Hello, I'm a trans woman and I've been having identity issues partly revolving around how my hair looks like, to the point where I kinda obsess. Does anyone else experience anything like this? Like, thinking that your hair makes or breaks your appearance even though you are happy with your face and body for the most part? Part of the issue is that I cut my hair short about 10 months ago, and it's grown out a lot since then, but it's nowhere as long as it used to be still and waiting for my hair to be long and pretty is a really slow and aggravating process for me, maybe partly because of my impatience. I worry about things like if I have a hairline like a male, if my forehead looks like a male, and also things like no matter what I do my hair looks flat on top and poofy on the sides, even with layers. I have curly hair. Yeah, so I hope I don't look too weird for writing this, but I want to hear anyone's thoughts. I've been told I'm beautiful but I obsess over some small things, like this.

Hi, Hey Its May!

Yup.  Worse, I have advanced androgenic alopecia.  Shiny on top surrounded by a broad fringe.  Not enough hair of my own to do anything with.

I have to hear a wig pretty much constantly. I have several in my color, so I have something to wear while another one is washed and dried.  I have an old one to sleep in.  (The idea is the newest in the rotation becomes the fancy dress wig, then the everyday hair, and finally the oldest and saddest becomes the bedtime hair.)

I realize how pathetic this might sound to the young and hairful out there, but I gotta do what works for me, and going without doesn't. It doesn't feel right, and a glimpse in the mirror is massively dysphoria-triggering.  Do Not Want.  I I wear...

Anyway, May, welcome to Susan's Place!

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I also have the short naturally curly hair.  I had my hairline revised 9 months ago and it's quite a few different lengths as a result.  It is one of the major defining things male or female.  Hair is quite noticable.  There are a couple suggestions I can make from one curly girl to another...

If your hair is looking lopsided, your hairdresser may not be all that experienced in cutting curly hair.  It's quite different from cutting straight or wavy.  You may wish to shop around with a few consults.

The second suggestion, is perhaps your hair product/routine may be counter productive to what you're trying to achieve.  What type of product have you been using?  I switched to Deva Curl and my hair is night and day from what it was.

There's no real way to get around the long wait for your hair to grow back out.  I lose about 60% of my length with my curls.  I've taken to hair ties, head bands, scarves, snoods...  which if I position them correctly give the appearance that my hair is a lot longer that it really is.

Using tressume moisure/no product/air dry


Using deva curl/no product/air dry

I have quite a bit of dysphoria about my hair.  Or, to be more precise, about the lack of it.  I am pretty thin on top with a badly receded hairline.  So it is wigs or nothing for me.

I had my own hair styled at the back and sides.  It is quite curly/wavy, so I can fluff it up a bit under a hat.  I'll wear a hat if the situation prohibits a wig.  (I am a volunteer firefighter, and you can't wear a wig under a fire helmet.  You can't wear a hat under it either, but it's a quick change.)

I look better with a wig (I have three), but I'm okay with a hat and my own hair.

I think hair is important to all women. Trans or CIS. Women will spend a lot of money, time, effort and heartache on their hair. A lot of guys couldn't care less about there hair. They don't want to spend any time on it. I have guys come in with the most gorgeous thick hair that just want it buzzed. I just think NO NO it's too nice for that. But it's always the same answer when I suggest a different cut. They don't want to mess with it at all.

Barley Quinn is totally right. Not all stylists can cut curly hair and if they don't know how your hair can totally ruined. Ask before you let someone cut your hair.
Julia

In all honesty. Im lazy and really can't be bothered with my hair. I listen to suggestion from other women, as far as hair products are concerned.

I tell everybody, I dont have a mans hair style or a womans hair style. I'm a person with hair. And this persons hair is like this. I like it this way, getting with my friends and family, for going out gives tending my hair their more significance for me.
That said, this isn't about me and my hair.

I did fuss about my hair and forehead all the time. I wore a wig, untill my hair grew out, I couldn't leave it alone, always hiding my forehead. When my hair was long enough I was just glad I could say it was real, and drop the wig. i am obsessive compulsive and that results in a lot of running my hands through my hair. And i think people focus on this more then my hair or head.

Sorry I'm not much help.

I think hair is probably my single biggest anxiety right now in terms of appearance.  I have thinning hair up front and after 4 months of hormones, am not seeing any thickening yet.  I weighs on me all the time.  Of all the things hormones can do to my body, thickening my hair is the one that I think is most important to me.  Boobs, well if they don't come in, there's always surgery which is covered by my insurance.  If my body doesn't shape up the way I want, exercises and simple cosmetic procedures can fix that.  Hair however is a very different animal.  Yes they can do transplants, but you need to have enough hair in other places, it's super expensive and from what I've heard, incredibly painful. 

I want so badly just to have enough hair that I can pull it back into a ponytail for a cute everyday look.  I'm so jealous of women I see who have this awesomely thick hair and they've got it pulled back and go out to the store or for a run or whatever.  Hopefully in the next few months I'll see some results.  Otherwise I think Finasteride might be my next course of action.

Quote from: AlyssaJ on August 01, 2017, 02:06:04 PM
Hair however is a very different animal.  Yes they can do transplants, but you need to have enough hair in other places, it's super expensive and from what I've heard, incredibly painful. 

Otherwise I think Finasteride might be my next course of action.

Alyssa,

  Hair restoration is not painful.  I experienced no pain during or after the procedure.  I wouldn't worry about that part of it.  It is fairly expensive at $4 a graft for my procedure.  They did 3166 in one session, one of Dr. Gabel's specialities - Megasessions.  I do highly recommend doing research on the doctor prior to consults.  Not all doctors in the field are specialists in the field.

  I've been using Finasteride for 15 months.  It works very well on the crown, and to a lesser extent on the temples.  I gained back quite a bit on my crown, and maybe an 1/8" more on my temples after the first 9 months on it.  The special bonus is that it is a 5 alpha inhibitor and will stop you from producing any DHT, which is super charged testosterone.  So there's that.  They say you will see 90% of the effects of finasteride in the first 2 years.  So it may save you some cash if you don't have to fill as much scalp in hair restoration.

I had no hair procedures on my crown, just on my temples.

Yes both waiting for it to grow and seeing if receded areas will grow back are stress inducing.

I haven't cut mine in 10 months now and have been on finasteride since starting HRT. I think the thin crown area is filled in well. I've taken to applying minoxidil on my temples just hoping hair might regrow there. My hair is thin and wavy. If fresh washed it is sort of wispy making it poof out in all the wrong ways. I keep waiting for more length hoping the greater weight will make it lie down better. Since its uncut the back is much longer than the sides and the front hair seems to grow slower overall. When I color my hair to cover my greys, I look longingly at the girls hair on the box for certain.

I had some infill done on the temple area - you couldn't see it with a fringe, but pulled back it definitely wasn't a female pattern.

No it isn't painful at all. If that's your fear then don't worry. The worst part is being able to hear this strange scraping noise from behind your head where they take the strip from.

I went from this



To This



With Hair implants

Dream come true for me to finally be able to have long pretty hair, in my past life I had to keep it short for work, now that I'm the boss of me I haven't cut it in over five years and it's to the middle of my back, I also love my natural blonde color and how it looks longer and sun kissed by the California sun ☀️

wow you are like my twin we think so much alike on this ahaha!

I feel where you are coming from, my hair is everything to me. That is why I absolutely refuse to sport a shoulder length hairstyle or anything above it because it will give me dyphoria. I'm happy with my face and body, but hair is the one thing I will not mess with. I'm just not confident to cut my hair and feel feminine at the same time. It's probably some lingering dysphoria I have related to facial hair and certain angles of my face that I want to hide even though ppl think otherwise. 

Quote from: Harley Quinn on August 01, 2017, 10:00:36 AM
I also have the short naturally curly hair.  I had my hairline revised 9 months ago and it's quite a few different lengths as a result.  It is one of the major defining things male or female.  Hair is quite noticable.  There are a couple suggestions I can make from one curly girl to another...

If your hair is looking lopsided, your hairdresser may not be all that experienced in cutting curly hair.  It's quite different from cutting straight or wavy.  You may wish to shop around with a few consults.

The second suggestion, is perhaps your hair product/routine may be counter productive to what you're trying to achieve.  What type of product have you been using?  I switched to Deva Curl and my hair is night and day from what it was.

There's no real way to get around the long wait for your hair to grow back out.  I lose about 60% of my length with my curls.  I've taken to hair ties, head bands, scarves, snoods...  which if I position them correctly give the appearance that my hair is a lot longer that it really is.

Using tressume moisure/no product/air dry


Using deva curl/no product/air dry

I also have naturally curly hair. It's really important to find hair dressers that understand curly hair. The worst thing a hairdresser can do to curly hair is wash it before cutting it. Wet curly hair is longer than when it's dry. 1 inch of wet curly hair is equivalent to 4 inches of dry curly hair! Not all hair dressers know this. They should cut curly hair when it's dry and then wash it afterwards.

My corners are a little high- they cause my a lot of dysphoria. My front hairline is fine - it's only 3 fingers width from eyebrows. This is normal measurement for cisgender women who actually have higher hairline then men but have lower corners.

I am scheduled for an FUT hair transplant on my corners in LA this month. Can't wait!!

I had fut as well. Good luck Nina!

There are 2 schools of thought on curly hair, one is a wet cut "Ouidad" and dry cut "Devachan". Can't honestly say which is better... but I do know to run away when they ask what number guard I want LOL

When I was doing the perm thing, my hair was always cut wet. In addition the length of the perm depends on how long it's been in so I determined the length I wanted the stretched out hair to be which was about 3 inches. My cut was fairly short you may desire more length but once the length is known, the remainder of the hair can be styled around it.

Hair is one of the easily definable male or female characteristics so it's totally understandable and very common for it to be a point of obsession. The fact that growth takes so damn long only makes it worse. I was heavily thinning/near bald when I decided to start transitioning and after 7 months on finasteride and nearly 4 on hrt the amount of regrowth I'm seeing has me feeling positively giddy. I had even planned to cut it short one last time to even out and then grow it and I just decided to just let it go. I think by the time I'm out publicly around the new year I'll have more than enough for a nice female look. Even my temples are filling in and rounding out and my hairline has started to creep forward, but I don't expect it to recover to it's original place. I'm pretty okay with that though and if I ever feel the need there are always facial feminization procedures to handle that.

I too have hair issues.   I am a non transitioned MTF, recently on HRT.  When I was about 12-14, I let my hair grow out to below my shoulders.  But then cut it short again, and then in my early to mid 20's, I went super thin on top, and just continued to get thinner and thinner til finally last year I reached a point of just shaving every bit of my head hair off, because I feel like I look better completely bald, than with the bozo the clown look with nothing on top, and hair only on the sides.  So I am going to be looking into wigs that I can like and get used to.

Quote from: .Christy on August 05, 2017, 06:00:53 PM
wow you are like my twin we think so much alike on this ahaha!

I feel where you are coming from, my hair is everything to me. That is why I absolutely refuse to sport a shoulder length hairstyle or anything above it because it will give me dyphoria. I'm happy with my face and body, but hair is the one thing I will not mess with. I'm just not confident to cut my hair and feel feminine at the same time. It's probably some lingering dysphoria I have related to facial hair and certain angles of my face that I want to hide even though ppl think otherwise. 

Exactly Christy 😊

Harley,

this looks great! I am at 4 months post op myself for 2300 grafts.

When did you see most of your new growth start? For 7 months yours looks like it has already been growing for quite a bit!

Quote from: Harley Quinn on August 01, 2017, 03:13:57 PM

I had no hair procedures on my crown, just on my temples.