New Member, 1 week on, Still Early

Member Stories
#1
  1. Where are you from (country)?
    USA
  2. 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
  3. What is your current age, height, weight?
    19, 5’9", 165 athletic/bodybuilder build
  4. Do you excercise regularly? If so, what type of excercise?
    Yes, 4-5 times a week, strength training
  5. What type of diet do you eat (vegetarian, meat eater, raw, fast-food/organic healthy)?
    Clean and Healthy, bodybuilding diet
  6. Why did you take Finasteride (hair loss, BPH, other)?
    Diffuse hair loss
  7. For how long did you take Finasteride (weeks/months/years)?
    1 week
  8. How old were you, and WHEN (date) did you start Finasteride?
    19
  9. How old were you when you quit, and WHEN (date) did you quit?
    19
  10. How did you quit (cold turkey or taper off)?
    6 days 1mg, skipped day, 1 day .5mg
  11. What type of Finasteride did you use – Propecia, Proscar, Fincar or other generic?
    Propecia
  12. What dose did you take (eg. 1 mg/day, 1 mg every other day etc.)?
    1mg/day
  13. How long into your use of Finasteride did you notice the onset of side effects?
    3 days for serious side effects (panic attacks, depression, etc) got worse with more days
  14. What side effects did you experience while on the drug that have yet to resolve since discontinuation?
    Loss of libido, slight ed, no random daily erections, depression, anxiety, malaise

Put an X beside all that apply:

Sexual
[x ] Loss of Libido / Sex Drive ***might be stemming from depression
[x ] Erectile Dysfunction ***not as hard sometimes
[ ] Complete Impotence
[ ] Loss of Morning Erections
[x ] Loss of Spontaneous Erections
[ ] Loss of Nocturnal Erections
[ ] Watery Ejaculate
[x ] Reduced Ejaculate ***seems a little bit less
[ ] Inability to Ejaculate / Orgasm
[ ] Reduced Sperm Count / Motility

Mental
[xxxx ] Emotional Blunting / Emotionally Flat
[xxxX ] Difficulty Focusing / Concentrating ***BRAIN FOG!!! this with blunting/lack of motivation is the worst
[ ] Confusion
[x ] Memory Loss / Forgetfullness
[x ] Stumbling over Words / Losing Train of Thought
[ ] Slurring of Speech
[xxxX ] Lack of Motivation / Feeling Passive / Complacency ***this with brain fog/blunting is the worst
[ ] Extreme Anxiety / Panic Attacks
[x ] Severe Depression / Melancholy
[x ] Suicidal Thoughts ***only because this isn’t a way to live

Physical
[x ] Penile Tissue Changes (narrowing, shrinkage, wrinkled) ***penis seems more lifeless
[ ] Penis curvature / rotation on axis
[ ] Testicular Pain
[x ] Testicular Shrinkage / Loss of Fullness
[ ] Genital numbness / sensitivity decrease
[x ] Weight Gain ***perhaps in the midsection
[ ] Gynecomastia (male breasts)
[ ] Muscle Wastage
[x ] Muscle Weakness ***although I can still lift the same weights I have in the past
[ ] 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 this seems to be from brain fog
[x ] Increased hair loss lol irony
[ ] Frequent urination
[ ] Lowered body temperature

[ ] Other (please explain)

  1. What (if any) treatments have you undertaken to recover from your side effects since discontinuation of the drug?
    Omega 3,6,9; Good quality vitamins; Lyosine; arginine; gaba

  2. 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)?
    N/A

  3. Anything not listed in the above questions you’d like to share about your experience with Finasteride?

  4. Tell us your story, in your own words, about your Finasteride usage and side effects experienced while on/off the drug.

So I hate having to post here. I really didn’t want to, but I feel like posting now. I noticed pretty aggressive diffuse thinning on my crown, so I went to derm (Bernstein in NY) who told me to take Fin. Had already read up on sides being the hypochondriac I am but took the drug anyway out of vanity. First five days were brutal, loss of libido, slight ed and increasing depression and anxiety that stemmed from nowhere. After waking up and having a massive panic attack on the 6th day, talked to my dad (who’s an MD) who said skip a day and maybe start again on reduced dose. Skipped 7th day and took one .5mg dose on 8th day. Called up Bernstein who told me to stop and Dad agreed. Ninth day until now (It’s now the 17th day off the drug) I’ve had debilitating, 24/7 brain fog and emotional blunting. I didn’t have either of these while on the drug. I have not “crashed” nor have I “felt the surge of dht coming back to me” either since I quit. The panic attacks/most of the anxiety has cleared up since I stopped the drug, and I’m only largely depressed now because I don’t know if I will have permanent sides or not. I still have a major loss of libido and don’t have random daily erections (although I get them at night and in the morning, and can get them with a little manual stimulation. My penis does seem a bit shrunk, but I took some gingko biloba which HAS increased blood flow to the area. I got ta blood test and all levels are normal, I’d post the test but truthfully everything is within correct ranges (called in by MD dad who rigorously looked at it, his hypothesis is that my hormones may have taken a hit while on the drug and are now recovering since I had such an adverse reaction to the drug with the first week)

My real fears and questions are these: It’s been almost 3 weeks and this brain fog/emotional blunting is still the same, hasn’t gotten worse, hasn’t gotten better. What are my chances of recovering? This really isn’t a way to live, and although I don’t feel suicidal, I feel no spark from life. I do slightly feel a bit of my old self inside, but it’s very faint. Will this get better?

I know it is still less than three weeks off the drug, but from what I hear, and from what I’ve read (and I’ve done A LOT of lurking on these forums (probably around 50 hours in 2.5 weeks), if the persistent side effects are to go away, they would have gone away by now.

I really don’t want any false hope, but if any of you more seasoned guys out there have any true feelings on if I’ll get better, I’d really like to hear them and would sincerely appreciate listening.

Final Notes: My brain fog is weird, I still am highly functional, and can make calculations in my head pretty quickly, I also can have conversations with people and I see myself “acting” like my old self, but I don’t feel like my old self. This seems to be a common thing with depression as well, which I do seem to have from all of this. The “fog” just seems like I’m not totally there, however, not in a derealization sense (I’ve felt that before) but just in a sense that my senses seem blunted and I’m not taking in as much sensory information as I normally would. I generally feel a huge lack of motivation to think or analyze anything live I normally have. I’ve grown up with pretty debilitating pure-OCD which has always had me analyzing life and everyday occurrences, I have noticed that I no longer have OCD at all since I stopped taking the drug, a very weird (and extremely scary) phenomena. All of the OCD is just replaced with brain fog and emotional blunting. They’re 24/7. I also notice that I may not be getting stage 3 and 4 sleep as well, which might be playing a role in all of this.

#2

No one? No one has tips for brain fog/blunting? Would make life so much easier if I could just get over these symptoms. Mew? Anyone?

#3

guess it was a waste posting here, lol

#4

If you need someone to talk please pm me.

#5

Update:

Still feel like shit.

Messed around with girl the other day, didn’t actually do much but got decent erection with making out.
Still fogged out of my mind with complete anhedonia and lack of emotions/lack of zest for life. Get morning wood at about 70%. Would totally trade mental sides for sexual any day. Wish I was like myself again.

About one month off the drug.

Good luck me.

#6

Doubt you’ll find anyone on here who would encourage you to continue taking the drug, it will come down to hair or your penis? Believe me there is no contest

#7

Encourage taking the drug? I’ve been off a month, lol…

#8

I never felt a surge of DHT either, neither did I crash. I did have horrible sleep problems (waking up at 4 a.m every day and not being able to go back to sleep).
Also I noticed that even after 2 months I had a form of in-explainable brain fog.
I was still very functional but I had a sort of distance between everything I did, and I was very aware of that.
It required me to really focus on what was happening or it would slip from my mind. I also had some grey outs (remembering things only when you are reminded of them).

I’m not sure when but it must have been around 3 or 4 months after quitting before I lost that type of brain fog, it was also the time when my work started to improve tremendously, I had been performing badly the months before.

Maybe this will give you some hope, maybe it won’t, either way I hope you will recover like I did

#9

Thanks so much for this. I hope I end up like this. I did read your old posts, however, and you said you were cured pretty early(5 week). Did you still have the brain fog after this recovery? How bad would you say you were operating with the fog. I feel like I am functional but not entirely there and it’s very noticeable. Probably like 50% fog however I can still function. Any insight?

#10

You said in an earlier post you never had brain fog…

#11

Hi there. There is always hope, but it’s really hard to know what % of people recover after a given period of time. I think that most people who have sides for less than a few weeks or a few months don’t post here, and actually don’t come back to this site! So anyone that can reply to your messages can only give you their side of the story, which is usually … pretty sad.

Chances are that since you only took a few pills, you should be able to recover sooner than later. I know there are some exceptions to this, but stay confident! I wouldn’t call it “confirmed” before sides are persistent for at least a year, and then, you still have good chances to recover after 2, 4, or 7 years … I know it’s hars to be optimistic, but time is probably our best friend right now. Hand on !!

#12

Thanks very much. Have you recovered much? How do you feel nowadays?

#13

Now is actually not a very good time for me. I’ve been off for 18 months now, and up until 6 weeks ago, I was doing a fairly steady progress and holding up around 70-80%. But all of a sudden, within just a few days, things dropped to almost 0 !! Honnestly, I don’t know how to explain it. I have a healthy lifestyle (with the exceptions of a few extra drinks maybe once a month), but otherwise, I exercice (mostly jogging, hockey), I eat pretty well and I sleep well. It’s summertime and girls look amazing, but I can’t find a way to find them attractive !! It’s driving me crazy…

The only thing I may have done differently is that I stopped taking vitamins… I was hoping that I would do some sort of progress over time, but it hasn’t been the case yet. So as of yesterday, I re-started taking Centrum and Zinc, and we’ll see how that goes. It seems simple, but it worked well for me in the past. Hopefully it will have some effect this time too. I will post back in the next few weeks to share this.

I don’t have any of the mental sides so I can’t report any progress on that.

I hope you will start feeling better soon, and I encourage you to keep posting, even if you are healed. It’s always nice to see improvements in members…

Cheers!

#14

I will definitely keep posting. Especially if I get out of this mess. Just seems like each day I’m closer to being in the “permanent side effects” category. The fog seems to have lifted a very slight amount (maybe 5-10%), although this might just be wishful thinking or me accepting my fate. I have a little bit of OCD again although this might just be me forcing it on myself to feel normal again. The fog seems to make it very difficult to do any higher level thinking (other than about my condition, haha) and especially makes my Pure-OCD hard to do. So maybe that’s why I’m not having any tendencies. Sexually seems a bit better. I can jack off in regular time once a day, probably more (haven’t tested). Libido sucks but probably because I’m mentally fucked up and more concerned about healing than girls.

So you’ve never dealt with any mental sides, progress? Good luck to you and I hope you get back to that 80%! Don’t overthink it! You’ll get there!

#15

Something I’d like to add: this sight is a plague and disease in itself. While quite helpful at times, it can be incredibly depressing and influencing of negative behaviors (such as anxiety, depression, etc)–especially for newbies that are experiencing early pfs. It truthfully appears that MOST people get better with time (although incredibly slow) but still complain and treat each other like shit daily.

UPDATES for myself:
-Brain fog slightly less, might be just accepting it or learning to live with it–feels like a disconnect from the world, slight pressure in forehead and behind eyes, harder to focus on things, multitask, still extremely functional and able to pay attention in class
-Libido recovering slightly, have brain-dick connection, Get a few boners a day, mainly from manual stimulation (dick rubs against pants or whatever)
-Have nocturnal erections, some when I wake up
-Erection quality a little shittier but not bad
-Porn gets it up hands-free pretty much
-Not as depressed or anxious
-Hopefully when my DHT and Test come up (hopefully they will) I’ll feel a bit better
-DHT still shit but enzyme might be coming back online still
-Still Passive but emotions have come back a bit, can laugh and hang with friends
-The less I think about my situation, the better. A positive outlook is imperative for recovery. I will NOT accept my fate. I have NEVER backed down from anything before. I may have not been through worse before, but I’ve dealt with SIGNIFICANT adversity in life.
-A few weeks ago, this statement didn’t mean anything to me, now it means a bit more. Anger seems to be coming back a bit.
-Look forward to gym a bit more than before, don’t really feel pumped in the gym but can still lift the same amount of weight and also looking the best I ever have in my life. Got dat 6 pack coming in–bodybuilding has helped before in the past, it’ll help now
-Can enjoy music now, feel frisson
-5.5 weeks off drug

#16

Well, just at first, during the first couple of weeks (about 4-6). I felt like my head was going to explode, and of course, after spending most of my time on this forum, I was deeply depressed !

Today, I have none of the conventional mental side effects reported by other members (brain fog, suicidal thoughts, etc.). On the other hand, I’m not very joyful and can’t really say I’m back to normal. I came to the conclusion that there is a direct link between libido and happiness! When you think about it, life evolves around sex … why do people do anything, if it’s not for sex! Go to the restaurant, go clubbing, go tho the movies, dressing up nicely, having a nice dinner at home … everything ends up with sex ! When there’s no interest in sex (and no probability of that happening), everything becomes very boring all of a sudden. That’s how I feel like … frozen !

Luckily, I have my job, my friends and my kids to focus on, while I find a way to deal with this.

1 Like
#17

Notes for self

-Feel much better hanging with friends and staying away from forum. Still no OCD and lots of brain fog, but still very functional and able to have conversations/remember the majority of things
-Not great at multitasking
-Don’t have much higher level thinking going on in head, just focus “in the moment” most of the time when talking to people/doing things
-Headache not as bad right now (12:47am) as it was a couple hours ago, took two tylenol. Definitely have forehead/sinus pressure going on when brain fog is heavy
-Brain fog doesn’t seem AS heavy as before, can do some analytical thinking/wondering unlike in beginning of brain fog where I just accepted everything
-Have had some cravings for food, notably two donuts
-Still feel incredibly fatigued but can lift same amount of weight in gym
-Still feel a filter over the world, like I’m not entirely connected, but I guess it could be worse
-Sometimes have mood swings, perhaps hormones are trying to get back in order?
-Lack of DHT probably plays a large role in all of this

Feeling pretty good right now. Definitely have a problem but only a month out. Hopefully won’t end up like someone who is here for many years.

#18

Saw Dr. Alan Jacobs in NYC. Starting Clomid and AI treatment.

#19

8 Weeks off Propecia: 57th day off drug
Updating this for reference. 0 being horrible 10 being prefin

Sexual
[x ] Loss of Libido / Sex Drive 2/10
[x ] Erectile Dysfunction 5/10
[ ] Complete Impotence
[ ] Loss of Morning Erections
[x ] Loss of Spontaneous Erections 3/10
[ ] Loss of Nocturnal Erections
[ ] Watery Ejaculate
[x ] Reduced Ejaculate ***seems a little bit less 6/10
[ ] Inability to Ejaculate / Orgasm
[ ] Reduced Sperm Count / Motility

Mental
[X] Emotional Blunting / Emotionally Flat Better, can enjoy things again but still heavily blunted 5/10
[X ] Difficulty Focusing / Concentrating ***BRAIN FOG!!! Still shit, perhaps improved 5%, 5/10
[ ] Confusion
[x ] Memory Loss / Forgetfullness Getting better, long term memory intact, short term sucks 5/10
[x ] Stumbling over Words / Losing Train of Thought Not too bad, 7/10
[ ] Slurring of Speech
[X ] Lack of Motivation / Feeling Passive / Complacency Very shitty, 3/10
[ ] Extreme Anxiety / Panic Attacks
[x ] Severe Depression / Melancholy Can be very bad at times 4/10
[x ] Suicidal Thoughts 4/10 but still holding out hope

Physical
[x ] Penile Tissue Changes (narrowing, shrinkage, wrinkled) 4/10, sometimes normal-ish
[ ] Penis curvature / rotation on axis
[ ] Testicular Pain
[x ] Testicular Shrinkage / Loss of Fullness 6/10
[ ] Genital numbness / sensitivity decrease
[ ] Weight Gain NO MORE, LOSING NOW
[ ] Gynecomastia (male breasts)
[X] Muscle Wastage NEW and horrible, 4/10
[x ] Muscle Weakness BAD with Muscle wastage, 4/10
[ ] Joint Pain
[ ] Dry / Dark Circles under eyes

Misc
[ ] Prostate pain
[x] Persistent Fatigue / Exhaustion Slightly better, 4/10
[ ] Stomach Pains / Digestion Problems
[ ] Constipation / “Poo Pellets”
[x ] Vision - Acuity Decrease / Blurriness Not as bad, 7/10
[x ] Increased hair loss Finally slowed to a scary pace
[ ] Frequent urination
[ ] Lowered body temperature

[ ] Other (please explain)

#20

Feel good right now. Night time. 6/10 in discomfort. Was gonna put 5 but actually feel alright.

It’s a long road ahead.