Four times, the hair on my head has thinned and grown much more slowly than usual. The first time, shortly before I was diagnosed with diabetes, was probably malnutrition; after I was back on insulin it picked back up. The second time, shortly before I was diagnosed with gallstones and subacute thyroiditis, was probably malnutrition again. The third time was unexplained. All three times, all of the hair on my body grew more slowly.
About a month ago, after cutting my hair pretty short, the hair on the top of my head didn't seem to be growing in normally even though the hairs on the sides of my head were. This time, I'm thinking it looks like male pattern baldness (my hairline has seemed to be maybe receding for the last couple of years).
Just for the heck of it, I thought I'd google around for health associations with male pattern baldness. In men in general, it is associated, apparently, with a higher rate of death from heart disease- about a 30% increase in risk. Among men with diabetes though, that risk is even more dramatically increased.
In this study of men with all types of diabetes aged 30-95 in Taiwan, the ones with male pattern baldness matched for age and sex had more than double the risk per year of dying from heart disease. This might be partly because of things causing balding also affecting insulin sensitivity.. or not.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23677087
This article on the risk of balding and risk of heart disease in men in general has a lot of theories on pages 20-21 : http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3641488
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On Friday I left my Regular at some friends' place and didn't go back for it until today. I tried bolusing with intramuscular Lantus and it seemed to work moderately well... my blood sugar was worse than usual but not so much that you could pick it out as my worst day or anything, and I did have two large meals.
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