new thread
Hey guys, as I saw the thread about creatine it put me into thinking since I started working out heavy about 1 year ago. I'm letting my hair grow for arround 2 and a half years and I noticed despite the increase in length that my hair got a lot thinner and "fewer" since I stared lifting. I also lost about 25 Kgs of fat after starting going to the gym and to compensate and help my body I also got myself quite a lot of supplements.
Now I know about the DHT issue and was wondering if there is something that damages my hair growth in the supplemnts also. I'm taking the following suplements wise:
Dymatize ELite Whey Isolate (protein powder, about 3 scoops a day)
API Amino 2300 (BCAAs, about 6-9 tablets a day)
Animal Pak (multivitamin, 1 pack a day)
Animal Flex (minerals for the joints, 1 pack a day)
and cycling EFX Kre-Alkalyn (creatine pills)
I'm planing to eliminate all supplements except the protein powder( since I doubt it can have any major negative effect on my hair) and see if there is any improvement. Thing is I don't know what's causing the thinning, should I try to find a "anti DHT" shampoo or will reducing the supplements work?
My hair is about 50 cm long and wavy almost curly at ends, my routine is shampoo & condition once a week, if I'm really sweaty I do a water only wash inbetween. I produce a LOT of sebum, so the conditioner is mostly to recover after the chlorine from swimming(wich I have to do once a week for the next two months)
I'm 21 years old and my direct relatives don't have any hair issues or at least never so young (my father for example started having a receding line just in his 50s and even then he still has enough hair) so I doubt it is genetic.
Sorry for the wall of text but I know there must be others here who work out and are interested on this subject. Any tips and hints are welcome.
Congrats with the weightloss!
However losing weight for longer periods of time, like stress and illness is bad for your body and it goes into efficient mode (even when just eating under maintenance instead of completely starving yourself) and that will eventually reflect in your hair also.
As a CF'er I can tell periods of illness, antibiotics and what not in how much my hair grows and if it thins or not, however the effects are small (ie.: probably not visible to others) and in better times it seems to recover with renewed hairgrowth.
Even how much and hard you work out will probably reflect in your hair, if you're on the verge of overtraining a lot (stress) especially when cutting fat that'll reflect in your hair like I described above.
..As for supplements besides creatine even proteine can be damaging to your liver and kidneys as well if you take really large amounts (2-3x bodyweight in kg in grams of proteine a day or more as often advertised is probably overdoing it, atleast I got really good results with 1.5x max. as well)
Supplement companies would like to sell as much as they can.. but scientific studies usually seem to disappoint.
Yeah and long hair gets in the way when lifting weights sometimes even though I'm always cautious of that myself. Over time I'll have lost more hair that way then without it but shrug, so it goes, priorities, for example what good is hair if you don't have the stamina for a good headbanging session. (atleast my neck is far better upto prolonged metal windmilling since working out! \m/ >_< \m/ )
Hehe thanks, my weight loss was mild though as in I didn't loose more than 2-2.5 kgs a month, but still I think it had some effect on my hair. I plan on burning at least 10 more kgs this summer. Thing is as you said it too, my overall body health is at least as important as my hair, but I hope I won't get bald from trying to have both. I will try and see after I finish the supplements that I have left to start taking them in lower doses and maybe change some since the animal pack has a LOT of vitamin A wich I heard damages hair, but there will still be the DHT problem.
Btw, I love metal too! (and since working out my neck got a lot thicker from shrugs and deadlifts :D) /headbang :)
Solfaur, Check out this page on protein powder. http://www.fitnessatlantic.com/whey_protein_hard_facts.htm
I was taking WHC protein powder and a year ago I had a heart attack as a result of hardening of the arteries. I did research on the powder and found it could cause hardening of the arteries so I stopped taking it.
Interesting read, and also sorry about the heart attack but the protein powder I'm taking is from the microfiltered whey isolate cathegory so I think I'm safe on this side, on the other hand though the whey protein bars I'm eating from time to time when I am on the run are not (most probably they are WPC since they are very cheap) so I will try and take it slower with those.