LaDolceDita

I went and spoke to another doctor today and he said something that I thought I'd mention here, see if others agree;

He said under 'symptoms of PCOS' body hair is up there. Hair loss however he says is under 'less common symptoms'. He said this is because all men pretty much get facial hair, stomach hair, chest hair, etc. But not all men get hair loss. He said in order for a woman with PCOS to lose hair they'd have to have the genetic disposition as well as the higher levels of male hormone. (Unless they had some androgen producing tumour, and then hair loss becomes the least of one's worries)

This makes sense to me; I dont think I've ever seen a man without facial hair/stubble. I have the same hair pattern so far as my father; face (although very little- just some fine but darker hair under chin and upper lip), snail trail, legs, arms, knuckles (ugh!). My terminal hair on my lower legs and forearms is also the same medium brown color as his. But he has no terminal hair on his chest; neither do I.

Basically he said body hair is far more common because men get it, but balding isn't. Is there any truth to this?

BlueEyesSmilin

Not that i'm aware of. I believe that the scalp hair loss is totally related to the PCOS and remember reading somewhere that if your father had male pattern baldness you were more likely to suffer from thinning hair as well.

Please someone correct me if i'm wrong.

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joyblack

That's more or less correct in general terms -- or put it another way, PCOS gives us a "male" hair distribution pattern.

However there are various other points that could be made:
* With women who have PCOS the hair growth or loss tends to develop a bit slower than in most males
* With women who have PCOS the hair growth or loss tends to be less extreme than in most males
* It's important to remember that there are important racial differences with regard to hair growth -- for example, pure bred native-American males have no beard growth and likewise, largely with Inuit, while most Asian males, other than from the Indian sub-continent, have very light hair growth and aren't nearly so likely to go bald, so there's considerable variation even among males. Even a typical non-PCOS American woman of Caucasian ethnicity is likely to have heavier moustache growth than a pure-bred Native-American Indian male.

I think the most sensible way to look at the whole question is to ask oneself "What sort of hair growth or loss pattern would I expect if I was male?" and to expect a similar pattern to develop, though probably not in such an extreme form. I think the distress brought about in the course of fighting the hair growth and/or loss is probably greater than the distress caused by the hair growth and/or loss itself. In other words, I subscribe to the theory that it's probably better to accept what is more or less inevitable (even though we wish it wasn't so), adopt whatever strategy of hair removal (for me, shaving) or cover up (wig etc,) may be best for us, and get on with life.

LaDolceDita

I understand what you're saying joy
But what do you mean by "What sort of hair growth or loss pattern would I expect if I was male?" How do we know this; is it by looking at other males in our family?