I almost lost my hair AND my sex drive at 22. Here is what actually worked.

I'm 23. Two years ago I was pretty sure I'd look like Patrick Stewart by 25.

I went the nuclear option route — a DHT blocker at 21, the thing everyone on Reddit swears by. It worked. It also nearly cost me other things I would prefer to keep functional.

This is what I learned. If you have a working scroll wheel and a hairline, you're going to want to read this.

1. DHT blockers work. Here's the part Reddit underplays.

Within 6 weeks my shedding had slowed. Cool. Within 6 weeks I also had:

Brain fog so dense I forgot the word for "fork" in a Chipotle.

Mood that bottomed out for no reason in particular.

And — I'll just say this part with a little distance — my college girlfriend was the one who pointed out that something was off in the bedroom. At 22. I will never forget the conversation.

The Reddit threads about the side effects that linger long after you quit the pills are real, by the way. I didn't believe them either. I was wrong.

2. The math wasn't mathing.

I quit. Cold turkey. The sides took a couple months to fully clear. The hair loss came right back, of course — the moment you stop fin, your DHT picks up where it left off.

So now I was back at square one but minus three months of self-confidence. I had a choice: accept the receding hairline, or find something that didn't trade my hormones for my hair.

Trading hair for a working sex drive is, in retrospect, a bad deal. Trading hair for nothing is worse. I went looking for option C.

3. Option C: GHK-Cu.

A buddy of mine got into peptides for cycling recovery. He texted me one day: "this is the one for hair, it doesn't touch your hormones."

It's called GHK-Cu. It's not a drug. It's a tripeptide — three amino acids stuck to a copper atom — that your body already makes. You apply it topically. It signals dormant follicles to wake up. That's the whole pitch.

No hormonal effect. No systemic side effects. Just a signal your scalp is already supposed to be receiving but isn't getting enough of as you age.

I was skeptical. I was also out of options that didn't involve a transplant or a permanent hat.

4. Six months in.

The before-and-after at the top of this article is from my phone. I didn't doctor it. I didn't get a transplant. I didn't go back on DHT blockers.

What changed in those six months:

Hair density at the temples and frontal hairline came back. The fluffy baby hairs at the part filled in by month three. By month six other people were the ones bringing it up.

Sex drive: fully intact.

Mood: fine.

Bedroom function: nobody's filing complaints.

This is the part where I'd usually say "your mileage may vary." It probably will. But the molecule has 50 years of research behind it, no documented systemic side effects, and exactly zero downsides I personally experienced.

5. Where to get it without getting scammed.

Most "peptides" online are labeled "research use only" — which is a legal loophole that means nobody is checking what's actually in the bottle. I didn't trust any of them. I ended up on Maneup Labs because they're U.S.-made, third-party tested, and they actually tell you how much peptide is in the bottle. Their product is called Restore.

I'm not getting paid to say this. I'm 23 and I have hair and my hormones are still mine. If you're at the part of the journey where you're researching DHT blockers at 1 a.m. — read this twice and consider the other option first.

6. If you want to try it.

Right now it's on sale — up to 57% off and it locks in at $36/month if you autoship. Prices will not be lower than this week.

— Benjamin