Hey bro, everyone here is on your side. We're all a little older and trying to help you younger guys from making the same mistakes that we made.
I agree that 20 years old is probably too young. Here's why: If you're losing hair at that age, you will lose more hair. I know it's a bitter pill to swallow, but that's the way it is. Propecia can help, but if I'm not mistaken, some people don't respond to it. Other people have to stop taking it because of side effects. If you were to have a transplant, and then lose the hair behind it, you will look unnatural. If you have a strip porcedure, you will have a scar across the back of you head and then you can't shave your head either. Belive me, I know because I was in this situation. You can look at my photos and see what I looked like -transplanted hairline and not too much behind it. I HAD to have another surgery or look strange as my baldness progressed. Not to mention, when I started all of this in my early 20's, I was single then, and now I'm 35 and have a wife and 2 kids. It's not easy to come up with the funds to keep "chasing" the hair situation. Your adult life is really just beginning and you don't know what's in store for you. You don't want to be locked in to having sugery after surgery.
I would advise sending your photos and history to at least a handful of TOP docs and see what they have to say. They've seen guys like yourself before and they can give you good advice. Good luck.

I understand what everyone is saying about waiting if you are young. That is a great agreement 10 - 15 years ago when propecia was not an option. Propecia is %90 effective. No one is claiming that he will never need another ht. If the doc is doing f/u, stand along ht's why be miserable for the next 5 years when you can help fix the problem now. If the doc is conservative with the hairline what is the difference?

TS808,
Good advice, young guys you need to consider what he has to say!

JTF has got a valid point here I think.
It would not really make a difference if he did get a mature hairline implanted now instead of later.
I think that with FUE the chances of a disaster are reduced a fair bit.
I mean he can just forget about it later if he looses hopelessly much hair and just shave his head.
A shaved/buzzed head with just a hairline looks better than a shaved head without a hairline anyway. (look at Vin Diesel)

The hairline should be mature and not too dense however and it must be FUE.

Don G

el guapo,

I agree FUE may give you the option to shave your head (although I have yet to see a shaved head months after FUE, so we may be deluding ourselves as to how good it looks), but having the HT in the first place leaves you with only shaving as an option, if you don't have more money and have additional hair loss requiring additional work.

Given shaved heads are in style now, but were not ten or fifteen years ago... and maybe won't be ten or fifteen years from now... that puts young people in a position they may not even think about when deciding to get the HT. That was my point.

Mr. T

Mr. T's web page

just curious...are you meaning that FUE just might look LESS hideous than a scar on the back of your head, if you should choose to eventually shave your head?....i guess its a matter of degrees then isnt it..a full length scar vs. some pock marks.....

I'll offer this up ..FUE thins out the existing donor site..we all recognize that...Strip doesnt...the donor site merely loses a strip of skin...I'm wondering that as a person ages, and perhaps the hair in back thins out a bit, which would be more likely to show..if the hair thins around the FUE site even more than the actual FUE process thinned it, wouldn't that show up more than a scar, which could still be hidden even with thinning hair, by merely letting it grow a bit?...

personally, im hoping for the day that some scientist comes up with a finding that pouring banana margaritas on your scalp twice a day grows hair...oh yeah, in a perfect world...

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It would not really make a difference if he did get a mature hairline implanted now instead of later.

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It would matter a lot, if a guy got a lower hairline placement at a younger age, because he still had more hair at the time of his surgery.

Let me say it a different way... sometimes when young guys want a transplant, the "correct" placement of their HT hairline would be higher than what they currently have(!)

Age is not the only factor, but it is a big big factor nontheless. I believe it was Dr. Jones who commented, that when very young guys get a transplant, his age factor raises the odds that he will be disappointed later. I'd bet this is common to all clinics.

quote:

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I'll offer this up ..FUE thins out the existing donor site..we all recognize that...Strip doesnt...

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Of course it does. There's no such thing as a "free lunch" in the donor area. When you close the gap, FU groupings in the donor area are not going to be spaced as close together. Granted this is a subtle effect, especially if the donor strip was small, but strip surgery is not a free lunch.

A small point, but something that people need to realize.

[This message was edited by arfy on February 28, 2004 at 03:03 PM.]

I'm with you. I'm young too and I would love to have hair in the front where there is none. Propecia or Rogaine could be taken for the back...but the hairline is what bothers us young guys so much.