Hair Regrowth, Heart Disease & Sex Change

[francoislinkus]

I'm pretty sure estrogen is bad but this guy is saying it regrows hair? Depresses me that you can't seem to regrow hair without stopping T, DHT i.e being a man. I'm also bummed out by the link between baldness and heart disease as my Dad died young of a heart attack. Is this guy right about this stuff? That I can't be a man and have a healthy heart & head?

https://perfecthairhealth.com/trans-hormone-replacement-therapy-hair-regrowth/

 

[CLASH]

Hey Francois,
I am new to the forum (although not peat's work) but I've read the article you've posted and I am familiar with the author so I'd like to possibly provide some insight into the situation. I once had similar thought processes and feelings around the situation involving hormones and hair health.

In regards to the estrogen therapy, I don't think the injection of estradiol itself is what leads to increased hair growth in the male to female transition. It is more the spironolactone (anti-androgen, I think I read somewhere that it has progesterone-like effects on the forum), and the castration (anti-androgen). I don't think either of these things are necessarily good things to do to regrow hair though....

In regards to DHT, from what I understand, it seems to be involved as a mediator in hairloss. This seems to be somewhat undeniable. However, it is not the cause of hairless itself (an interesting conundrum at first reading). From what I understand hormones are messengers, mediators between cells. They are the products of a specific cellular environment, wether to signal the state of the environment or to respond to the state of the environment. So, what is causing hairless is the cellular environment, i.e. your overall health state, and DHT is more or less a signal of this health state or perhaps a mediator or response to this health state (atleast at the scalp level).

Furthermore, there is a thread on here (I can't post links, I'm a newcomer) somewhere where Haidut discusses that DHT can be converted downstream to beta-diol hormone derivates and these possibly are the mediators of hairloss. I think that this clearly shows the context of the cellular environment being involved in the hairloss as opposed to the DHT itself. This can also be seen with haiduts/ peats recommendation of being careful when taking hormones such as DHEA. If the environment in which DHEA is introduced is unhealthy, then DHEA has a higher chance of being converted into estrogen. Even though, DHEA is beneficial, as is DHT, the environment or context to which they are placed in can greatly determine the effects produced. Thus in the case of hairloss, again, I'd say DHT is more of an indicator, produced in response to an inflammatory environment or perhaps to signify or mediate the inflammatory environment. Modern medicine has happened to stumble upon DHT in relation to hairloss and confuse it as being the cause. With this, modern medicine seems to have gotten lost in the most basic aspect of logic, tending to believe that correlation equals causation. An easy example of this poor thinking is the cholesterol- heart disease hypothesis. The hypothesis goes as such: theres cholesterol in plaques in the arteries so this must be the cause of heart disease. This is akin to saying because their are firemen at the fire they must be the cause of fires. Although this analogy isn't 100% logically in line with the understanding of DHT, I think it exemplifies the thinking of modern medicine and such fallacies pretty well. I also think this indicates the importance of having a contexnt from which to look at things.

With this in mind, if DHT is removed, as is evident with finasteride, spironolactone, and male to female changes and the hairloss abates and is reversed then it seems that DHT is mediating the hairloss. However, is the inflammatory "estrogenic" environment that is inducing the DHT levels in the scalp to what they are abated and reversed? I would say most likely not. Also, it is possible that some of these treatments, like finasteride have direct anti-inflammatory effects. As Danny Roddy recently pointed out finasteride starts out as progesterone, so on top of reducing DHT, it also may have some anti-inflammatory effects that counteract the inflamed environment. But this still leaves the question as to what initiated the inflammatory environment to begin with? It may be nice to counteract inflammation with anti-inflammatory substances and to eliminate DHT (the mediator of hairloss) but I think it would be even better to stop the production of inflammation from its root. Also, something interesting and inspiring to keep in mind, is that if men who have significant hairloss can fully regrow their lost hair with a sex change (as pictured in the link you posted) then I think its fully possible for men who aren't undergoing a sex change who have lost hair to significantly regrow their hair.

So to recap about DHT:
1) it is a mediator/ messenger perhaps a protective mechanism of a possibly inflamed cellular environment and it can lead to hairloss but it is downstream from the actual cause which is the environment itself. Thus, DHT causes hairloss, but is not the cause of hairloss haha.

 

[BrianF]

No, its not correct. Its all kinds of wrong. Its so wrong that calling it wrong doesnt really do it justice.

Check out Danny Roddy, also check what Ray Peat himself has said about MPB. Estrogen is more likely to be the culprit in MPB and in female hairloss.

 

[CLASH]

Hey BrianF,
Thanks for responding. I think that maybe you misunderstood what I was saying. If you'd lend me your ear for a moment I'd like to perhaps rearrange the wording of what I said so perhaps it would make more sense. I agree that an estrogenic environment is what induces baldness but based on finasteride, male-to-female transgenderism, spironolactone and other anti-androgenic therapies effectiveness on treating baldness, I believe that DHT may actually be a mediator or involved in the baldness process itself. This does not mean that DHT itself is the cause of baldness, in fact the estrogenic environment may be the cause and DHT just a bystander in the process. Thanks for your time BrianF.

 

[BrianF]

Hey Clash, i was responding to the initial poster, not to your post. Your post is absolutely correct. Its the infirmation that someone gave to Francois i felt was very wrong.

Glad we got that sorted out. You must have thought me quite rude.

 

[CLASH]

No worries, BrianF.
I apologize for the miscommunication.
No, not at all, I've read forums long enough to see that sometimes peoples responses are strong.
Glad were on the same page.
Thanks for your time, hopefully this can help Francois out.