I’m not too sure if this idea would work for everyone but this accidental discovery helped me to turn grey and white facial hairs dark again… but for quite a different purpose.
Full disclosure: I’m transgender, and getting well up in years and thus faced with two problems regarding my facial hair.
#1 is I had and still have way too much of it, and I want it ALL Gone!
#2 is that it was already very much turned salt and pepper by the time I began my transition so that roughly half the facial hairs were not susceptible to laser treatment for removal or reduction that way.
I bought a 24 month subscription to a local laser removal clinic and began the long journey to getting this stuff nuked off my face and neck. The clinic used a Soprano Ice laser system and the lady who operated it is well trained and was a nurse for many of her younger adult years before starting a family and then a new career in a wide variety of laser dermqtological-related treatments of more kinds than I even knew existed. The laser did a remarkable job on thinning out my still-dark facial hairs and something kind of miraculous happened about halfway thru the 24 months when my hormone doctor added progesterone to my hormone replacement therapy. Progesterone began to turn my formerly grey and white facial hairs dark again, and they grew more robustly as well. Hairs that were grey turned darker and more youthful in appearance sooner than the white ones, which slowly turned grey and stayed there for a couple months before darkening to dark brown again. The progesterone acted as some sort of hair growth stimulant, bringing better blood circulation, and I presume oxygen and nutrients to those grey and white follicles and gave them a “second wind” at life since even the roots turned dark and robust again. Trying to pluck one of those hairs out with tweezers was pure hell, I swear I could’ve lifted a large weight with just one of those progesterone-rejuvenated facial hairs… it was anchored so firmly by its root, easily twice as strong as before the influence of the progesterone.
And for my purposes, That made these formerly white and grey facial hairs susceptible to the laser and nuking them off my face. Not all of them were rejuvenated to youthful dark color by the progesterone however, but enough were that it made a very worthwhile difference. At the end of 24 months of laser treatments, I no longer had a shadow, and as long as I had a fresh shave, all it took was a little foundation and blush makeup and I had a remarkably feminine-passing face… for half a day anyway, until the white and gray stubble grew enough to poke thru my makeup, lol!
Electrolysis is now being employed to remove the grey and white facial hairs, which is a long, slow and painful journey. I’ve actually begun training to become a professional electrologist myself, still a rank beginner with a fancy new machine but that’s another story for another thread. I have plenty of “source material” to train on with myself as the guinea pig/hapless victim with a low pain threshold so I’ll get excellent feedback from learning the process and being effective with zapping follicles while minimizing pain, and since I think I’m descended from werewolves and Sasquatch as my ancestors, I will have lots of practice to become proficient before performing electrolysis on any paying clients.
As to the progesterone, it also acts as a mild androgen with some theorized ability to weakly bind to androgen receptors in tissue cells and activate them to some degree. In my case, I’m not completely genetically male, I’m a bit of a genetic unicorn, discovered in my mid 50s to be an XX/XY tetragametic chimera, the result of beginning life at conception as fraternal twin brother and sister zygotes which shortly before or as we attached to my mother’s uterine wall to establish the pregnancy and merged into one embryo with two individual persons’ DNA in the sets of stem cells which would ultimately become the fetus that became me. My doctor determined that the cells that make up my central nervous system, eyes, inner ears, olfactory nerves, digestive tract, and all my outer skin is a mosaic of 70% female XX dna cells and 30% male XY dna cells. No idea yet what the rest of my body’s genetic distribution is but that sure explains my weird childhood, unusual teenage puberty and all the gender identity issues. That 30% XY dna was very powerful however. Born with about 2/3 male reproductive system the low testosterone levels eventually overrode elevated estrogen levels and masculinized my body a lot more than I ever wanted, and undoubtedly the mixed DNA has an effect on my hair growth cycles and reactions to hormones. I’m not a medical professional in any way, just a layperson who’s been educated to very high, even I daresay expert levels on some hormone related topics, out of personal necessity. Progesterone can be administered in many forms, but for the purpose of seeing if it will provide any benefit for darkening / restoring some “youthfulness” to hair follicles, there are many topical creams and oils available over the counter which contain progesterone. Progestelle oil is one popular brand. For a man who wants a robust beard with minimal gray or white hairs in it, this might be something you could give a try. It won’t work for everyone though, it’s a 50/50 chance, but it’s fairly inexpensive, and topical applied progesterone will not cause you to grow breasts or get gynecomastia unless you have very low T and very high estradiol bloodstream levels, even then it’s the estradiol that grows breast tissue, progesterone only helps it mature after its developed.
Topical progesterone on the face can be a bit of a double edged sword though… in that it can make facial hair grow more robustly while at the same time make the skin underneath much softer, so when it comes time you wish to shave it all off, the hairs will be stronger and tougher for a razor to cut, while the skin is softer to the point of being more easily cut by an errant razor blade, and when you’re in my particular situation , that combination isn’t exactly optimal… to make an understatement, lol!
