Well,
where to start...
I first noticed that I was losing it when I was around 25 years
old...it was not a good feeling, but at least if I let my hair grow
a bit longer, I could hide it. Then my friends started noticing it
and I acted like it was no big deal & that if it got much worse
I would just get it fixed. Boy am I glad I waited as that was back
in the mid 1990's (the plug era).
The next thing that really hit me was when I would be outside for
a while in the summer...man that sunburn on the noggin hurt when you
combed it!
The years went by and the hair kept going...I tried
Minoxidil...nothing, then I got Proscar from New Zealand until
ordering it was banned (in Canada anyway). The Proscar seemed to
help stop the loss but didn't really regrow anything.
A few more years and I met my wife, got married and used Dermatch
to help cover things up (couldn't cover the island though). Then
came the little guy (our son) and I noticed that the mid scalp area
was thinning which I really didn't like. I decided that if it got to
the point where the dermatch wasn't concealing too well that I would
seriously look into getting a HT.
Another couple years and the little guy said to me one day "I
like your little hair" (meaning the island). If my two and a half
year old is noticing, I need to get something done.
In the summer of 2003 I starting looking around, I went for a
consult at the local PAI office, sounded promising, but something
didn't sit right. Thankfully I started surfing for more information
and found the Hair Transplant Network and Hairloss Help forums.
Following a review of the doctors listed, results and opinions
expressed, I narrowed my search down to Dr Jones in Toronto and
H&W in Vancouver (currency exchange did play a role in my
selection). Following consults with each, I decided to go with
H&W as their estimate (3500-3700) was closer to what I think I
required. So I booked my appointment with Dr Wong at the End of
October.
My donor strip was about 1.45 by 25 CMs or 36ish square CMs. They
managed to disect the strip into 4022 FUs made up of 1336 singles
(.8 graft size), 2182 doubles (1 & 1.1 graft size) and 504
"bigs" (1.2 & 1.3 graft size).
I'm pretty pumped up to see what the results will be like, I'll
post more when things start happening.
