Mental health aspect of hair loss

Hi everyone hope you are all doing well. I kind of just wanted to vent here and ask for advice through all of this because I want to hear the opinions of strangers online who have/are going through the same thing I am.

So a little story time I started noticing hair loss when I was 20 (I’m 22 now). This was around Jan 2024. Nothing too major, but my hairline was receding a bit but I chose to do nothing about it. Then my hair started thinning a bit on the crown and my hairline receded a bit more but I still looked like I had a full head of hair so I chose not to do anything about it. I looked at finasteride and minoxidil at the time but was in denial and told myself it wasn’t that serious. I thought of anything to disillusion myself from what I was facing. End of 2024 December my hair was fraying and thinning at the top and it just looked gross although I had my hair on the sides.

It was then I decided to buzz my hair. I saw my aggressive M shape hairline and my heart dropped to my stomach. I’d never felt so shocked and upset as I did after that haircut. My hairline looked so bad, it was the classic vegeta. After I buzzed it I didn’t go out the house for a while. It affected my social life a lot because I was in university at the time. It affected my appearance and self esteem a lot and gave me some pretty dark thoughts about myself. It was then I started taking 1mg finasteride and 2.5mg oral minoxidil.

I’ve been on it for a year now and I think I see some improvement. I feel more confident in myself and I have to tell myself everyday that it’s going to be ok and I’m doing the best for me and my hair. My hairline is still chopped but it grows in a way where it covers it up pretty well and it’s only an issue on windy days. However some days I feel like my hair looks good and some days it does not. Some days I feel like my hairline is improving when I examine it and some days it feels and looks like it isn’t improving. It’s a very confusing feeling.

I guess I’m writing this to ask if anyone has gone through anything like this and if it got better for them, hair wise and mental health wise. I know at the end of the day it’s just hair but obviously it’s a big deal for a lot of people lmao. I also want to know if people used the medication I’m using to recover their hairline a little bit. Have you found success? I would love to hear some encouraging stories about people getting their hair back to a point they are happy with. Feel free to vent about your personal hair loss struggles too and if you’re going through anything like this. I would love to hear them too.