My day started with a trip to work to show my face until April 15th. My Boss gave me "have fun at your vacation" stuff and Off I went to the airport at 4:15pm from Baltimore. My flight landed at San Francisco Intl Airport at 7:55pm and I had 4 hours wait. I grabbed something to eat and Finally was on board at 10:55pm to Sydney. I had planned to take bunch of sleeping pills in order to pass the 14 hour flight. Luckily, the time went by quickly, I slept for 9 hours, read a book for 2 hours and watched a flick for 2 hours.

We reached Sydney at 8:30am Sydney time, I was a little tired but the flight was much better than I hoped. Once we landed, I had a weird experience with customs. While coming back to U.S in the past, I usually check all the stuff at the customs form (Do you have any cash over 10k?, Any medicines blah). Nothing to claim. Wierdly anyone going to Sydney should know this, they check YOUR BAGS when you are getting out of the airport. Not like U.S where they don't care, in Australia, they Quarantine everything. I had some sleeping pills, cold medicine and some Tylenol in my carry on, thinking that its no big deal, I let it go through XRAY.

My Bag was flagged and I was treated like a criminal. The aussie dude pointed at the custom form and was like "IS that your signature mate?", I was like "YES but I didn't know over the counter medicine was something to claim." He went on on and on about how Australia is surrounded by islands and they don't want any viruses, I was like "Ok take the medicine but I am pretty sure 90% of travelers have some kind of medicine with them." He looked at me and was like "OK I will let
you go off with a warning." At this point I am thinking, "GOD BLESS USA". I have never been treated like that for some over the counter medicine.

I also had a 30k cashiers check in my pocket and I was so nervous what if they had checked that. They must've thought I was some TERRORIST!!

I caught a taxi to my Hotel and got there, got the map of the area and had some breakfast and slept till the morning.
Monday March 17th, 2003

A call came into my room saying my "luxury Taxi" was there. I checked out and asked the driver how far was the place,
he said 40 minutes. The drive was very nice with great weather and beautiful Sydney highways. We got to DR woods clinic around 9ish. I went in and said hi to Jenny, she gave me a cup of coffee. Finally Dr woods came in, with his RayBan Sun Glasses, ruffled hair, washed up jeans and a hip shirt. I was like OH that's him. He came and introduced himself and looked at me, touched the back of my hair and said We will get you looking better.

Honestly, first impressions tell a lot about people. For me, I felt he was very laid back and someone I could talk to. Its very hard for us hair loss sufferers to even share what we are going through with our girl friends (will she think I am a loser?). But with Dr Woods, I felt I could tell him everything, MY EVERY PROBLEM.

He got ready in his white DR Suit and then we got to his room. At first he took some pictures and said "Buzz Cut. NO charge" I had never shaved my head this short ever but thanks to Jotronic's "They wont remember in 6 months anyways" comment, I said that to myself and was like go for it. He gave me the buzz cut and when I looked at myself, I was like WHY THE HELL I DIDN"T do this before? I loved it! At one point, I  was thinking WALK AWAY YOU LOOK GOOD LIKE THIS! But honestly that was fooling myself because I really wanted hair.

I asked DR. Woods, If we will go over the procedure etc. He said well first we will take out the grafts and then we will discuss what shall be done and what's  possible. There was no BS talk about "Oh you will have full head of hair" etc like the doctor at MHR gave me. Dr woods said "YOU ARE A Balding Man and you can't have density/coverage both at the same time, you can't pick both."

At that time I lifted up my shirt. he just started to laugh out loud. He was like "OH MY I have never seen anyone's chest like that" and Juiceman has seen it, he can tell you how dense my chest is. At that time DR woods said "OK you can have a full head of hair, As a matter of fact, I will take 1000 from your chest"

At that time DR Campbell walked in. I was just staring at her NON STOP...She introduced herself and I was like its a privilege to meet you finally..heheh! She said she would be back...I was like I hope so!

I was still nervous so I said before you take out any FUE's, Can you show me any patients with my sort of hair loss? He went and found a tape of this Asian guy who was a Norwood 6 and had a HT 4 weeks ago. He had stayed in Sydney and after about 4 weeks, his grafts hadn't shed and it looked amazing. IT looked as if he just had shaved his head. I hoped I get that result in 4 weeks but we will see.

I got on my stomach and Dr Woods said he will place the anesthetic injections at the back of my head. I am the kind of person who hates needles, when he went in with one shot, I started to sweat out and I actually got up and was about to throw up. Dr Woods was like I told you to take the injection in your butt (some injection to calm you down). So I took that and I was fine after that.

The pain after that injection isn't much actually. It's much less worse than a dentist poking needle in your teeth. After that I actually relaxed a lot and he took out few FUE's and said Let me show you. I looked at my FUE and also under the microscope, It was amazing!!!

At that point, DR woods started to take out the FUE's and Dr Campbell also joined, they were counting them loudly once they took them out. After bout 3 hours, we were done. I had a Sandwich and couple of Pain Killers (Endone). This is my advice to any future Dr. Woods patient. DO NOT TAKE ENDONE! After about 1 hour, I threw up whatever I hate. Something to do with Endone. If you do want to take pain killers, take Codeine which isn't as strong as Endone.

Anyways, He gave me the shot in my behind again and local anesthetic on the top of my head and he said he will first put some hair in the midsection to "have a foundation". I was relaxed at this time. This procedure lasted till 1:30am!!!!!!

DR woods is a big fan of JFK. so we watched that movie. At every important point he would stop and explain me the politics behind it. At first I was like "yah yah focus on my head MISTER" but later on I got very engrossed in it and I started to ask him questions like about Vietnam War and blah..... He told me that when JFK was shot, his entire family was crying around the table. He is passionate about JFK to that extent.

AT 9 we broke for some dinner (chinese).

AT about 1:30, Dr woods Dropped me to the beach house, it is about 40 minutes from the clinic. The drive is horrible because after the procedure you just want to go to bed but sitting in the car can make you a little sick. I recommend a bottle of water with you for any future patients.

I got to the beach house with my bags. DR woods showed me around and I just crashed and went to bed

Tuesday March 18th, 2003

On Tuesday DR woods was meeting Dr. Cole. So I had a day off. I was glad because I was feeling a little sick. I relaxed
and slept entire day. I had some calling cards that I had bought back home that worked in AUS, so I called back home and just enjoyed my day.

Wednesday March 19th, 2003

Dr woods picked up around Noon since his meeting with Dr Cole lasted another day. I asked him about Dr. Cole and he said "he was a nice guy." I asked him about what the future holds? he told me he wants to open up a clinic in the Bahamas with about 20 doctors doing the Woods Technique. He said Dr Cole was here to discuss that with him. That's all he told me.

Our surgery started after lunch. This time the lovely Dr.  Campbell worked on me the entire day. Since Dr. woods was busy with Programmer.

Dr. Campbell is a very and sorry to use this word but "motherly." She makes sure you are ok. When she gives you the injection very gently and asks you all the time if you r in any pain. Dr woods also did that but Dr. Campbell did ask a lot more.

This time my grafts went in faster than Monday and we were done by 12:00 Am. A dude named Ozzie, very nice guy, husband of TONI? I think, he dropped me home

I got home, took 3 tablets of Codeine cause I was in a lot of pain. But in the morning it had all gone away.

Thursday March 20th, 2003

My day started with Dr woods taking about 600 Grafts out of the back of my head. Same procedure, shot in the butt, anesthetic and off you go.

I got home again at 1:30 am around that and took some codiene and went to bed.

Friday March 21st, 2003

This time Wendy picked me up and I think I met Juiceman on this day. I think it was Friday, correct me if I am wrong Juiceman. One thing about Juiceman, he has a wonderful personality and he made me feel that he could be someone's very good friend. Sorry if that sounded corny Juiceman! I saw what he had gone through and wished he gets the results he hopes for.

DR woods took 200 FUE from the back of my head and 400 from my Chest for today's procedure. Once you go through the procedure once, its all the same. Chest is also the same. There is a little pain when he is giving you local anesthetic to your chest but nothing you can't bare.

Our day lasted till 1:30 am, I had McDonalds for lunch and Chinese for dinner..And some fruit.

Any HT patients taking meds should know that the medicine are very strong. You need to eat a lot of fruit. As a matter of fact, after dinner DR woods was like "EAT SOME FRUIT" like a father would to his son..he was like "Finish those grapes"...

Saturday March 22nd, 2003

My last day of poking needles in my head. I was excited and also scared! Scared because I was scared of the swelling, didn't want to look bad going back. I had little swelling around my forehead but nothing around my eyes YET! I was scared after this procedure, I may get swelled up..however not that this procedure was to my hairline, I had just heard that it takes time for swelling to come down.

We did 800 Grafts of Chest hair and they were placed behind my hairline which was constructed earlier. This session was quick, it lasted till 10:30pm only. Ozzie dropped me home and Dr woods said he would see me in the morning. Sunday march 23rd, 3003

I called back home saying "my business trip is going good so far"...Dr woods came in the morning around 10am to check me out, he cleaned the back of my head with some water and cottons. I wore a Aussie hat that you may see that Australian wearing on TV! Steve something..I forgot his name. Looked funky for sure! They had no bandana's so this had to do.

The swelling had come down to my eye. MY right eye was swollen as if someone had punched me! but not as evident. If I "stretched" my eyes using my face..as if making a face, it didn't look as if It was swollen. That's what I did when I checked in at the airport, I stretched my eyes and also at the customs. Luckily I didn't had to take off my hat at any place because before going into security check, I took off everything metal, rings, chains, belt so that It wont beep and I wont have to take off my hat and that worked!!
I was so ecstatic at that!

I had some cotton so I kept on puffing on the cotton and putting it on my right eye while I waited for the airplane to board. I was hoping it wouldn't get worse.

I got on the plane and took 3 sleeping tables. I had bought an Sleeping EYE SILK Patch at the airport. That really helped.
I put it on and went to sleep. When I woke up, the swelling was gone. When I went to the bathroom, I looked at it and
I screamed "WOHOOOOOOOOOOOO" and the dude who was waiting outside got curious. When I got out, he was like "Did you find a treasure in there?" I was like "What? What do you mean?" ..He said "You were screaming with joy".. I was like "OHHHHH, that my eye was swollen because of some infection and now its gone so I was excited.." I went back had some dinner and went back to sleep again.

I slept 9 of the 14 hours on the plane and the rest I had my MP3 player. The funny thing in these bad economic times is that, at first when I went to Hong Kong and Bangkok, You would see Good movies on Airplanes. Like things in Theatres but now they have gone so cheap that they are showing Jerry McGuire and SPY Kids! Crap stuff!

My plane landed at SFO at 8:30am! i ate something and was home at 7:30pm with a connection to Baltimore!

That was my Woods Experience.