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HOW TO STOP AND COMBAT HAIR LOSS: The Main Pillar of Looksmaxing
by @ascension!
by @ascension!
Table of Contents:
- Introduction
- Hormone loss in men
- Testosterone-to-DHT transformation: how it happens, how to improve Testosterone, etc.
- How to BLOCK the Testosterone-to-DHT transformation and 'why'
- Why is it important to BLOCK it naturally and not take drugs to do it?
- DHT on your skin: how to BLOCK it and 'why' it is safer and more direct to BLOCK
- Nutritional hair loss
- Why does a nutritional deficit lead to more hair loss?
- Hair cells: how they work
- What does a nutritional deficit look like in hair?
- When do you have to suspect this type of hair loss due to nutritional causes?
- What nutrients are the most important for hair?
- Folic Acid and Vitamin B12
- Vitamin D
- Biotin and others
- Inflammatory pattern
Hair loss is one of the most difficult issues in medicine, not because of its seriousness, but because its mechanisms are not entirely 'clear' and because we have not yet found a long-term solution to deal with hair loss. However, if we understand what are the main causes that can cause hair loss, we have a much more useful and effective strategy to treat it; we have on the one hand the hormonal causes, on the other hand the inflammatory causes and thirdly, the nutritional causes. These mechanisms can affect both men and women and we are going to see each of them in both and how to improve them.
Hormone loss in men
The most obvious or most common cause is surely hormonal hair loss in men. Many men lose hair, but the vast majority of them lose it due to hormonal causes.
The hormone most linked to hair loss in adult men, especially when the loss begins after the age of 18, is DHT; This hormone called "Dihydrotestosterone" seems to be one of the main 'responsible' in men (specifically) for hair loss. But the reality is that the levels of this hormone in people who have lost their hair ARE NOT particularly higher than those who DO NOT.
The current theory suggests that in people with hair loss there is a greater 'genetic sensitivity' to the fact that this hormone acts on the hair follicles of the scalp, causing the loss. The truth is that regardless of whether this theory is valid or not, BLOCKING this hormone slows down the hair loss process. In addition, this mechanism of hair loss leads to the typical pattern of androgenic hair loss, which is hair loss on the crown and at the entrances, but respecting the sides of the head.
There are three things you have to understand about this imbalance in man.
Testosterone-to-DHT transformation: how it happens, how to improve Testosterone, etc.
In the first place, DHT comes from Testosterone, that is, Testosterone through a molecule called "5α-Reductase" is transformed into DHT and when this Testosterone is converted into DHT 'excessively' due to alterations in our metabolism, due to alterations the functioning of our liver, for genetic reasons or any other cause, this results in low levels of Testosterone and high (or proportionally-high) levels of DHT. If they are not very high compared to a person who does not have hair loss, proportionally they have changed a lot.
Therefore, improving your Testosterone levels and your metabolism NATURALLY helps prevent hair loss. And, here the key word is "naturally", because if I take anabolics that increase Testosterone artificially I will aggravate this hair loss, why? Because the transformation of Testosterone into DHT has not changed, and suddenly I am giving my body much more Testosterone to transform into DHT, causing more loss. On the other hand, if I metabolically correct naturally how this transformation happens, I can avoid it by maintaining good levels of Testosterone in my body.
If you want to improve your Testosterone naturally, you must first understand that hormones have 3 steps to follow for their correct production:
- Raw material
- Production
- Obstacles/Inhibitors
- Fish / shellfish
- Coconut oil
- Olive oil (unheated)
- Avocado
- Nuts
- Seeds
Also, it is important to know that a good Testosterone value goes hand-in-hand with a good growth hormone value.
The second factor is that you have the production factory in GOOD CONDITION, which in this case is the liver. It is recommended that you perform a liver cleanse to keep your liver in good condition by eliminating toxins. Another factor is also having a production factory in GOOD CONDITIONS, but not having the production stimulus, the stimulus is achieved through:
- Sexual activity
- Strength exercises and H.I.I.T
- Sun exposure
- Stress
- Not sleep quality
Dietary fat is the only source of essential fatty acids which are the building blocks of eicosanoids. Eicosanoids are the molecular glue that holds the human body together. They control hormones and are produced by every living cell in the human body.
- Saturated fats can be found in butter, cocoa butter or animal fat.
- Monounsaturated fats are found in foods such as nut and nut oils, olive oil, and canola oil.
- Polyunsaturated fats include fish oils and essential fatty acids such as evening primrose, flaxseed and borage.
How to BLOCK the Testosterone-to-DHT transformation and 'why'
Secondly, we have to BLOCK this transformation (obvious), but how? There are many natural supplements such as Pygeum Africanum or Serenoa Repens, which naturally serve to block this transformation, by BLOCKING the "5α-Reductase" molecule.
Why is it important to BLOCK it naturally and not take drugs to do it?
Because many times the natural blockade AVOIDS the negative impact that this process has when you consume a drug, which is, for example, reducing your libido. The CONS, because obviously everything has PROS and CONS, is that they are less effective than a drug.
DHT on your skin: how to BLOCK it and 'why' it is safer and more direct to BLOCK
Finally, you have to understand that if DHT works on your skin (especially on your scalp) stimulating hair loss, it means that the "safest" place to BLOCK its activity is on the scalp, precisely because blocking it on the scalp avoids all these general symptoms (side effects). Therefore, if you are going to block DHT and are experiencing androgenic pattern hair loss or come from a family with a history of hair loss, block it from the inside out with supplements and topically.
Nutritional hair loss
What about nutritionally-based hair loss? There are three types, as I mentioned: hormonal, nutritional and inflammatory, and nutritional is the one we give less importance to.
More and more people are aware that a diet that is not efficient, that does not meet all your requirements will AFFECT the quality of hair that you produce and lead (especially if sustained in the long-term) to hair loss.
Why does a nutritional deficit lead to more hair loss?
The answer is "nutrient conservation", your nutrients as well as the resources of this planet are limited and there are two factors to consider with respect to nutrients.
First of all, since hair isn't exactly the MOST IMPORTANT place in the hierarchy for your body, it's obviously going to be way below keeping your brain healthy, for example. This means that not only if you have a nutrient deficit will your hair SUFFER, many times when we have normal values they are within the range of the specific nutrient (such as Vitamin D or Vitamin B12), but they are suboptimal values. Your body distributes them as a priority and they are not enough to nourish the hair in a complete or healthy way.
Hair cells: how they work
Secondly, hair cells are the FASTEST growing and dividing cells in your body, they are only behind the cells of your bone marrow (which are the ones that form red blood cells, white blood cells or platelets), not even skin reproduces faster. This basically means that the more a cell (any cell in your body) works and divides, the more nutrients it will consume. Therefore, making a nutritional deficit will have a greater impact on that specific tissue.
What does a nutritional deficit look like in hair?
In the first place, when you have a deficit, you find a DECREASE in the speed of hair growth, this often goes completely unnoticed, but you realize it because you cut your hair with a certain frequency and today you no longer have the same frequency. That is the first step, then we find that the hair begins to hit the mark and then, obviously, it falls out, but not respecting any specific pattern (I mentioned earlier the androgenic pattern related to DHT and how each one has its 'shape' and specific places where it happens), when you make a nutritional deficit (as it affects your entire scalp), it happens globally, it does not respect any specific pattern. This nutritional pattern, being more widespread, is less noticeable, therefore, it is usually unworthy, but as restrictive diets become more popular, we are finding more and more hair loss linked to nutritional deficiencies due to "how I eat". Also, repairing these deficits is important, because even if I have a very slight nutritional deficit, other imbalances such as hormonal or inflammatory imbalances can worsen.
So, it ends up having a synergistic effect to lead to more hair loss.
When do you have to suspect this type of hair loss due to nutritional causes?
When your hair:
- Grows much slower than usual
- When you have had a poor diet or a restrictive diet (veganism or ketogenic) for many years
- When your hair begins to thin all over the scalp
Actually, on the one hand we have iron and ferritin. Ferritin levels are MORE IMPORTANT than iron levels for hair loss, they affect the development of your hair follicle and both this mechanism and the others linked to nutritional deficits do not affect a specific area. But, ferritin could also be a problem for men, the evidence on this is clear, we have to keep our ferritin levels at 75 ng/mL to avoid having hair loss linked to low iron, keep in mind that the ideal value of ferritin will go from 70 - 200, but the minimum value from a laboratory is usually much lower.
Folic Acid and Vitamin B12
On the other hand, we have folic acid and Vitamin B12 that go hand-in-hand with having a ferritin deficit.
Vitamin D
Then we have Vitamin D, which is more famous for its EFFECT on hair, because one of the most misunderstood factors of Vitamin D is that it is not a Vitamin, but a hormone. This hormone is very important because it modifies how our body responds to stimuli, especially immunological stimuli, and this is important, because if your immune system regulates hair growth, especially if you have an active inflammation mechanism, limiting your growth and you'll see how. Therefore, Vitamin D is especially USEFUL for hair loss frames that are of inflammatory cause combined with nutritional cause. Also, keep in mind that telogenic effluvium (hair loss due to stress) is among the pictures of hair loss due to inflammation, but it is also related to the immune system and its exaggerated reaction, especially after having had a situation of stress, stress that raised your cortisol and that leads to hair loss. Therefore, leveling your immune response is key and Vitamin D and Omega-3 are going to be central to this.
Biotin and others
We have biotin and other nutrients like silica that you must have heard about because this nutrient is found in most hair supplements. These nutrients that are important for hair are common and it is rare to be deficient.
This information is necessary because there are many substances necessary for good hair, for example collagen (which we do not necessarily have in deficit) and it is more frequent to have mineral deficiency such as silica (which gives structure to your hair). So is it a good idea to take these kinds of supplements like biotin? Yes, it's always a good idea, what you have to understand is that it's not going to be a big difference, why not? Because they are not the cause of your hair loss, it is important that you understand that if you have a hormonal pattern of hair loss, you do not have to take biotin, you have to solve the underlying problem.
Inflammatory pattern
And the third pattern that I mentioned to you is the inflammatory pattern.
As you saw before, Vitamin D deficiency can aggravate your hair loss not only for a nutritional aspect, but also because it affects the response of your immune system and your immune system generates inflammation, but it is by no means the only mechanism that leads to to inflammation-related hair loss. The MORE inflammation I have on my scalp, the MORE damage I will do to my hair follicles and the more risk of hair loss I will have, the easiest way to see if you have inflammation on your scalp is the following… First of all, do you have an itchy scalp? Is that itching intermittent or does it happen when you apply a product like shampoo? Do you have dandruff? Do you have seborrheic dermatitis? If the answer is yes to any of these questions, you surely have inflammation. In many cases, this itching is caused by an imbalance of microorganisms that we have on our scalp, such as an overgrowth of some type of bacteria, fungus or demodex (parasites that feed on the oil on our scalp), but be aware Keep in mind that there are other causes of inflammation that do not necessarily lead to hair loss, as they do with psoriasis.
In most cases that you have inflammation linked to an imbalance of microorganisms, this is fixed by improving your nutrient levels on the one hand and balancing your flora on the other. Obviously, when talking about the scalp, it is NOT ONLY the bacterial flora of your intestine that you have to improve, it is also that of the skin, this means that you need to take probiotics and not damage the bacterial flora, but it also means avoiding products that are going to alter the pH of your skin and end up altering the flora that can develop.
On the other hand, when we think of dandruff as inflammation, we always accelerate the speed at which cells are replaced, which is why it is common to find when you have a more inflammatory pattern, more dandruff.
Three of the nutrients that I named above are essential to maintain a balanced immune response in the scalp and avoid dermatitis or dandruff. But, also to keep these overgrowth of microorganisms that can lead to inflammation at bay.
If I mentioned Vitamin D and the regulation of the immune system response, obviously Vitamin D is going to be one of them, Zinc too and on the other hand, iron / ferritin because it points to the same thing. The optimal values of these substances for good hair quality are 50 - 80 ng/mL Vitamin D, 70 - 200 ng/mL Ferritin and 70 - 120 ng/mL Zinc. This is important because many times it does not coincide with the normal values or the values that we have for reference.
On the other hand, it is important that you understand when we have dandruff or when we have dermatitis, that the MORE inflammation we have, the FASTER we change the cells of our scalp, therefore, the more dandruff we produce because our bacterial flora does not have (or parasites too) long enough to destroy, degrade, and feed on that cell slough. So, we see flaking in larger parts, we all lose that cell, only people who don't have dandruff lose it microscopically. Once I understand that inflammation is bad and that it can have many causes, including nutritional ones, from bacterial flora or tendencies of inflammation due to the simple fact that my immune system responds in an exaggerated way, how do I solve it? I do have a flora imbalance that generates inflammation, improving my flora; taking probiotics, avoiding foods that alter my bacterial flora and avoiding skin or scalp products that alter my pH. If I have a nutritional problem; correcting those nutritional imbalances. But, if I have an exaggerated immune response (tendency to exaggerated inflammation per se); my first advice regarding this is to alter your balance of Omega-3 and Omega-6, when we consume like the vast majority of the population (plus Omega -6 than Omega-3), we generate a pro-inflammatory trend in our body, that means that when faced with a response we are going to have more inflammation than another person, how do I correct this? Compensating for this imbalance, consuming much more Omega-3 and much less Omega-6, this decrease in Omega-6 is done by avoiding industrialized products on the one hand, but also on the other hand, it is done by avoiding vegetable oils (corn, soybean, sunflower, canola, etc.) which are all oils that have a tendency to unbalance this Omega-3:Omega-6 ratio, on the other hand I can take Omega-3 or consume more fish and shellfish that usually provide me with the type of Omega-3 that I need which are the EPA and DHA subtypes and it helps me to rebalance this ratio and have less tendency to generate inflammation later, not only on the scalp, but throughout your body.
Therefore, there is no specific combination of supplements that you have to consume for your hair, what you really have to do is resolve the underlying mechanism that you have (whether it is hormonal, nutritional or inflammatory). But how long do I have to take supplements for hair loss? Depends. If your problem is related to DHT and is hormonal, you can improve Testosterone metabolism by keeping more Testosterone and less DHT by following the advice I mentioned above, but it is something that will be present throughout your life. On the other hand, if it is due to inflammation or nutritional deficiencies, it is even EASIER, because I only have to use these supplements until the underlying problem is fixed. Many times this supplementation continues for a long time because you have a restrictive diet that leads to an imbalance. especially if you are avoiding animals it is an iron deficit, for example.
On the other hand, if you used a product like Minoxidil, remember that leaving these factors that stimulate hair growth leads to rapid hair loss called the "rebound effect." Therefore, keep in mind that if you are going to use it, it has to be your LAST OPTION and that you are going to have to continue it, so it is not a good idea unless it is LAST OPTION.
TL;DR: Block the mechanisms that cause hair loss, supplement any deficits you have, reduce inflammation and correct your hormonal imbalances. If this is not enough, you can use growth stimulants, the most common is Minoxidil but it is not my recommendation for the same reason that I have just mentioned, there are other growth stimulants such as lasers or platelet-rich plasma, which are also beneficial for your health.
Remember that hair goes through several phases: fall phase, growth phase and growth stagnation phase. All these phases are normal hair development that last several weeks each and always remember that the imbalances you have will take time to show changes. Therefore, if you are going to do something for your hair that you last at least three or four months under treatment so that you can see if it worked or not.
My next thread will be about how to reverse Aging and some substances such as NAD that also provide energy, so that this is fulfilled, reach this thread to at least 50 reactions and vote for me here, you have 20 minutes!
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