r/TelogenEffluvium

I shed like crazy 1 year ago but since then I hadn't shed much, but also haven't seen regrowth either. Not long ago I noticed also more thinning in crown area more than before (it's TE diagnosed by professional, not AGA) and fixed one of possible causes, which was vitamin D for me just this month. I've noticed lots of tiny hairs that don't add any volune start coming in over the last 30 days, but as I said, they are so thin you can't really see them all that much. So my question is : how long until my hair is back? Or at least until my scalp is not as visible? It's really visible now, especially under light and at my vertex, and I have school coming up in 2 weeks which gives even more anxiety.

i’ve recently checked my iron and ferritin because i’ve read so much about it on this subreddit. my doctor thinks my TE is from going off birth control and/or losing some weight, she didn’t want to test my vitamins & minerals. so i went ahead and ordered a test through a private clinic that offers testing because if i am low in something that could affect my hair i do want to fix it.

my tests came back as serum iron 7,8 and ferritin 26. the serum iron is a bit low but can differ throughout the day as i understand it. the ferritin is not too low, at least in my country (sweden), but from what i understand it’s still too low for optimal hair health.

i want to start supplementing iron but when i asked my doctor how much i should take, she said ”take a multivitamin”. i’m not sure that’s enough as i really want to get my levels up. so i wonder what you guys with low iron/ferritin took (how much iron and what kind)? and how long are you supplementing for? just for a while or for a long time?

i have a sensitive stomach and not sure which kind of iron would be best, but read that iron bisglycinate is supposed to be stomach friendly? also read something about taking iron every other day, instead of every day, could be better for both stomach and absorption.

if anyone wants to share what and how much you take, how often and for how long, i’d be super thankful.

thank you ❤️

currently dealing with a pretty severe case of what i think is telogen effluvium… jan - feb i began dieting and since i have lost a lot of weight, in fact i became under weight and lost my period in the process. i don’t diet anymore and eat completely normal but i guess the damage was done and roughly 2 months ago i began shedding like a literal dog. i already have pretty fine short hair to begin with so seeing clumps in every shower and all over my pillows and clothing is pretty heart breaking. it has destroyed my confidence entirely, leaving the house is hard. my hair looks totally different my hair line at the sides i so fine u can see through to my scalp and it just feels like a never ending nightmare. i bought some topical minoxidil and a hair serum from “the ordinary” brand in hope this will help regrowth but i was just hoping to get a sense how long others experienced telegen effluvium for and how they coped mentally? because it seriously is affecting my mental health. i have a history of depression and this has sent me right back into another episode which may sound vain but it just feels like i’ve lost all control. my hair is literally falling from my head rapidly and it feels like nothing will ever make it stop.

Topics:
Why I share this
Quick intro
How to know if it’s TE at home
Why it happens
How to validate it
What not to do
What to do about stressors:
- Nutrient deficiency & Health Issues
- Caloric Deficit Trigger
- Emotional Stressors

Why I share this:
I keep following this subreddit with different eyes (after shedding ended) and I notice how scary this timeline was for me and it probably is for many. It would be better if great advice wouldn’t get buried under so many scary new stories being uploaded every day. I hope this is helpful to someone.

Quick intro:
My first massive hair loss happened all of a sudden in May 2025 after a shower. Hands, shower sink, floor, full of hair. This continued until 1st week of June 2026 (a full year). I’m 36M, Latino and my family has good hair genetics (no alopecia). Always did sports and in general, ate very well. I didn’t have a major negative event going on in my life before my first shedding but since I can remember I always had high cortisol levels AM/PM and in those months I was going through tough situations but nothing extreme in health nor psychological. What I did do, was go through a very high caloric deficit diet with high protein, and training very heavy (more on this below).

How to know if it’s TE at home?
At a high level you can know it’s TE if the shedding is (1) sudden and massive, (2) it’s widespread to different regions of your head and, (3) if you pull hairs from different regions, a bunch come out in your fingers. With this, it is very likely it is TE. Someone with Androgenetic Alopecia (AGA) will lose hair with time, but not at this rate. If they pull their hair, it won’t come out easily. It will be strong. It will just fall by itself through time.

Why it happens?
Oversimplified: it’s not just high stress. It’s high stress when you are nutrient deficient and or going through an hormonal imbalance. A sudden sickness, a caloric deficit diet, an emotional stressor event are all stress for the body. If your body is going through any of these, you are going to absorbe critical nutrients at a higher rate than normal. And if you’re low on these, your body will find a way to get them. For many body functions you need Vitamin D, Ferritin and Zinc, but these are especially critical for your hair. If you are deficient on these, your body will use what little you have for more important things than your hair, so it will fall. If you’re not deficient on these perhaps there’s something hormonal going on which I’m not an expert on because I didn’t have issues on that area.

How to validate it?
Go to a trichologist doctor or a dermatologist with a specialty in trichology. But be advised: this industry is full of scammers thirsty for your money. Make sure the place looks more like a medical clinic and the professional looks more like a doctor. They will do three things: (1)check your lab results for Vitamin D, Ferritin and Zinc, so bring those before your first consultation, (2) pull your hair in different regions of your head, and (3) check with a trichoscope for scalp health and follicle units, which is just a small clump of hairs, usually 1 to 3 that grow together out of one spot on the scalp, like a mini hair “cluster”, this last tells them whether hair is falling out evenly everywhere (pointing to TE). With these, you should have a good diagnosis. Anything outside of this could be a hormonal imbalance, but I don’t know much about this. My case was an obvious bad relationship between high constant stress and key nutrient deficiency. Finally, if you do have more predisposition to baldness due to genetics, recommendations will go around pills or sprays of finasteride or dutasteride (this one is the best). They slow down the rate of hair loss caused by hormones caused by your genes. But if it’s only TE, you will probably only need oral/spray minoxidil to speed up shedding of hairs that are already programmed to fall so your hair growth can reset. This may take a few rounds of hairs falling (you will see long and short hairs falling. With or without bulbs, perhaps even white ones. Don’t worry about that, it is normal.

Tips: (1) Don’t do surgery and don’t pay for any pills or sprays until you have a diagnosis that makes sense and that you understand. Use your full consultation hour for questions. (2) Corner the doctor to what you need. Say something like you only want a diagnosis and no products, because you’re leaving the country for a year and you read that they are great providing in depth diagnosis which is why you came for. Really, corner them. (3) If a doctor sounds like a salesman, he is. If you feel he checked you poorly and rushed, he is doing it. Corner them to what you need from the start or leave for another one. My doctor recommended me products I could buy in any shop, not from him, great signal.

Do’s and Dont’s

Shedding is good and your hair will come back. Period. It can take 3 months, a year like me, or more. But it will come back. It’ll be more or less noticeable depending on what type of hair you have, or if your TE has stayed intense for a long period, of course scalp will be more visible. But it can all go back to normal if you treat it correctly.

What not to do:
Stop inventing lotions with rosemary or other stuff without your doctor. You may get an infection. Don’t start medicines without your doctor, you might not need what you’re taking and the dose could harm you. Don’t avoid showers. You may get a scalp infection. Again, don’t avoid showers, let all those hair fall. They will fall anyways. In fact go take a long shower, and softly, not pulling, help them slide and fall. Cry if you want, but do it. And do this in every shower. Every 2-3 days. Shedding is good. You need these hairs to fall to allow the new micro baby hairs to take their turn. You won’t be able to see them but they are already trying to push those out. Your hairs are falling with or without showers, but when you postpone those showers, those loose hairs get accumulated entangled with other hairs and that’s why in your next shower you will have a heart attack for the “massive shedding”. You’re just accumulating. Let them fall.

Shedding is good. The faster they fall the faster new hairs take their place. But this will happen if you also do the right things for the causes:

What to do about stressors:

Nutrient deficiency: Get your key nutrient levels back to normal asap. Check your Vitamin D, Ferritin and Zinc. This is the foundation of everything. Most people are chronically deficient on these and they don’t even know how harmful it is for the long term not just for the hair (short term). A health issue can make you deficient of those nutrients during the buildup as well, triggering TE.

Caloric deficit: Check what was wrong with your caloric deficit. If you’re deficient in Vitamin D, Ferritin and Zinc, then your diet is not being very nutritional. Or your body is not handling it well. To fix your TE, I’d say reduce your caloric deficit or even go for a surplus for sometime to correct. Then learn what happened. Maybe you were not eating enough healthy fats? The caloric deficit was too high? Maybe the caloric deficit was happening while having high cortisol or an emotional stressor situation, absorbing your nutrients faster than you thought. Which leads us finally to:

Emotional Stressor:
This is very complex but I’ll share how I’m handling it. I’m still struggling with it but my TE stopped. I’ve had constant high levels of cortisol AM/PM for years (lab tests confirmed). I believe mixing a caloric deficit with my high levels of cortisol is what led me to TE.

What I like to believe has worked for me is understanding that stress will never leave, and it’s all about how I handle stress. If you’re waiting for issues or problems to go, you need to wake up. Life is full of obstacles. The problem is how you learned and made a mental habit to manage them. The sleepless nights, sweats, anxiety, waking up at 3AM is a result of your habits handling your situations unconsciously. I’ve always been shocked about how some people live in the middle of an apocalypse, and still give the energy like they just came from the beach.

Something I learned is that the mind controls the body, but also the body can control the mind. In the same way that a bad thought can make you anxious physically, a calmed body, can also calm your mind. So:

(1) Let your body tell your mind to calm the fudge down. Basically fake calmness with your body till your mind believes it. Next time you are tense: check if you are having shallow breathing. Holding your breath. Tensing muscles somewhere? Next time you feel tense close your eyes and pay attention to these things and regulate them consciously. If you can’t concentrate on that and fall back to your thoughts it’s a clear signal of mental programming/habit.

(2) Make your body behave like it’s relaxed at the beach during your entire waking hours. Not a one hour meditation or a 30 min journaling. Your bad habit is active the entire day unconsciously, so you need to be as conscious as you can during the entire day to keep your body relaxed. Even if your mind is racing in negativity, breath calmly, don’t tense any muscles, walk slowly, look at the sun. It will be hard but to be honest, that’s how you wish your body could feel the entire day. Don’t you? Be consistent the entire day, and do it for weeks. Your body tells your explosive mind that there is no lion around, I’m chilling, so you chill. But habits take time. If you constantly forget, again, it’s a signal that you built a bad mental habit over the years. It won’t make a big difference in 1-2 weeks but it will kick in the more you do it! Be especially self-aware in tense situations.

It may be exhausting to be hyper aware to force your calmness, do it anyways. Kind of ironic, right?

Finally combine this with Magnesium Glycenate (400mg for women/500mg for men). Perhaps take 210mg in the morning and 210mg in the night as a man. This is not for sleep. It’s to calm the nervous system and we are all chronically deficient of this mineral. Keep in mind that if it says: Serving Size: 3 capsules and that is 210mg, it means each pill is actually 70mg you need 6 pills to get to 420mg. Normally is not just one pill. People usually underdose magnesium.

Extra: don’t do weed if you have chronic high cortisol. Cortisol will lead it to the wrong places.

If I missed something I will edit this post and add updates at the end.