I’m in my 40s and still have a “full” (I have the typical receding temple “M” type pattern but the “bald” temples still have some coverage) head of hair. I’m pretty self-conscious of the thinning, but I’m probably not balding to anyone else. And I’ve had a short closely trimmed beard for around a decade. I spent my first 30 years with my face clean-shaven and even with much better thicker hair I looked a lot worse back then. A couple times I’ve shaved and it looked ridiculous. So I mostly just trim it every couple weeks, even if it’s all the way down to heavy stubble territory.
If I ever went bald, I think I would have to rock the bald head/big beard look. Combovers look ridiculous. And so does a clean shaven face (for me). I wouldn’t grow a huge beard. But I wouldn’t rock the Uncle Fester look or the George Costanza.
Isn’t that the typical Satan combo? Or maybe I’m just thinking of Anton Lavey. I did an image search on “Satan Look” and mostly got pictures of Barack Obama.
Exactly correct. Once a week or so is even enough. Along with the beard evened out and faded into the scalp. Not the shiny dome but short enough to look neat. Began with alopecia areata onset even before pattern baldness, first having a barber do it, then just doing it myself.
Very little work involved. My wife would have preferred the curls I had stayed but that was not an option.
I was thinning pretty young and coincided well with being a punk rock, so my hair probably hasn’t been longer than 1/4" since I was 20. Shaved I totally look like a nazi skinhead, but cropped I think is ok.
Personally don’t like having a beard but don’t mind wino trim on occaision.
But someone like Isaac Hayes totally rocks the look. YMMV
I will confess that I generally dislike the appearance, but not because of any intrinsic disgust , but because many of the people I see rocking it under groom the beard.
I absolutely get that it’s a lot of work to keep clean, unknotted, and pleasant, especially after a meal, but . . . just no. Too many icky examples have created a personal prejudice, which like all such, should not be applied to an entire class of people, but I’m weak.
Overall though, I agree with many of the posters in thread, that if you’re losing your hair it generally a more visually attractive option to get rid of it all if you don’t go my FiL’s route of all hats, all the time. And I always wanted to grow a close cropped Riker beard, but my super curly jewfro facial hair was excessively curly the one time I tried to grow it out, and far from sufficiently even to make even a half-assed effort.
In my family, my father had a slowly receding hairline, with no open patch on the back, and just let it go, still looking fine in his 80s. My brother is similar, and has buzzed all his hair and beard down to less than a centimeter, and it works for him. My half brother has his father’s hair, and, well, I suspect he’ll join the bald & beard club in another few years as he loses all the hair off the top.
I have my maternal grandfather’s hair. I’ll probably have full loose curls until I drop dead. A point I make to my brother every time I see him.
I’m in my early fifties and thinning fast. During the waning days of the pandemic lockdown, I had the barber give me a very close buzz so I could see the future of my head. It was better than I expected.
Then I came home and my wife yelled at me and my younger daughter cried, so I regrew my usual length as best I could.
Well, that does sound like it might help boost your chances of dropping dead before you lose your hair, if your brother gets sufficienty tired of hearing it.
I think we’re at the point now where the look is so common it isn’t really considered endemic to the skinhead subculture. Although I suppose avoiding Doc Martins and leather jackets would probably help.
Shaved heads on white guys look silly. Someone should tell them it looks like their neck is blowing a bubble. I’ve heard they think it looks better than male pattern baldness, but here’s the thing: it’s not the hair on the sides that makes MPB look funny. It’s that big, white bald spot in the middle. I hate to tell them, but shaving their head does nothing to hide that full moon of pale skin on top. All they have done is make it worse, now they look like a shirt with a big thumb sticking out of it. Embrace what nature gave you, get a nice haircut and stop pretending that by shaving your head, we will never notice you are going bald.
Well, what really looks silly is a 90% bald head with just wisps of hair here and there. Shaving is much tidier.
And on the subject of lumpy bald heads, what’s a man to do when he has the scant wisps affliction AND a 7in divot in his skull from being hit in the head by an airplane prop??
Toupees are even more ridiculous than any of the above, so that’s totally not happening.
I shaved my head, turning bald by choice, as a way to show support for my gf when she was facing chemo. I shaved, then it turned out she didn’t need chemo, after all.
I kept my shaved head (and full beard) for a few years. A smooth skull feels so cool, and splashing cold water on a chrome dome is so refreshing.
However, shaving is time consuming. While I was bald I would shave at minimum once daily. When we went out for the evening I’d shave a second time. I hated having any stubble. I eventually stopped shaving and it grew back.
Just a note. Don’t rub a bald guys head. It doesn’t bring good luck or give you wishes. I tolerated it, like I tolerated women who wanted to braid my beard when it was ZZ Top length, but it’s really not proper.
I started to lose my hair around age 26 or so, and decided to just shave it all off. I’ve never gone back. I grow the beard- more accurately a van dyke- because otherwise my head is just a big pink bowling ball.
The shaved head looks good on the right dome (my shaved head would look like a relief map of Turkmenistan), but something about the full beard ending at the mid-ear just doesn’t look “correct.” Now, a Van Dyke or Goatee with chrome dome would look real Arabian Nights-ish.
Stubble top and fade in sides is made easier when the hair is white against pale skin. The lower beard still has color and suggest falsely that the rest of the hair would if it was only there.
I used to look like that. Not “shaved” but buzzed. However, once the pandemic started, I just let it grow and it’s about 10-12 inches all around now. I literally didn’t see anyone but my wife for like 2 years, so nobody saw all of the awkward in-between phases, especially the “unintentional mullet” phase.
I had a long beard but recently trimmed that back to just a couple inches from like 10. It was white/grey all around the edges so I cut away most of that part. My MIL asked if I was trying to look younger, but it was really just a convenient pre-existing line to cut by. Now it’s mostly black again except for a white streak down the chin and a little white around the sides.
