaculate / Orgasm
[ ] Reduced Sperm Count / Motility
Mental
[x ] Emotional Blunting / Emotionally Flat
[x] Difficulty Focusing / Concentrating
[x ] Confusion
[x ] Memory Loss / Forgetfulness
[x] Stumbling over Words / Losing Train of Thought
[x ] 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
[ ] Testicular Pain
[ ] Testicular Shrinkage / Loss of Fullness
[ ] Genital numbness / sensitivity decrease
[ ] Weight Gain
[ ] Gynecomastia (male breasts)
[ ] Muscle Wastage
[ ] Muscle Weakness
[ ] Joint Pain
[x] Dry / Dark Circles under eyes
Misc
[ ] Prostate pain
[ ] Persistent Fatigue / Exhaustion
[x ] Stomach Pains / Digestion Problems
[x] Constipation / “Poo Pellets”
[x ] Vision - Acuity Decrease / Blurriness
[x ] Tinnitus (ringing or high pitched sound in ears)
[ ] Hearing loss
[ ] Increased hair loss
[ ] Frequent urination
[x] Lowered body temperature
[ ] Other (please explain)
What (if any) treatments have you undertaken to recover from your side effects since discontinuation of the drug?
If you have pre or post-drug blood tests, what hormonal changes have you encountered since discontinuing the drug (please 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?
Tell us your story, in your own words, about your usage and side effects experienced while on/off the drug.
When I was extremely sick, I used to read other people’s recovery stories every single day just to find a little hope. I promised myself that if I ever got better, I would come back and share my own experience. If this post can help even one person not lose hope, then it’s worth writing.
Sorry if this becomes long.
I started taking finasteride around 01.09.2025. After my very first dose, I noticed something strange immediately: my penis shrank dramatically. I remember thinking it was weird, but I didn’t panic. I was healthy, training 5 times a week, eating extremely clean, active, social and mentally strong. I had never struggled with depression in my life other than normal heartbreaks. I had never had suicidal thoughts. I was confident, ambitious and enjoyed life.
After a few weeks on finasteride, my brain slowly started feeling strange. I began having disturbing intrusive thoughts completely out of nowhere. For maybe 5 minutes every day, I would suddenly get these terrifying suicidal thoughts that did not feel like “me” at all. It scared me badly. I remember thinking: “What the hell is happening to me?”
At the same time, my sleep slowly disappeared.
I started:
- waking up constantly during the night
- struggling to fall asleep
- having endless dreams
- never feeling rested
At first I couldn’t connect the dots. I thought maybe stress or anxiety was causing it. But nothing in my life had changed except one thing: finasteride.
Eventually I started reading about the side effects. When I saw what this drug could potentially do hormonally and neurologically, and also saw that even health authorities had warned about psychiatric side effects, I stopped immediately.
For about one week after quitting, I actually felt amazing. It was like my body was relieved. I felt almost euphoric compared to how I felt on the drug.
Then suddenly, everything collapsed.
About two weeks later I experienced what I can only describe as a full nervous system crash.
It felt like my brain stopped functioning properly. My head felt like it was burning. I couldn’t think straight. Reality felt wrong. I went to my parents and told them that something was seriously wrong with me.
The next 4–5 weeks were the darkest period of my life.
I turned into a zombie.
I could barely sleep because every time I started falling asleep, my nervous system would jolt me awake in panic. It felt like my body was trapped in permanent fight-or-flight mode. Adrenaline surges constantly. My nervous system would not let me rest.
I had:
- severe derealization
- depersonalization
- nonstop brain fog
- panic attacks
- extreme insomnia
- emotional numbness
- terrifying intrusive thoughts
- complete loss of inner peace
The suicidal thoughts became horrifying. Not because I wanted to die, but because my brain felt chemically broken. It felt like dopamine and serotonin had disappeared completely. I remember begging God to take my life because I genuinely believed I could not survive in that condition.
People around me could not understand what was happening. Doctors were mostly useless. Some looked at me like I had anxiety. But this did not feel psychological. It felt biological.
After around a month, I was still sleeping terribly. Until then I had refused to take any medication because I was scared of making things worse, but eventually I became so desperate that I had to take Sobril just to get some sleep.
Even then, my sleep felt abnormal.
Every single night felt like a movie marathon. Endless dreams. No deep sleep. I woke up exhausted every morning like my brain never actually rested.
Weeks 5–6 were brutal.
At this point the panic was slightly less intense, but emotionally I felt completely dead. Empty. Drained. I spent most days lying in bed just waiting for nighttime. I had zero energy. Zero motivation. I truly thought my life was over.
The nightmares were insane. I would wake up soaked in sweat.
Weeks 7–8, I finally started getting tiny amounts of deep sleep again. Not much, but enough to notice a difference.
I was still extremely sick:
- memory destroyed
- terrible cognition
- severe brain fog
- derealization constantly
- emotionally numb
Sometimes I could barely hold conversations with my parents. Watching my parents become terrified and unable to sleep themselves was one of the worst parts. I felt like I had destroyed not only my own life, but theirs too.
Weeks 9–10, things slowly improved.
I began sleeping slightly deeper. I started feeling tiny moments of relief. Very small signs that dopamine and serotonin were trying to come back online.
Then I had another wave where derealization and brain fog became overwhelming again. Earlier the derealization would come and go. Now it lasted for days nonstop. I felt completely disconnected from reality.
At one point it got so intense that I would walk alone in the woods for hours because I thought I was going insane.
Weeks 11–12 were still very hard. Sleep was becoming more stable, but I still couldn’t imagine living the rest of my life feeling like this. The only thing that kept me going was my family and my faith.
Weeks 13–14, I finally started feeling somewhat human again.
The derealization was no longer constant. Brain fog became more situational instead of nonstop. I noticed that:
- bad sleep worsened symptoms
- unhealthy food worsened symptoms
- stress worsened symptoms
I became obsessed with clean living:
- strict sleep schedule
- healthy food
- exercise
- sunlight
- no alcohol
- no stimulants
Weeks 15–16, I traveled to Egypt with my parents.
This was actually a major turning point.
The winter in Norway had mentally destroyed me. The sunlight and warmth in Egypt helped massively. Salt water, sun exposure and walking outside every day noticeably improved my mood and nervous system.
For the first time in months, I felt moments of life returning.
Weeks 16–17, I continued improving:
- sleep became more stable
- dopamine and serotonin felt stronger
- motivation started returning
- libido improved
- future plans returned
I was not 100%, but maybe around 70%.
Weeks 18–19, I felt even better.
I trained harder. I started thinking about work and business again. I began feeling hope for the future.
I traveled to Egypt again because I genuinely felt the sunlight was helping me.
Unfortunately, during that trip I pushed myself too hard:
- poor sleep
- too much sun
- poor eating
- overstimulation
One day I slept terribly, stayed out in the sun all day and barely ate. That triggered a relapse.
The derealization came back strongly. My reward system felt flattened again. It honestly felt like my dopamine and serotonin crashed temporarily.
That relapse taught me something important:
even when you start feeling better, your nervous system may still be fragile for a while.
It took me several weeks to recover from that setback.
Now it has been almost 6 months since my first major crash.
Today I would say I am maybe around 85–90%.
I am functioning again:
- I sleep relatively well
- I train
- I socialize
- I think about the future again
- I can enjoy moments again
- libido is functional
- motivation exists again
But I am still not fully “me.”
The best way to describe it is:
it feels like driving with the handbrake slightly on.
I can live life, but the emotional intensity is not fully the same yet. Some days I feel really good. Other days I feel flat, distant or emotionally muted.
Caffeine still affects me badly. Even half a cup of coffee can make my nervous system feel strange.
And tinnitus has become one of my biggest remaining issues.
My tinnitus fluctuates heavily:
- sometimes quiet
- sometimes brutal
- worse after flights
- worse after poor sleep
- changes with neck/jaw movement
Interestingly:
- if I bite down hard with my teeth, it changes
- if I bend my head downward, it gets louder
So there is clearly some neurological/somatic component to it.
Spiritually, this journey changed me completely.
I am Muslim, and honestly without Allah I do not know how I would have survived this. I have never begged God so much in my life. During those early weeks I genuinely felt like I was in hell. No words can fully describe the suffering.
The scariest part was that nobody could really help.
Doctors did not understand. Friends disappeared. My best friend never even visited me once. Even some family members emotionally disappeared during the worst phase.
Only my parents truly stood by me every single day.
And honestly, one thing that surprisingly helped me massively was ChatGPT. From the very first day of my crash, it explained many of the mechanisms behind what I was experiencing: nervous system dysregulation, derealization, sleep disruption, overstimulation, autonomic symptoms, dopamine flattening, etc. It was more useful than most doctors I spoke to.
The reason I’m writing all of this is simple:
If you are early in this condition, do not assume your worst state is permanent.
Recovery is not linear.
You can go:
- from hell
- to improvement
- to setbacks
- back to improvement again
I genuinely believed my life was over multiple times.
Now I can finally say:
I believe the brain and nervous system are capable of healing far more than we think.
I am still healing.
But compared to where I was, the improvement is massive.
I would say, the doctors tried to push anti psychotics and antidepressants on me, and I refused. I said I know I can heal by myself, and the doctor said ‘that’s not going to happen’
From that day it triggered a fire in me to become healthy again. I would recommend to let your brain heal and don’t go near those drugs.
Do not lose hope.