Lessening Social Anxiety about Your Transplant
Q:
There’s one area of my life that is more pronounced than my hair loss. It’s the amount of anxiety I suffer from on a daily basis. My anxiety levels increase greatly when I find myself in social situations surrounded by people chatting constantly. It’s very overwhelming to me trying to keep up with the various conversations. I’m working towards getting a transplant but my anxiety about answering questions about the procedure is already growing. Do you have any advice for my situation?
A:
We conducted a study whose results were published as Psychology of Hair Transplant in Hair Transplant Forum Journal in 2008. In this study, we noted that younger men with hair loss had a significant improvement in their anxiety after restoring their hair. This improvement could be explained by the social anxiety these men endured on a regular basis due to their hair loss.
So you might in fact improve your anxiety by doing a hair transplant procedure and by taking care of your male patterned baldness.
One important fact to remember is the transplanted hair grows very slowly. This means that people who see you on a regular basis won’t be able to detect the new hair growth. It will not be difficult to hide the new hair except for the first few days/weeks. During that time period, you might see some redness or scabbing from the newly transplanted hair in the recipient area.