Feeling really down - need advice

LegacyUser

Hey guys, I just thought I'd write here about something thats getting me down quite a bit.

I'm in my early twenties and my hair is really starting to thin. Its pretty bad at the grown now and the top of my head is getting a bit thin too. For a while I just ignored it, but 6 or 8 months or so ago I was hanging it with a few friends and I bent down to pick something up and one of them said, shocked, "you're going bald!" and a few of the others gave out to her for saying it, I just laughed it off. TBH I thought it wasn't noticeable, I guess since I'm tall enough, 6'2" she just hadnt seen it before. Anyway since then I've been super self conscious and obsessive over it and its really getting me down. I spend ages with two mirrors looking at it, and even in college in the tiered seats I've stupidly been reluctant to sit near the front because I'm paranoid the people behind will see I'm losing my hair. Sounds stupid, its not as if I can help it, but a lot of the people in the course are women and I think it looks really unattractive.

I've looked at myself in the mirror and said "just shave it off and it will be done!" treating it like taking of a plaster, a sharp short shock rather than ages of pain. But I can't. My hair was one of the things I really liked about myself. When I was younger I had real long hair, rocker hair. I cut it off for rugby (long hair and rugby don't mix!) and consoled myself by thinking that I could just grow it back. Now I cant My hair has always been such a big part of who I am.

I'm afraid that my head shape just wont suit a number one or being totally bald. It suits some people but not all. I have a rather large head, if I was to compare my head shape to a celebs it would be like Matt Damons, tall forehead.

Anyway a few weeks ago I went to a doc about it and he did a few bloodtests and whatnot then said he would proscribe me propecia (i think thats how it is spelt) along with some shampoo. He tells me that this will lead to a noticeable improvement and should stop any further hairloss but that in ten/15 years I would be looking at haying to get something else done. Needless to say this intrigued me, but its expensive and I dont like the idea of taking all those tablets, I hate taking pain killers even. All those tablets could hardly be healthy. Plus I'm not sure I can afford them, and do they even work?

It appears I will end up with the patrick stewart - Capt Picard hairline in the future.

This is really fcuking me up. I used to be quite overweight when I was younger but I lost all that and dropped to a healthy 12 stone from about 16... That was when I was much shorter now. Over the past 6 - 8 months I've been slipping back into my old ways, eating too much, staying in feeling down and I've put on around a stone and generally let myself go. I used to do 60-70 pressups, tricep dips and 200 + crunches every night. I just stopped doing it, it no longer gave me the buzz it used to, sounds shallow but I really liked looking in the mirror and liking what I saw, it made me feel really good about myself and confident, thats gone now. It feels like I've gone full circle, back to being totally unattractive.

Does anyone have any words of wisdom? I'm writing this now because I decided not to go out tonight with my friends over this, its effected my confidence that badly. Its ruined me with women, I'm always worried that when they notice my hair loss they will go right off me. Maybe in 4 or 5 years when lots of others my same age will be in the same boat it wont be a problem, but right now I'm the only one out of my circle of friends with this problem.

I'm feeling really down and like a complete dope. I'm so embarrassed about it I dont even want to go to a barbers to get my hair cut because he would notice, now I know that that is simply retarded in the absolute extreme but thats how I feel.


Does anyone have any advice/encouragement or anything?

Defiler Of The Coffin

Sounds like you've got stuck in a rut regarding your self-esteem and confidence. Why have you stopped exercising? Do you feel that by losing your hair you won't look good regardless of how fit you are? If so then you need to snap out of this. You are not doing yourself any favours by overeating and isolating yourself in the house. You mention that you feel "totally unattractive", I very much doubt that is the case but people can detect when a person's confidence level is low so maybe that is affecting how people react to you on a night out. You have successfully managed to lose weight and improve your looks before, you are well capable of doing so again, this time from a better position.

Take it from someone who has been losing his hair since the age of 16 that it isn't really that big of a deal. Some women may not be interested in you because of your hairline but if it wasn't that it may well be something else. The vast majority won't care. You've got height in your favour, many smaller men would give up their hair if they could have your height! Remember that everyone has hang-ups about their appearance, all you can do is make the best of what you got, in your case you would seem to have plenty.

That being said, it is perfectly fine to seek treatment for your hairloss if it is affecting you that much, just be prepared to spend some money, and don't expect it to magically fix your confidence. It will help, but you should be secure in yourself regardless of how much follicles you've got on top. You don't seem too sure about this, I would suggest talking it over with your doctor again and making a decision.

You seem like a decent guy, remember to keep a positive mental attitude and you will be fine. Exercise will help you immensely. Chin up, your best days are in front of you!

jpm4

Been there. It is tough starting to lose it at a relatively young age, but you can bet at least a few of your friends will be there in a few years! A few thoughts that helped me put this into perspective:

-Women don't care as much as you might think.

-You won't be young forever. Sooner or later everyone gets older, looks start to fade and we all have to deal with it.

-No harm in at least trying the shaved head look - hated the look of it on me at first but a month later I was pretty happy with it.

borabora

As a girl I say definitely try shaving your head! It looks really manly and sexy. It only occurs to you that someone shaves to conceal baldness after a while and it doesn't even matter if they do anyway. It looks far better than a wispy/receding head of hair I think. Regardless, you don't want to be with someone that would be so shallow to consider these things a dealbreaker anyway. Also many women love a tall man so you've got that!

I think the issues here are deeper than what's on the outside anyway. You sound like a lovely fella so you should work on your self esteem and self image - what you allow yourself to be. Good luck!

BattleCorp

Hi,

Yep, you are in a bit of a rut alright but to be perfectly blunt, only you can help yourself.

You know how to work out, you've done it before. Get up off your backside and start exercising again. I know it is probably very hard to motivate yourself but you have to put the effort in.

Secondly, your hair "issue". I was in the same boat as you, spent ages doing my hair every day, my pride and joy. At 24 I started to go bald, rapidly. I spent ages trying comb-overs and other ridiculous haircuts to try and cover it up. Then one day on hols in Australia, I said f**k it, got the razor and gave myself a number one haircut. I thought I looked stupid for all of one day but funny enough, nobody else thought I looked stupid. I thought I had a funny shaped head (which I probably do), but guess what, nobody ever even mentioned it. I got the "oh, you've a new hair cut, it suits you", but haven't every gotten a negative comment. Plus, it takes me about 1 minute to wash and style my hair. Wet, shampoo, rinse, towel, n then I'm out of here.

Firstly, shave your head or get a number one all over cut.
Secondly, get up off your backside and start exercising.

LovelyLottie

From a female perspective, it definitely is not as big of a deal to women as you think it might be. It's so common it's not something you'd dwell on at all.

But i get that it's a very big deal for you. It's tough that it's happening at such an early age, and i understand that you feel different to all of your friends.

I think the problem is that your self-confidence might have already been shakey to start with, and this is testing you. Bite the bullet and shave it off or get it cut really short. I think a shaved head is very hot, the comb-over / wispy hair look is a no-no As mentioned above by another poster, lots of girls love tall guys (myself included). You've got that - so many guys wish they were taller, and there's nothing at all they can do about that. Shaving your head will be weird in the beginning i'd say! but it'll look good after a while and you never know the girls might even like it

Get back doing exercise and you'll find that things are not as bleak as they seem.

Good luck.

LegacyUser

Thanks everyone for the advice.


There are other issues at play too, its generally been a really crap 6-9 months, my father nearly died and he had just about gotten over that when he was diagnosed with cancer so things have been fairly stressful to say the least.

I thought more about it and I really only, as I see it, have a few options:

1. Go down the doctor/treatment route.

2. Continue on the way I am

3. Get out the clippers and shave away



At 20 years of age I don't think I can afford to pay for the tablets, they aren't covered by the drug scheme. So thats that pretty much out the window then.

Obviously continuing on the way I am isnt really an option, if that was acceptable I wouldn't be writing up here.

So that leaves me with shaving my head. I'm nervous about doing it, but I think it might be the best option.

How would I go about doing this, should I just stick it on number one and shave away? Or should I leave it a bit longer, or go even shorter?

I'm not looking forward to the questions I'll get asking why I did it tbh. Thinking about how the look mightn't suit me I figure that in a month or so it will have grown back to pretty much the way it is now, so its not the end of the world. Cutting off my hair is my decision, so I'm kinda cheating nature out of its prize haha. I walked around town today and I looked at peoples hairstyles, so many had short hair, its not as if I would be the only one, its a style that guys with ample hair choose to have.

I'm suffering from a very dry scalp atm so shaving it off might actually be a relief from that.

I might grow a goatee or something as well, go completely mad.

I've also decided that if any woman doesn't like the fact that I have my head shaved then it is her loss. As it stands I am low on confidence and not happy with how I look. If I can change that then I'll be fine.

Julie London

Im a woman and a man going bald is not unattractive. Women in general see men going bald as a normal thing. I would shave the head it looks manly and sexy, many women love it. If you dont like it it will grow back to how it was before.

BattleCorp

Don't worry about what people will say if you get a number one hair cut or if you shave your head. If anyone asks, just say that it's easier to keep it this way. And you know what, it really is easier to keep it neat when it's that short.

No more worrying about wet and windy days tossing your hair. Seriously, cutting my hair to a number one is the best thing I've done regarding my appearance. I no longer have to worry about how my hair looks because it always looks the same, every single day.

I bought a €20 razor two years ago and it's still going strong so I'm saving a fortune also (sorry to all the barbers out there).