A lot of people would be surprised to know how a guy can be losing hair and not know it. I always thought that even after my head was shaved that I'd notice the continued thinning and recession. After all, we all give our scalps a thorough examination for missed spots, etc. and it should be obvious when there's less hair to shave than there used to be.
Well, yes ... and no. If you're thinning out on top, you don't expect to see as much stubble as you do in the horseshoe area. If you shave every day, you tend to think that the top would fill in some more if you gave it enough time, so it's easy to delude yourself. The other thing, that I was surprised to find out is that most of us don't usually end up 100% bald on top. Even if you're 95% to 99% bald, if you feel that little bit of stubble on top, you feel like you've still got hair. In reality, if you grew it out, you may find that it's only a little bit of peach fuzz that no one else can even see.
A couple of months ago, I saw a photo of the back of my head and I was absolutely shocked to discover that the entire horsehoe area had gotten lower in the back. There's still a little stubble there, that i feel when I shave the crown, so I hadn't even noticed how sparse it had become. I'm probably at about Norwood VI now, and since God willing I have plenty of years ahead of me, there's a high likelihood that I'll make it to Norwood VII eventually.
I know what you mean, though. After years of being committed to the shaved look, it's still a bit of a shock to learn that there isn't as much hair as there used to be. I've known for about 20 years that I was going to have substantial hair loss, but somehow I never thought I'd end up with complete MPB. Not that it really matters at this stage of the game.