by I was lying on an operating table at 6am in Istanbul the most vulnerable I have ever felt. I was run through the hospital minutes before, I was given forms to sign as an interpreter explained the procedure and my head was completely shaved. Holding back tears and shaking from anxiety and cold, I was given Xanax to calm my nerves. Soon I was connected to IV drips and blood pressure monitoring and put under anaesthetic.
Although this is all dramatic and a bit careless on my part, I had carefully and meticulously planned that I wanted a hair transplant.
As the grandson and younger brother of two completely bald men I knew very well that the time would come for me to get a transplant. Everything in my life came from my mother’s side of the family: my thinning and disappearing hair, my sensitive skin and my love for marshmallows and chipotle chips!
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Unlike most guys my hair wasn’t receding from the front, I was slowly losing it from the back. I didn’t notice how fast my hair was falling out because I couldn’t see it looking forward. My biggest wake up call was when a family member loudly and gleefully asked what I was going to do about the “big gap” in my head followed by a barber putting in my “punishment spot”. expressed.
The process
I started working and quickly got an appointment with a trichologist in Dublin with the help of my colleague, Grainne. However, my excitement about starting the process soon ended when I was told that a hair transplant would not completely solve my problem and was not a miracle answer to my hair loss. He told me that a hair transplant was basically a Band-Aid over a wound, that it would be a short-term solution. And I thought my new hair chances were gone.
This consultation really put a stop to my plans and I felt that I had no other feasible solutions that would work for me and my budget.
Fast forward 12 months and I was back in the consulting chair of another Dublin trichologist. What changed this time was his attitude towards me and my hair. He agreed that a hair transplant would not be a lifelong solution, it would be something that would last 10 years or so and told me I could get another one again.
Ten years is a long time and who knows what could happen between now and then? I might get hit by a bus, there might be changes in hair technology or I might want to embrace the buzz cut look.
Treatment in Turkey
I flew to Turkey in January 2023, telling only a handful of people. I am an extreme person in the right situation and I talk a lot, but when it comes to something personal in my life I tend to withdraw into myself and stay closed and private. I wanted this experience to be mine and I didn’t want to be bombarded with texts and calls no matter how good they were. I talked about it with selected people and only when I was ready.
Santa gave me my flights for Christmas, they came in at around €480. The cost of the operation included three nights in a hotel, bank charges and airport transfers. That was €3,200.
I noticed that a guy I knew from my younger years looked a little different on Instagram, so I reached out and asked him if he had done work. He was very helpful and directed me to Dr. Serkan Aygin’s clinic. I was put at ease traveling to Turkey because I knew the clinic was reputable, I had a first hand account of how things worked and my friend A1 looked at me with the results.
My experience with the operation was not good, however, I felt panicked, alone and scared. People have said that I didn’t prepare or research beforehand, but you can’t research how your brain is going to react to a situation you’ve never been in, no matter how many people you talk to or how many reviews or article you read. .
I’ve never been in hospital before, I’ve never been on a drip and, of course, I’ve never had anyone operate on my scalp for almost eight hours. The first part of the operation involved removing the “grafts” from my “donor area”. Basically, this was removing a collection of follicles from the back and sides of my head to transplant into the front and crown areas.
I was face down and asleep for most of the operation, but I could feel what was happening in my head when I woke up. It felt like a clicking pen going across my head. Click in to cut out the tiny piece of scalp and click out again.
The second half of the procedure was putting the grafts into my “recipient area” where I had lost my hair and that was very painful. I felt so many incisions and the hair replanted into my head again.
My face was covered and the technicians around me were speaking Turkish, so I had no idea what was happening. I kept asking them how much time was left as I passed out from the pain.
I also received bad news the day before the surgery. In consultation before I flew to Turkey I was told I needed 3,400 grafts, but when I arrived the dermatologist told me I needed 6,000 almost double the amount. The issue was that they could only do 4,200 in one go. I understand that in one sense, they weren’t going to remove too much of my hair and donor hair that I already had, but it meant that I would have to do this all over again.
I had a vision of having a perfect head of hair for the summer. Now that dream turned into a nightmare with another flight to Turkey and more surgery in a strange country, when I left without understanding the language I was more isolated and vulnerable.
Transplant number two
Getting my procedure in Ireland was what I always wanted. But I felt that there was a price for this because some clinics here charge almost €20,000. I would never have that kind of money, especially knowing that the results are not for life.
After my experience in Istanbul I was worried about going under the knife again. The initial recovery meant I couldn’t exercise, be in the sun or wear a hat for various periods of time. Then I was stuck wearing a hat for another long time. With two autumn weddings and a sun holiday, I had to plan my next surgery carefully as I wanted to feel and look my best.
I found Growclub on Instagram and my interest was piqued as they were based in Dublin and the price point was almost identical to what I paid in Turkey. The big difference was that I didn’t have to use a piece of annual leave, it was only two days compared to six the first time. I could drive myself there and back too.
My nerves definitely increased again and one of the owners of the clinic saw that it was on the ball with a few squares of chocolate to relax me. I left my house that morning at 8am, I arrived at a small clinic and I didn’t feel like a number in a big hospital.
The operating room was set up with a huge TV and Netflix and after sleeping through the extraction process I sat up and binged on At Home With The Furys in the afternoon. I don’t remember the anesthetic or how I was put through the first round, but in Dublin I had a series of needles inserted into the crown of my head. Once that slightly uncomfortable process was over, I felt nothing. My overall mood and feeling was much better than my experience in Turkey, where I felt scared and anxious. In Dublin, I was completely treated like a princess.
The Result
Last year was jam-packed. I went to Eurovision in Liverpool, celebrated my 30th birthday and attended a hen party and a wedding while my hair was growing back and it looked weird. The first time I noticed proper growth was when I could blow dry it and style it in July, exactly six months after the first operation.
I feel much more confident in myself, I don’t realize that people are looking at or judging my bald patch and anytime anyone calls my hair “fluffy” or “full”, I go from ear to ear. I feel 10 feet tall, and not just because I have a giant quiff again.
Read the full feature in this month’s issue of RSVP Magazine – on shelves now.
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