PhantomFear
Member
My situation is complex and this post will likely be quite long. I'm in quite dire states at the minute, so I'd be extremely grateful if you could read the post in it's entirety. I started TRT three years ago at age 19; I am still not dialled in, and I now have a whole host of other issues that were't present prior to starting treatment.
I went to my GP three years ago complaining of fatigue, inability to gain muscle, low libido and inability to concentrate. I suspected that testosterone might be the issue as I had three testicular torsion surgeries during my late teens, the latter of which involved fitting permanent bilateral stitches to prevent further torsion. The stitches never took and still hurt to the touch six years later, and it also led to a large varicocele forming on my right side. My GP ran some labs, and the results of interest are posted below:
21/03/2016:
Testosterone: 14.2 (10 - 38) nmol/L
SHBG: 41 (11 - 71) nmol/L
TSH: 0.9 (0.3 - 6) mIU/L
HbA1c: 31 (20 - 41) mmol/mol
ALT: 81 (3 - 53) iu/L
01/06/2016:
Testosterone: 12.9 (10 - 38) nmol/L
SHBG: 38 (11 - 71) nmol/L
Kidney, FBC and Lipids were also run and all came back within normal range. As you can see, the blood work was extremely limited, but my GP insisted I was fine and offered me an SSRI - I obviously declined. Because everything was within range my GP said he was not willing to do further bloods, and said e2, FSH and LH were not needed.
I disagreed so sought out treatment via the private sector. I found a private urologist nearby and took my bloods to him - he agreed I was low for my age and prescribed me testosterone there and then with no further blood work. I was quite surprised he offered to prescribe despite such little blood work, I knew I needed more bloods, but I was a naive 19 y/o and didn't know what I was getting into. Starting TRT that day was the biggest mistake of my life.
I spent two years under the care of that urologist, and you won't be surprised to hear he was utterly incompetent. He was uncaring, unresponsive and had no real knowledge base of the male endocrine system. I spent the majority of my time, unsuccessfully, self medicating and educating myself on how to set up a TRT protocol. After extensive research I quickly realised how insane it was to start T with no blood work. I did my best to manage my own protocol but I had little success. After spending two years on my own, I was left with zero libido, complete erectile dysfunction (which was never an issue pre-TRT), a severe anxiety disorder (which I now know manifests when my estradiol is above 150 pmol/L) and a host of hypothyroid symptoms.
When I realised I was never going to be successful on my own, I decided to seek out help and transferred over to my current doctor. While my current doctor is much more competent than my previous doctor, I'm still no closer to getting dialled in and have a number of issues which are progressively getting worse.
Here is a photo of all of my recent protocols over the last year and the associated bloods:
On a number of occasions my bloods (referring only to testosterone, estradiol and SHBG) have looked fine and my protocols are reasonable, yet I still feel awful. There was a short period where I felt okay upon adding in aromasin for the first time where I had good erections and strong libido, but this only lasted two weeks and subsided; a similar thing also happened when increasing frequency from 6.25mg E4D to EOD.
Here is a list of my current symptoms, most of which have been present for at least a year:
Erectile dysfunction, zero libido, memory issues, inability to concentrate, constantly cold hands/feet, thinning scalp hair, thinning eye brows, stomach pain/bloating, dry skin, high blood pressure, low oral body temps, palpitations and severe anxiety.
Here's a few photos of the scalp hair loss:
This is where I am now. I've spent three years adjusting medications, doses, injection frequency etc to no avail. It's difficult to remember what I used to feel like before all of this, but I know it wasn't as bad as I feel now. I'm just tired of all this and I don't know what to do or where I'm supposed to go from here. I also have no idea what to do regarding the hypothyroid symptoms.
I'm considering coming off of TRT to see if I can revert back to how I was before, but I don't know if that's possible now. I can't use SERM's due to a severe retinal eye condition, as SERM's cause light sensitivity in some users which suggests it effects retinal function. My eye condition is already severe enough for me to be considered legally blind, so this is not something I am willing to risk. This leaves me with just HCG and aromasin to use while trying to restart my own production. If I do come off I'll discontinue the test, but still use 500iu HCG EOD and a low dose exemestane for two weeks unti the test is out of my system. I will then taper off of everything and get bloods four weeks later. If I do come off, I will likely use this thread as a log to document my progress.
I would love to hear some opinions from the users of this board on my situation. Thanks in advance.
I went to my GP three years ago complaining of fatigue, inability to gain muscle, low libido and inability to concentrate. I suspected that testosterone might be the issue as I had three testicular torsion surgeries during my late teens, the latter of which involved fitting permanent bilateral stitches to prevent further torsion. The stitches never took and still hurt to the touch six years later, and it also led to a large varicocele forming on my right side. My GP ran some labs, and the results of interest are posted below:
21/03/2016:
Testosterone: 14.2 (10 - 38) nmol/L
SHBG: 41 (11 - 71) nmol/L
TSH: 0.9 (0.3 - 6) mIU/L
HbA1c: 31 (20 - 41) mmol/mol
ALT: 81 (3 - 53) iu/L
01/06/2016:
Testosterone: 12.9 (10 - 38) nmol/L
SHBG: 38 (11 - 71) nmol/L
Kidney, FBC and Lipids were also run and all came back within normal range. As you can see, the blood work was extremely limited, but my GP insisted I was fine and offered me an SSRI - I obviously declined. Because everything was within range my GP said he was not willing to do further bloods, and said e2, FSH and LH were not needed.
I disagreed so sought out treatment via the private sector. I found a private urologist nearby and took my bloods to him - he agreed I was low for my age and prescribed me testosterone there and then with no further blood work. I was quite surprised he offered to prescribe despite such little blood work, I knew I needed more bloods, but I was a naive 19 y/o and didn't know what I was getting into. Starting TRT that day was the biggest mistake of my life.
I spent two years under the care of that urologist, and you won't be surprised to hear he was utterly incompetent. He was uncaring, unresponsive and had no real knowledge base of the male endocrine system. I spent the majority of my time, unsuccessfully, self medicating and educating myself on how to set up a TRT protocol. After extensive research I quickly realised how insane it was to start T with no blood work. I did my best to manage my own protocol but I had little success. After spending two years on my own, I was left with zero libido, complete erectile dysfunction (which was never an issue pre-TRT), a severe anxiety disorder (which I now know manifests when my estradiol is above 150 pmol/L) and a host of hypothyroid symptoms.
When I realised I was never going to be successful on my own, I decided to seek out help and transferred over to my current doctor. While my current doctor is much more competent than my previous doctor, I'm still no closer to getting dialled in and have a number of issues which are progressively getting worse.
Here is a photo of all of my recent protocols over the last year and the associated bloods:
On a number of occasions my bloods (referring only to testosterone, estradiol and SHBG) have looked fine and my protocols are reasonable, yet I still feel awful. There was a short period where I felt okay upon adding in aromasin for the first time where I had good erections and strong libido, but this only lasted two weeks and subsided; a similar thing also happened when increasing frequency from 6.25mg E4D to EOD.
Here is a list of my current symptoms, most of which have been present for at least a year:
Erectile dysfunction, zero libido, memory issues, inability to concentrate, constantly cold hands/feet, thinning scalp hair, thinning eye brows, stomach pain/bloating, dry skin, high blood pressure, low oral body temps, palpitations and severe anxiety.
Here's a few photos of the scalp hair loss:
This is where I am now. I've spent three years adjusting medications, doses, injection frequency etc to no avail. It's difficult to remember what I used to feel like before all of this, but I know it wasn't as bad as I feel now. I'm just tired of all this and I don't know what to do or where I'm supposed to go from here. I also have no idea what to do regarding the hypothyroid symptoms.
I'm considering coming off of TRT to see if I can revert back to how I was before, but I don't know if that's possible now. I can't use SERM's due to a severe retinal eye condition, as SERM's cause light sensitivity in some users which suggests it effects retinal function. My eye condition is already severe enough for me to be considered legally blind, so this is not something I am willing to risk. This leaves me with just HCG and aromasin to use while trying to restart my own production. If I do come off I'll discontinue the test, but still use 500iu HCG EOD and a low dose exemestane for two weeks unti the test is out of my system. I will then taper off of everything and get bloods four weeks later. If I do come off, I will likely use this thread as a log to document my progress.
I would love to hear some opinions from the users of this board on my situation. Thanks in advance.
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