hello people ,i am currently a 27 year old male who wants to become a women but not at this moment,due to job and other things,i currently take a low dose of spironolactone,and this is all due to the fact that i feel light headed if i take more ,i don't take any estrogen at the moment because like i said before my job is a very manly enviroment,i am also losing my hair very early stages,diffuse thinning,which i take avodart for,this i have taken for 9 months all avodart has done is slow it down maybe,this is disstressing because in a couple of years when i become the women i should have become at birth,i will look odd being bald ,i know there are wigs but i do not want to go down that route if at all possible,do you think that spironolctone will help retain my hair,i have been on spironolactone for 1 month,also i have lost a lot of hair since starting spironolactone is this normal or can spironolactone actually make hair loss worse

thanks everyone for replying love you all

Edit: Removed dosage info ~ Kate

These are really questions you should be asking the doctor who prescribed the medicine for you.

Sarah L.

Spironolactone will do little to save hair. Estrogen might do more. Try to add minoxidil to your routine. See a doctor and have your blood tested for the right mix of drugs.

Spironolactone started out as a blood pressure drug, that may make your pressure drop too low.

Quote from: lisagurl on November 01, 2007, 12:38:07 PM
Spironolactone will do little to save hair.

Well, DHT is the chemical which kills hair. DHT comes from T. Spiro reduces T, so I'd guess spiro helps with hair loss?

~Kate~

Quote from: Kate on November 01, 2007, 03:46:38 PM

Quote from: lisagurl on November 01, 2007, 12:38:07 PM
Spironolactone will do little to save hair.

Well, DHT is the chemical which kills hair. DHT comes from T. Spiro reduces T, so I'd guess spiro helps with hair loss?

~Kate~

QuoteMale hair loss is caused by a chemical called dihydrotestosterone (DHT). A naturally occurring enzyme in your body called 5 alpha-reductase transforms the male hormone testosterone into DHT. DHT is the main cause of thinning hair and receding hairline in men.

We all have some Testosterone even after SRS. Aging produces more 5 alpha-redtase which converts what testosterone you do have to DHT. Reducing testosterone does not reduce hair loss as is seen as we age the testosterone level goes down but more hair is lost. The second cause of hair loss is reduced blood to the hair root which minoxidil opens the capillaries.

Minoxidil though only works in very limited circumstances.  It is by in large ineffective on a very large number that do use it.

The reason more hair is lost with aging is because its been exposed to DHT with a long long time, and the hair shaft has diminished in size.

This happens much slower in women, and even there its hereditary, but it happens all over the head.

Eventually DHT kills the hair folicle, fast or slow, choose your poison.

Spiro does help hair loss, with less T, there's less DHT, so there's less less DHT getting to T receptors at the hair folicle.

Also, Spiro blocks the T receptors directly, but since it has a short half life and doesn't block all receptors, some DHT from T coming off the adrenals gets to the hair shaft.

For many people, the hair is not that sensible and the small amount will not affect hair significantly, but for others very sensible to DHT, hair loss will continue, but at a much lower speed.

For everyone though, cutting most DHT entirely will enable the hair that's folicle that's not dead yet to very slowly recover in the space of years.

There is a more DHT in older men, less in fact as testosterone goes down with age, that's why hair loss often slows down when men hit their 50's.

In women, its a bit more complicated, estrogen increases the length of time the hair is in its active phase. There are more active hair at a time and hair is denser.


At menopause, estrogen goes down, the hair cycle is shorter, and there's less estrogen inhibiting T action from the adrenals and so, DHT starts to have more impact on the hair shafts. So, you get a reduced density and the hair that's there is attacked by DHT more.

The hair is most vulnerable to DHT when its dormant, with less estrogen, the hair is dormant longer and from cycle to cycle, in people sensible to it, the hair shaft becomes smaller.

i have been told by a gp in the uk that spironolactone will kill your hair at doses of more than 100mg,i find this hard to accept but the gp was adamant that this was the case how can this be?

That GP doesn't know what he's talking about.
What on earth would be the mechanism by which it kills hair!!!
Never heard of that ever .

by the way this was about 6 months ago when i asked him about spironolactone and i have since changed doctors,he also claimed that because my dad has all of his hair that i should not worry,well i do worry i mean ultimly i will become a women but i will not look like a women with no hair,he said because spironolactone is a diuretic that 1 of the side effects is hair loss and he reckoned that all of is pateints suffered hair loss on even low doses and that taking more than 100 mg of it was insane for your hair,now i have been on the drug for 4 weeks and my hair is worse than ever so i am thinking maybe he was right,

please can anyone help me, i mean it has always been my aim to become a woman that i am in my head but i feel i will always be trapped in this body because my hair loss will prevent me from being what i want to be

Quote from: dean1972 on November 02, 2007, 01:01:21 PM
spironolactone is a diuretic that 1 of the side effects is hair loss

Yes, spiro will flush your body of water and salt while retaining potassium.

But spiro *prevents* hair loss, it doesn't cause it. Consider how many people have transitioned using spiro... and have NOT lost any hair. The vast majority will tell you that they gained hair in fact, myself included - although I'm also taking DHT-blockers.

~Kate~

I'm only nineteen, but I haven't lost any hair yet from taking it   But I'll agree with the science from the above posters rather than my experience.

Quote from: dean1972 on November 02, 2007, 01:01:21 PM
by the way this was about 6 months ago when i asked him about spironolactone and i have since changed doctors,he also claimed that because my dad has all of his hair that i should not worry,well i do worry i mean ultimly i will become a women but i will not look like a women with no hair,he said because spironolactone is a diuretic that 1 of the side effects is hair loss and he reckoned that all of is pateints suffered hair loss on even low doses and that taking more than 100 mg of it was insane for your hair,now i have been on the drug for 4 weeks and my hair is worse than ever so i am thinking maybe he was right,

please can anyone help me, i mean it has always been my aim to become a woman that i am in my head but i feel i will always be trapped in this body because my hair loss will prevent me from being what i want to be

I don't know of one thing in all that that was correct.  First of all baldness is a recessive trait.  That means you can't just look at your father.  You have to get the same gene from both your father and your mother.  Check out the men on your mother's side of the family.

In most products that effect hair loss, there's little effect in the first 4 months because the hair's already weakened by DHT will fall out anyway and it takes a while for the lessening of DHT to pass a threshold for hair to stay.  When hair is miniaturized. it has a tendency to have short cycles then fall and stay dormant for awhile. Your hair won't recover substantially until the hair shaft dimension is bigger and growth cycles are longer. This can take awhile because of the factors I'll mention.

Spiro helps hair loss in two ways, the first by stopping the testes from producing T can take awhile and the dosage for this effect to occur is variable with different people.  The second way is by directly blocking the testosterone, in particular DHT from reaching the hair folicle. This effect is immediate, but again, spiro has a short half life and you certainly need more than 100mg to block all DHT reaching the hair.

Depending on your sensibility to DHT, the slow diminution of T (and DHT since its converted from T) will make you continue to lose hair for awhile.

If you want to remove T's effect quicker, and at least stop further loss if not immediate regrowth, take dutasteride (ideally) or finesteride (very cheap, but slightly less effective).


Spiro is prescribed to women who have hair loss problems and hirsutism before menopause since they're not prescribed finesteride because of its possible impact on the fetus.

Spiro does much higher than 100mg can be taken safely.

keira thanks for explaining all that,i already take avodart and it is not very good meaning after 9 months ,hair is much worse,so spiro is my last chance

AVODART CUTS MOST DHT, BUT WITH SPIRO THE AMOUNT OF DHT WILL BE EVEN LOWER.

But, its rare that avodart doesn't at least stop hair loss (if not regrow some).

Have you gone to a hair specialist to see if there was not some other reasons than male pattern baldness for hair loss.

Also, we are very bad judge of how those meds work. Often they ask patients if their hair is thicker or thinner than the year before and what they say, and what the photographs and density analysis show is not the same. Only photographs without flash in exactly the same flat lighting condition can truly tell your hair loss is progressing or not.

If you do have male pattern baldness and its that aggressive, some male, in either side of the family, would have had to lose his hair very young. Do you have something like that?

well i have been doing a lot of research on avodart and many people say it is poor drug however my hair loss just may be to strong although when i started the drug i had a full head of hair and was only worried about the minimal recession ,whicjh has receded a lot more since being on the drug

Dutasteride is definitely not a poor drug, though if the hair loss is hyper aggressive it may still continue. But, it at least should continue slower since DHT is cut almsot to zero.

As for some people say its a bad drug. You can find people to have bad opinions on all drugs in existence. That's why they don't use anectodes to judge drug efficiency.

Still, if spiro and dutasteride at least doesn't stop hair loss, there may be some other problem.

keira thank you for replying again,what you say makes perfect sense,and everything that i am taking should at least stop my hair loss but i have visited a dermotoligist about 4 months ago and he said it is defintley mpb,now i just cannot beleive i am going backwards with what i am on,even now i still have good hair but if it continues which it will ,how am i going to pass as a female in a few years,this is what really worries me and also i am ashamed to say there is a lot of vanity on my part as well and if it were a straight choice betwenn remaining a man and keeping my hair or goping bald and becoming a woman i would choose to remain a man ,even though evry bone insidede me tells me i am a female,that is how much hair loss hurts me

Quote from: dean1972 on November 03, 2007, 10:09:31 AM
if it were a straight choice betwenn remaining a man and keeping my hair or goping bald and becoming a woman i would choose to remain a man ,even though evry bone insidede me tells me i am a female,that is how much hair loss hurts me

Well, women lose their hair too. There are wigs, partial hair pieces, hair transplants... there are other options available to you.

Still, it's rare to not respond to both spiro and Avodart. You might consider a second opinion from a different doctor?

Do you know what your testosterone level is? It might indicate if the spiro is working for you.

~Kate~