The first sight of balding is enough to send most guys cowering. You may already know the drill – or you will in a few years. About two-thirds of American guys will begin the balding routine by age 35 and a whopping 85% by age 50.
If you went through it earlier, you’ve got a little practice. But hair loss is traumatic at any age – be it 18 or 73. And it’s often made worse by those pictures, reflections and comments from some people who really need a shot to the face.
Here’s what they don’t tell you about balding in men: it’s a chance to reinvent yourself. Case in point, Neil Strauss – a 5’6’’ writer and self-professed balding chump who shaved his head and became the world’s most successful pick up artist.
Or some guy named Michael Jordan, who saw that he was balding as a young NBA star and just shaved it off. You know how the rest of that went.
Granted, you’re probably somewhere in the middle of those extremes, but you’re probably faced with a similar issue. You’re losing hair. Relax – here are 7 things you need to know about that thing called male pattern baldness.
You Can Still Be Hot
You don’t need hair to be sexually attractive. That’s the consensus of an international study which found men don’t necessarily lose their good looks as their strands get more elusive – though it doesn’t hurt if you’re Italian.
Some of the most profitable actors on the planet have nary a hair between them. Think Vin Diesel, Jason Statham and Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson. In fact, a funny thing happened with the latter wrestler-turned King of Hollywood; his earnings went up as his hair disappeared.
With this said, you may not be 6’4’’ and 250 pounds of twisted arm, but you may not need to be either. The only way you’ll know if you rock the balding look is to experiment. Shave it off and/or keep your hair short. Then ask women whether it flies.
You Can Own the Look
Much has been said about the beauty of perfection. You’ve heard it all – symmetry is attractive, along with classical proportions and a 6’2’’ physique.
Hogwash.
Sure they’re attractive. But they’re boring too. A 1995 study suggests your brain actually likes asymmetry because symmetry is unemotional and it’s not natural. Take a stroll back to English lit 250 and recall the poem Fra Lippo Lippi by Robert Browning in which an inebriated artist rants about the confines of Renaissance art.
Real beauty lies in imperfection, says the quirky monk, be it a crooked nose or a balding mane.
That’s what the Universe had in mind when it made you. Now it’s your job to make balding part of your look. So experiment – shave your head or keep your hair short. But own the look, whatever that may be, and be the best-looking YOU that your body allows.
You Can Slow it Down
OK, so you’re terrified at the prospect of balding. This happens to the best of us, and it’s highly likely that at some point it will affect you too. Relax – you can slow down the balding process, if you like, with several options. And one of them is natural.
We’ve talked extensively about hair loss treatments here at Natural Health Source, including Rogaine and Propecia. While they both work, Rogaine appears to be a better option for early stages of hair loss – typically at the front.
Propecia is linked to a series of sexual side effects, including erectile dysfunction, which could remain even after you stop using the product.
We offer a natural-based hair loss reduction system called Profollica. It’s a two-part system designed with herbals and amino acids in a daily herbal supplement and an activator gel with Trichogen.
In a clinical study, the Profollica formula reduced hair loss in 90% of men who used it.
You Can Fix it Permanently
Still convinced you don’t want to go the balding route? You can deal with it permanently, at present with hair transplants. And we inch closer to a hair loss cure by the year.
Hair transplants reshuffle hair from non-balding parts of the scalp to areas where it’s required (called the ‘donor area’). It’s a surgical procedure that takes about 8 hours and costs between $10,000 and $20,000+. Several procedures may be required.
Though hair transplants don’t grow new hair, and won’t give you the locks of times past, they can at least give some of your hair back.
Though hair transplants don’t grow new hair, and won’t give you the locks of times past, they can at least give some of your hair back. And even that is changing – just this year, researchers found that stem cells were able to grow new hair in mice. It’s a good bet that hair transplants could merge with stem cell technology in the next 10 years.
God only knows where things go from there.
You Can Still Do Cool Stuff
Don’t write your life off because you’re going bald. Do the opposite – do everything you wanted to do as a kid and then some. Travel? Get that done. Marriage and kids? Go for it. Want to run for President? No one is stopping you. Hair, and lack of it, does not define you as a man.
Don’t feel held back by your health either. Roughly 90% of balding in men is genetic. Unless your hair loss is from a medical issue (which may be reversible when the problem is corrected), your scalp is probably healthy.
Go about your business dude. Balding does not define you unless you let it, or want it to.
You Can Live Your Life
This leads into our next point. It’s tempting to crawl into a hole and those first glimpses of hair loss in the mirror or those pictures you increasingly don’t like to take. But you don’t have to take that road – provided you have a strategy to address it and get used to the look.
Yes, hair loss gets worse, and many guys go completely bald, but you know you have options to deal with male pattern balding. Try different things and get used to the fact that you have less than a full head of hair.
Look in mirrors and take pictures. Keep yourself trimmed – or shaven if you prefer – and know that life goes on whether you have hair or not.
You Are a Man
The Universe did not single you out when it gave you male pattern balding. It made you normal. Close to 85% of all men will experience some form of hair loss by age 50 according to the American Hair Loss Society. And you don’t have to look hard to see how many guys have dealt with the same issue affecting you now.
But balding is not the end of the world. It’s confirmation that you’re of the manly persuasion and a rite of passage for most – yes most – of American men.
Think of it as a chance to become the best version of yourself, on the inside and the external visage you present to the world. So be a man and say you’re balding. Own hair loss and deal with it however you see fit.
