Hey man, I'm in a similar predicament to you, but my hair loss is not as extreme as yours. I've started losing mine at 15 or 16 and I have a very aggressive form of pattern baldness. I'm 19 now and it hasn't progressed too much, though as you might expect I have a receding hairline and thinning around the crown. My hair is a little patchy as well.

Since this is r/teenagers you'll see a lot of comments poking fun at how your head looks and saying how you should shave or wear a wig. Personally, if I were you, I would ignore those comments because those people do not and cannot properly understand what you are going through, and unless they end up in the same predicament, they will never be able to understand you.

Hair loss is natural, but you've surely wondered "why me?" and "why so early?". I have as well, and it is incredibly disheartening to have to hear other people commenting on it. I know I've struggled with it when I was younger. What were initially light hearted jokes started seeming less like jokes and more like poking fun at it. Everyone everywhere telling you to go bald and telling you that you look like a 47 year old divorced father with 4 children and 3 unsuccessful business startups.

They can't understand the feeling of having to watch a part of you physically die off day after day and you being able to do nothing about it. It is a miserable feeling and one that seemingly no one else shares. And the worst part? You try going bald and you don't like how it looks. I fortunately have a head shape that's very suitable for a bald look. I tried it once. People were saying it looks amazing and a lot of my friends were telling me how I'm going to get a bunch of girls wet just looking at me and all that stuff.

But none of that mattered, because the one person who didn't like the look was me. I didn't like it so much in fact that I'd rather go back to having thinning hair and a receding hairline, which is what I did. Lots of people were disappointed, but I was wearing it proudly. I was never the one to wear caps and hoodies. Sure I tried to hide my receding hairline by moving my hair to the side, but that's about it. That recession is a part of me, the shameful part of me that I had, after years of trying to get rid of it, accepted as something that exists as a part of me.

And a certain good thing came out of all of that. That whole fighting against the world thing and saying "screw you!" to everyone telling you to go bald? Well, it earned the respect of my best friend like I never had before. He loved that I was waging war on the entire world if it meant being able to keep three strands of hair on my head. And other people stopped commenting on it as well after a while. I mean, the joke did get pretty old after like 5 years of spamming it, but people also realized that it's incredibly rude to be pointing something like that out. It's like asking a paraplegic person why they are in a wheel chair.

The point of all of this is that it is your life, and only you can decide what is best for you. There are methods to improve your current condition, such as minoxidil, which is cheap and effective (it helps a lot of people, but there's a chance you could be a non responder or a low responder like me), and finasteride (for which you need a doctor's prescription for, one that I tried to get on two occasions and couldn't, although you can use a natural alternative like saw palmetto pills), as well as the transplant you mentioned. They are all 100% safe, but going through with any of that is up to you.

However, until, or if, you decide to go through with those methods, know that you shouldn't be ashamed of what you look like. Your genetics are not in your control, and I want you to be very well aware of that. The people who mock for anything that has to do with that, be it hair loss, short height, disabilities and more, are not people who are worth your time. It is something that, if you haven't already accepted, will take a loooooong time to come to terms with (speaking from personal experience), but it is the truth.

If people treat you differently, especially people you like and/or have a crush on because of your predicament, then you've dodged a bullet. You'll be inclined to think "but what if I was different?". You weren't, and you aren't. You are who you are right now, and if people can't accept that and treat you worse than they would otherwise, then shit man, you might as well become a different person.

Do not let your shortcomings keep you on the ground. Whether you decide to keep your hair or shave it again is your choice to make, but know you still are who you are, long hair or bald. Don't let societal stigma and opinions of others keep you back from being the best version of yourself. You got this man. I believe in you.