Boom! You all have to learn from this

You know I don’t like to lead you on. I know that going bald is not easy. Hell, it is one of the most challenging things a guy can face, especially if he finds himself in the years of his youth. That is why I found this talk from Patrick Stewart so inspiring. It is a talk that any guy who is dealing with male pattern baldness should listen to. I don’t think there is a better pairing of words that we could expect from another human being as bald guys. Without further adieu, check it out:

Ok, so what did you think? Feel free to sound off in the comments. You know that my mind is already made up. We need encouragement all the time. Regardless of where you are at with your hair or whatever other physical feature you may have doubts about. The bottom line is that we need encouragement. It’s an unfortunate fact of life that we can’t all have the best physical features or 500 girls pining after us. But hey, who wants to deal with that mess anyway. It’s much better to have to work for it. The reward is greater and you know that it is genuine. It is not by the chance of genetics, it is by the real effort of personality. This is what shines through and this is what matters. Don’t fall for any of that stuff in the magazines, this is real talk and everyone can learn from it.

Advertisements

Shaving your head the easy way

Just wanted to share this video that I found. I appreciate it for the technique that is on display but also for the author’s frankness. He is up front and honest with the viewer.

If you have any inspiring videos along the same lines, please let me know about them.

Don’t believe the hype

In my last post, I talked about Rogaine and the misleading nature of their advertising campaign. If you watch their commercials, you would think that their product helps you keep your hair. But actually, they only tell you part of the story. The bottom line is that they don’t have a product that will save your hair. It just strings you a long for a little bit longer and in the meantime, they make their money.

I recently read this article on the blog Young Hair Loss, which is a good resource for hair loss sufferers in general. The author talks about using a product called Nizoral, which is actually a shampoo. In the article, he describes how he was more or less tricked into thinking the product was working based on the previous commentary he had heard about the product. This same factor can have an impact when it comes to things like Rogaine as well. When we see these slick marketing campaigns, there are seeds planted in our brains that tell us “this product works.” Then, once we start using the product, we subconsciously search for evidence that it is working, despite the fact that it may be doing absolutely nothing!

These big companies are not going to tell you the truth about why you are going bald or how you can stop it. They want to keep you in the dark so that they can string you along for as long as possible. Once they’ve milked you for your money, they don’t really care whether you arrive at a solution in the end or not. I talked about this in a previous post as well. You always need to consider who has your interests in mind. If you want the facts on male pattern baldness, read this – an article from an impartial source that is not trying to make money off of you. You won’t find the same information from a company like Rogaine. They will have you believe that hair loss is a simple problem, easily resolved by applying their foam all over your scalp every day. Now, I’m sure they have their fine print somewhere, but just think about that term for a minute: fine print. There is a reason why they make those words so small.

I would welcome you to offer your own commentary in the comments, but please no flame wars and above all, no personal attacks. Comments sections on the internet are often some of the ugliest places around, so let’s keep it civilized here.

A Rogaine Case Study

Rogaine is one of the most popular hair loss treatment products on the market. It’s a product that has been around for years, with a fairly decent track record and a relatively limited amount of common side effects. It’s also become a popular buzzword when it comes to bald or balding guys and pretty much everyone is familiar with Rogaine, either from a joke or from one of their commercials. They have a large market and it’s clear that they are making money as they spend a lot of money on advertising. Many guys wonder if Rogaine is legitimate. Can it really stop your hairloss? The short answer is no, but I will explain in more detail in the rest of this post.

Rogaine does not stop you from going bald. What it does do is help you re-grow hair. Basically, you will continue to lose the same amount of hair, but Rogaine will step in and help your re-grow hair more rapidly so that you can try to keep up appearances. The problem is that as you become increasingly bald, Rogaine is going to run out of follicles to re-grow. Once a follicle is miniaturized, don’t expect Rogaine to come in and revive it. This is why their commercials are so misleading. They don’t tell you that the product does nothing to fight baldness. Really, all you are doing is running in place for a little bit longer.

I confess, I did try Rogaine, but I tried in conjunction with Propecia, a DHT blocker that is taken as a pill. Propecia helps stop hair loss at the source and together with Rogaine, this is a great one-two punch. The Propecia stops the hair loss at the root and the Rogaine helps re-grow the hair.

There was only one problem with this strategy. The Propecia produced awful side effects for me. I tried to endure them for a little bit (after all, I really didn’t want to lose my hair), but after a while it was too much. I asked my doctor (who originally prescribed me to Propecia) and he told me that I should stop taking the medication. After a couple of weeks, things started to get back to normal. I have since learned that some guys do not recover from some of these side effects, and to be honest, I would have been pretty miserable if that was the case.

Anyway, I stopped taking the Rogaine at the same time. It didn’t make sense for me to put Rogaine in my hair every day, because it wasn’t actually addressing the problem. It was just buying me a little bit of time. That idea, that you are doomed either way, is discouraging and I decided I would rather own up to my hair loss problem sooner rather than later. And hence the reason I shaved my head, which I will get to in a future post.

Want to be an attractive bald man? Here are some tips.

Some will tell you it’s not possible. You just can’t be a good looking bald guy. To them, the idea of an attractive bald guy is an oxymoron. Well, is it true? Are you doomed to a life of misery and hell if you start losing your hair. Is this more or less a death sentence? To some guys. it seems like it can be, but for other guys, it seems not to affect them in the slightest bit. How can we explain this difference?

People think that some guys have the right face for going bald or that some guys have the proper skin tone. Well, like the say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. We can’t really make a scale here that applies to anyone, so if we have to really look at things on a case by case basis and while some people will find a certain bald guy unattractive, others may feel differently. We can say that there are a few things a bald guy can do to increase his odds of attraction, however, and we will talk about those now.

Dress your best

You might think this is a no-brainer, but the question is really what you think is meant by “dress your best.” If you think it is avoiding shorts and t-shirts, that’s only one part of the story. The biggest problem most guys have is that they don’t wear clothes that fit them. If you don’t know what a good fit is, take a Saturday afternoon and go down to your local department store. Find a woman who works in the clothes section and have her help you size some things up. Feel free to put on a little fashion show while trying not to feel self-conscious about yourself. Oh, and buy some nice clothes. If you invest a little coin, the clothes will look better and they will last longer. If you buy $30 shirts and $50 pants, you may have some problems with fit and they will only last so many washes anyway.

Get yourself in shape

If you’re overweight, your first priority needs to be to lose enough weight to get to where you should be for your height. You can figure this out with a bit of internet research, but you should be able to do an eyeball test yourself just by looking in the mirror. The truth is that you probably know if you are overweight or not. If you are not overweight, that does not mean you should neglect your physical form. Get in the gym and see what areas you can improve on. It could be adding some muscle or some bulk, or it could simply be toning a few areas. The great thing about working on your physical form is that you don’t need any surgery or money to do so. You simply have to put in time and effort. I know, this is easier said than done, but at the end of the day, it’s more possible than many other options.

Add something different

Growing a beard or wearing a different frame of glasses can completely change your look and it may something as small as one of these things that suddenly makes you attractive to certain women. Some guys opt for tattoos as well. The bottom line is that you should feel free to experiment a bit. Any one of these things can help set you apart.

Thinking about who has my interest in mind

Every one of us has been programmed in one way or another to appreciate certain physical aspects of other human beings. We look at a girl and most people will either find her attractive or not. That said, there will always be people that don’t fit the norm in terms of what their perspectives are an in terms of what they find beautiful. For example, some guys are attracted to women that are considered overweight by others. This would seem to defy evolutionary logic, but it’s not like those guys are battling their subconscious to be attracted to girls of that size – they are simply attracted to them! It’s a chemical thing, and there’s not much you can do about it.

Magazines, TV and movies can also shape our predispositions. They are seen as credible sources of information and whether we think that or not on a conscious level, there is plenty going on in our subconscious. Generally, actors and actresses fit a certain physical profile and most people are striving to achieve something like that themselves. And now I am starting to get to my ultimate point.

As a bald guy, there are lots of people that think I must be sad or depressed. After all, I don’t fit the ideal physical profile of a guy my age. I don’t have much to say to these people, other than the fact I know I am not depressed and there is not really room for argument there. The thing is, while there companies like Rogaine that would love for me to be depressed enough to be reaching for a variety of hair loss treatment products, I realize that I am a unique individual and that if I am self-confident, my appearance is not an issue. I am not going to get all the ladies. I know that. But, hey, that was true even before I started going bald. Now, I find that there are random women who actually say that they are attracted to me because of my bald head. I thought this was not how it was supposed to work, but like I said earlier, not everyone fits into a neat box when it comes to their preferences for the opposite sex.

So when you see advertisements from these hair loss treatment companies, think about who really has their interest in mind. These companies are not looking out for you. They just want to make you feel bad enough about yourself that you will buy one of their products. It’s all pretty pathetic when you really think about it.

Yes, I’m bald. So what?

Yes, it’s true. You can practically see your reflection if you stare at the top of my head. It’s a barren wasteland coated in a thin layer of oil, a result of natural secretions that continue despite the fact I no longer have any hair there. No combover for me, though, just the lowest setting on your conventional barbershop clippers.

You see, I spent years trying to pretend I wasn’t going bald. I did everything I could to put off the harsh reality that I was losing my hair. I even tried treatments like propecia – boy, that was a huge mistake – and herbal supplements. I pretty much did everything short of getting hair transplant surgery, which I still maintain I would never do, but who knows, maybe I would if the procedure actually didn’t cost a year’s salary and if it didn’t involve a rather brutal and bloody operating room scene.

Anyway, where was I? Oh, right, I spent years covering it up. Well, that can only go on for so long. At some point, you will have nowhere to turn. Your bald head will have triumphed and there won’t be anything you can do to hide it. Everyone knows a guy with a combover is bald and in these days of intense media criticism, we often know when a celebrity is going bald at the slightest indication of a receding hairline (just look at Lebron James).

So what did I do if I didn’t stop my hair loss and I couldn’t hide it any longer? The answer can be found in the video below:

It wasn’t quite salvation, but shaving my head has lifted me to another plane of existence. If that sounds dramatic, then I know for a fact you aren’t a balding guy who has decided to give up your hair and embrace baldness. If you were, then you would know exactly what I am talking about. As a side note, any bald guys who do know what I’m talking about, feel free to chime in down in the comments – strength in numbers is a real thing and if we are serious about changing perceptions, it has to start with a united effort.

This is the first post of many on this site, and while it will be mostly about me, I hope I can share a few things that everyone will find useful, whether they are bald or not. In the end, what I have discovered is that confidence is what matters. It’s not appearance. Maybe it is for women, but that’s not my affair. I’m here to talk to guys about how we can live more fulfilling lives. I hope you’ll stick around for the rest.