Ok as you probably know I'm mtf pre-everything. I thought I would have more time but things have started to fall on me.
Last year I had noticed I had some short hair on my temples (+widow's peak which I've always had) (I was then about NW2 ?). Lately I've noticed the hair on my temples getting sparse and many hairs are short (~2-6 cm). Even worse I can see thinning + shorter hairs from the left temple all the way to the crown.
Needless to say I'm totally freaked out. When I was young I had very thick hair and always wanted long hair. Now it feels almost like a betrayal. I thought it would be OK until I started my transition but apparently not. I'm afraid that by the time I'll be able to take hormones I'll have lost too much hair (a wig is always an option but it would really suck).
I don't know what NW stage I am now (roughly somewhere between II, III and III vertex)
So to get to the point, those of you who haven't yet started hrt but needed to start some treatment (finasteride or something else?) and have continued for years had any bad side effects or anything? I know you need to take it for life (or at least after starting hrt) and I had read of many dangerous side-effects. That's partly why I was in denial and didn't do anything about it earlier.
I'm in a kinda tight spot now (still financially dependent on parents), my father is doing some kind of radiation therapy (after removing a cancer), my mother needs to have an operation so....damn it.
Any opinions (based on experience) etc welcome!
Minoxidil twice a day and 1mg of Propecia a day is the most common treatment, and for the vast majority of people it is enough to stop hair loss, and even create some regrowth. Minoxidil is something you can get over the counter without even having a prescription. You can buy a six month supply on Amazon for about $30, so it's very affordable. Just make sure that you don't have a cardiovascular condition that the medication might interact with, and you should be fine. Propecia is off patent now, so you can get it relatively cheaply even without insurance, but some insurance does cover it (mine did). All you need to do is tell your doctor you want to take it to help with hair loss, and they should go over the side effects with you and then write a prescription. It usually takes about six months to start to see real results, and you may have some shedding at first that will make your hair look worse in the short term, but it should keep your hair healthy until you are ready to start full HRT.
You don't necessarily need to take the whole treatment for life either. Once your testosterone levels are under control, Propecia is probably not necessary any more, and after an orchie/SRS it definitely isn't. Minoxidil is something you do need to continue to take to maintain any regrowth you achieved with it, but I cut down to once a day after my orchie, and I can't say I noticed any difference. I decided to use it less often because it made my hair look greasy, which made me need to wash it every day, and my hair takes forever to dry. -_-
I stopped Minoxidil a gew weeks ago and did not loose hair. I started it together with Finasterid one year before starting HRT. I think Estradiol works better for me than Minoxidil. I had regrowth since starting it.
I had the strongest regrowth after switching from patches to injections.