Anyone combine injections and cream? How do you feel?

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eyeheartny

Active Member
  • I’m a long term TRT patient, 39 years old.
  • I’ve been on cypionate and inject a total of 154mg weekly in EOD subQ shots of 44mg each.
  • I have been doing some thinking about the potential benefit of keeping dosing the same but experimenting with using a low cypionate base around 80-100mg weekly and then using either daily scrotal cream or injectable propionate to allow for more diurnal variation in my levels.
  • I previously tried daily cypionate only injections but I was hypogonadal by the following morning and didn't feel great. I did drop some water weight when making that switch, and initially had a burst of energy when I added the prop in before the cypionate had fully washed out of my system.
  • I know that natty guys have wildly varying T levels based on many factors and am wondering how I’d feel with my levels moving a bit rather than the constant levels I’m at now.
  • Have any of you experimented with this? If so, how did you feel in terms of energy, libido, etc?
  • I have both cream and prop on hand so I could start the experiment soon. Eager to hear folks’ thoughts.
 
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I’m 28, I have been on dosages from 5.5mg test e daily (38.5 mg per week) all the way up to 30mg test e daily (200+mg) per week.

the lower the dose the better the libido. No muscle size lost at any dose. The higher the dose the more water I retain. My body fat usually stays about the same.

my lifelong dose will be most likely be right around 5mg test e and 3mg test p injected daily.

also likely will for at least some time inject 15mcg of estradiol valerate. Due to having a low level of estradiol.

I’m 5’9 190lbs 12% bodyfat

You are on almost triple my dosage.

Ive also injected more than you for a 10 month period and I wish I hadn’t wasted that 10 months of insane dosing.

The larger the dose of test p it extends the half life a bit. The propionate in that size dose I’m guess based on calculations I have discussed with another member on the forum may have a half life of .75-1 day proven with blood work.
 
JA Battle said:
I’m 28, I have been on dosages from 5.5mg test e daily (38.5 mg per week) all the way up to 30mg test e daily (200+mg) per week.

the lower the dose the better the libido. No muscle size lost at any dose. The higher the dose the more water I retain. My body fat usually stays about the same.

my lifelong dose will be most likely be right around 5mg test e and 3mg test p injected daily.

also likely will for at least some time inject 15mcg of estradiol valerate. Due to having a low level of estradiol.

I’m 5’9 190lbs 12% bodyfat

You are on almost triple my dosage.

Ive also injected more than you for a 10 month period and I wish I hadn’t wasted that 10 months of insane dosing.

The larger the dose of test p it extends the half life a bit. The propionate in that size dose I’m guess based on calculations I have discussed with another member on the forum may have a half life of .75-1 day proven with blood work.
Click to expand...

What is your SHBG? And what does that dose get your levels to? I'm only in the 700s at my current dose of 154mg/week.
 
This dosing approximately puts my levels in between 600 trough 950 peak

shbg is low-mid 30s

what is your shbg?

those are awfully low numbers for eod dosing at 44mg.

if it’s low shbg that is causing this then possibly lowering t dosage to something more natural will improve that with time. Also looking into thyroid and adrenal function may be necessary. If you have low shbg, then your free t numbers are much too high with this dosage you are on.

I also wonder what your numbers would be if you have a higher bf % and inject sub q. Not sure how much sub q fat you have. maybe try to inject into deltoids with 1/2 inch 30 gauge.
 
I did this for a while.. i injected around 70-100mg every 12-14 days and applied 50mg cream to the scrotum daily am and pm. I felt best with this. Good libido, very good and strong erections and good mood to. But then i had a new batch of cream and everything just when to shit. Since then i never seemed to replicate this.. unfortunately i did not do labs on the protocol i felt best with. Injections only are good for my mood but bad for libido and erection quality. Cream only gives me shitty mood and libido, but erection quality is alot better. The hybride protocol worked best on every aspect.
 
JA Battle said:
This dosing approximately puts my levels in between 600 trough 950 peak

shbg is low-mid 30s

what is your shbg?

those are awfully low numbers for eod dosing at 44mg.

if it’s low shbg that is causing this then possibly lowering t dosage to something more natural will improve that with time. Also looking into thyroid and adrenal function may be necessary. If you have low shbg, then your free t numbers are much too high with this dosage you are on.

I also wonder what your numbers would be if you have a higher bf % and inject sub q. Not sure how much sub q fat you have. maybe try to inject into deltoids with 1/2 inch 30 gauge.
Click to expand...

SHBG is low 20s consistently. Thyroid function was fine as of last March (haven't done labs since COVID), Free T3 top of range, free T4 low normal, TSH low end of normal, rT3 low end of range. I tried adding T4 and felt like I was going to die so that wasn't the right solution. Cortisol is low but follows the normal curve pattern, I assume it is suppressed because of testosterone treatment long-term. I had also slept terribly the night before the test. Since then I've tried adding hydrocortisone and felt horrible as well, so I don't think cortisol is the issue. On both T4 and HC, my HRV dipped a lot and my body showed signs of stress at night (according to Oura ring) so I backed off both and felt better after a washout period. When I had those labs last I was vitamin D deficient which I've since corrected. Need to do labs again but am feeling decent, maybe a bit more emotional and lower libido, so my protocol may need some adjustment.
 
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eyeheartny said:
SHBG is low 20s consistently. Thyroid function was fine as of last March (haven't done labs since COVID), Free T3 top of range, free T4 low normal, TSH low end of normal, rT3 low end of range. I tried adding T4 and felt like I was going to die so that wasn't the right solution. Cortisol is low but follows the normal curve pattern, I assume it is suppressed because of testosterone treatment long-term. I had also slept terribly the night before the test. Since then I've tried adding hydrocortisone and felt horrible as well, so I don't think cortisol is the issue. On both T4 and HC, my HRV dipped a lot and my body showed signs of stress at night (according to Oura ring) so I backed off both and felt better after a washout period. When I had those labs last I was vitamin D deficient which I've since corrected. Need to do labs again but am feeling decent, maybe a bit more emotional and lower libido, so my protocol may need some adjustment.
Click to expand...

I would say that one of the primary drivers of why I decided to dose my testosterone in the physiological known range of testosterone (3-10 mg daily) was to limit the possible suppression or interference of other hormones that I know that I need to feel well. A primary one being cortisol.

Also the daily peak trough plays into this as well. Having the lower amount of testosterone during half the day is important for many things such as managing estradiol and allowing for other metabolic functions to happen. Chronically high levels can be suppressive of other functions.

Proper cortisol function is necessary for thyroid hormone to even be cellularly viable. I’m sitting here experimenting injecting 5.5mg of test enanthate daily and feeling the need to rub one out every few hours when on six times that amount I felt nothing and had terrible erectile quality. How can that be?
 
eyeheartny said:
  • I’m a long term TRT patient, 39 years old.
  • I’ve been on cypionate and inject a total of 154mg weekly in EOD subQ shots of 44mg each.
  • I have been doing some thinking about the potential benefit of keeping dosing the same but experimenting with using a low cypionate base around 80-100mg weekly and then using either daily scrotal cream or injectable propionate to allow for more diurnal variation in my levels.
  • I previously tried daily cypionate only injections but I was hypogonadal by the following morning and didn't feel great. I did drop some water weight when making that switch, and initially had a burst of energy when I added the prop in before the cypionate had fully washed out of my system.
  • I know that natty guys have wildly varying T levels based on many factors and am wondering how I’d feel with my levels moving a bit rather than the constant levels I’m at now.
  • Have any of you experimented with this? If so, how did you feel in terms of energy, libido, etc?
  • I have both cream and prop on hand so I could start the experiment soon. Eager to hear folks’ thoughts.
Click to expand...
Are you planning on injecting with cypionate or prop for your base?
 
JA Battle said:
Also the daily peak trough plays into this as well. Having the lower amount of testosterone during half the day is important for many things such as managing estradiol and allowing for other metabolic functions to happen. Chronically high levels can be suppressive of other functions. Proper cortisol function is necessary for thyroid hormone to even be cellularly viable.
Click to expand...

Yep. That's why I'm thinking of going to a protocol that allows for more variation. I started off my TRT 9 years ago on EOD so I have literally been running at a steady level that entire time. I suspect there's a lot of processes that have been slowed/inhibited by this, so it's why I'm looking to change things up. I am no longer convinced by the "keep your levels as steady as possible" idea that some guys on this forum and others (a specific ******** group I'm thinking of is especially bad about this) like to suggest. I think variation is likely healthy, even for those of us who have lower SHBG.
 
eyeheartny said:
Yep. That's why I'm thinking of going to a protocol that allows for more variation. I started off my TRT 9 years ago on EOD so I have literally been running at a steady level that entire time. I suspect there's a lot of processes that have been slowed/inhibited by this, so it's why I'm looking to change things up. I am no longer convinced by the "keep your levels as steady as possible" idea that some guys on this forum and others (a specific ******** group I'm thinking of is especially bad about this) like to suggest. I think variation is likely healthy, even for those of us who have lower SHBG.
Click to expand...
With this variation in testosterone and considering the low Shbg what to do to keep the hematocrit stable? Does the variation not disturb the hematocrit in people who already have problems?
 
gerardo said:
With this variation in testosterone and considering the low Shbg what to do to keep the hematocrit stable? Does the variation not disturb the hematocrit in people who already have problems?
Click to expand...
The variation in testosterone is natural, as long as it's daily and in a physiological range. Under these conditions it's not likely to push up hematocrit. A problem with low SHBG is that guys may be using "normal" total testosterone as a target, when they need to be using free testosterone instead. Low SHBG means that total testosterone is lower for the same free testosterone. The HPTA naturally regulates by free testosterone and free estradiol, not total testosterone.

Here's an example using the Vermeulen free T calculator: A normal healthy young guy has SHBG of 30 nMol/L and total testosterone of 650 ng/dL. The calculated free testosterone is 15 ng/dL. So the question is, what happens with his low-SHBG twin, who is physiologically identical except that his SHBG is 10 nMol/L? The twin's HPTA is regulating to achieve the same free T, 15 ng/dL. This means that his total testosterone must be different, and indeed it is 450 ng/dL, much lower.

Now suppose the low-SHBG twin goes on TRT. If he makes the mistake of assuming he should match his total testosterone to that of his normal-SHBG twin, 650 ng/dL, then what happens is that his free testosterone jumps to over 22 ng/dL, which is almost 50% higher than his natural set point. It's no surprise then that he gets high hematocrit and symptoms of high estradiol, even though his total serum hormone levels appear to be midrange.

Bottom line: If you have low SHBG then you need to target lower total testosterone than is typical. Tracking free testosterone can be helpful, but I don't view any of the methods as foolproof—including a test with the potential for high accuracy, such as equilibrium dialysis.
 
JA Battle said:
I would say that one of the primary drivers of why I decided to dose my testosterone in the physiological known range of testosterone (3-10 mg daily) was to limit the possible suppression or interference of other hormones that I know that I need to feel well. A primary one being cortisol.

Also the daily peak trough plays into this as well. Having the lower amount of testosterone during half the day is important for many things such as managing estradiol and allowing for other metabolic functions to happen. Chronically high levels can be suppressive of other functions.

Proper cortisol function is necessary for thyroid hormone to even be cellularly viable. I’m sitting here experimenting injecting 5.5mg of test enanthate daily and feeling the need to rub one out every few hours when on six times that amount I felt nothing and had terrible erectile quality. How can that be?
Click to expand...
How long were on the 5.5mg test E per day dose before you started to notice solid libido improvements?
 
I’d say that at steady state on this dose I have these nice improvements. And the whole way as the blood levels decreased to this steady state the effects got better during the transition day by day. I’d say that this lower testosterone level has me a little lazy and horny like I used to be before trt. I will not stay on this low of a dose but I’m riding out this experiment for another 10 days. I will be most likely going with 5 mg te and 3 mg tp. I think higher levels make me more productive and less sexual. I want to find the middle ground.
 
gerardo said:
With this variation in testosterone and considering the low Shbg what to do to keep the hematocrit stable? Does the variation not disturb the hematocrit in people who already have problems?
Click to expand...

FT is key!


post#2
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Amendment to the Trt protocol. Daily protocol, EOD, doses? Consequences and parameters to follow.

Hello everyone. I have recently been part of this forum and I thank you in advance as I am finding it interesting. I have seen a lot of other topics and found it important to post this topic. I'm 51 years old, I'm a little bit fat. 01 year ago I started trt protocol with Nebido. 01 injection + 1...
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Injectable T has been shown to have a greater impact on increasing HCT compared to transdermal T.

3–18% with transdermal administration and up to 44% with injection.

In most cases when using injectable T high supra-physiological peaks post-injection and overall T levels (running too high TT/FT level) will have a big impact on increasing HCT.

Manipulating injection frequency by injecting more frequently using lower doses of T resulting in minimizing the peak--->trough and maintaining more stable levels may lessen the impact on HCT but it is not a given.

As again running very high TT/FT levels will have a stronger impact on driving up HCT.

T formulation, the dose of T, genetics (polymorphism of the AR), age all play a role in the impact a trt protocol will have on blood markers (RBCs/hemoglobin/hematocrit).

Other factors such as sleep apnea, smoking can have a negative impact on hematocrit.
 
JA Battle said:
I’d say that at steady state on this dose I have these nice improvements. And the whole way as the blood levels decreased to this steady state the effects got better during the transition day by day. I’d say that this lower testosterone level has me a little lazy and horny like I used to be before trt. I will not stay on this low of a dose but I’m riding out this experiment for another 10 days. I will be most likely going with 5 mg te and 3 mg tp. I think higher levels make me more productive and less sexual. I want to find the middle ground.
Click to expand...
Gotcha. Thanks.
 
JA Battle said:
I’m 28, I have been on dosages from 5.5mg test e daily (38.5 mg per week) all the way up to 30mg test e daily (200+mg) per week.

the lower the dose the better the libido. No muscle size lost at any dose. The higher the dose the more water I retain. My body fat usually stays about the same.
Click to expand...
This was my experience with TRT, too.

On weekly injections I always found that I felt the best a day or two before my next shot was due, around 650 ng/dl. Then, a day or so after my next injection when levels hit > 1000 ng/dl, erections and libido would disappear again, water retention would go up and brain fog would return. As I moved to a higher injection frequency and higher levels were kept more constant, my sexual function was lost outright.

Deep down I always knew that I felt better at lower level, but I didn't want to believe it. Everyone thinks that they can make extremely high levels work - mainly because they think it'll confer them an 'advantage' over naturals re: muscle, sexual function, energy, etc - but for most, it doesn't work that way.

Instead of acknowledging that it was the high testosterone itself causing the issues, I instead looked for scapegoats in estradiol, HCG, adrenal hormones, etc, as the cause of all my hormone-related issues. In reality, the real problem was staring me in the face the entire time, but I chose not to see it.

Years of time and energy wasted due to that mindset.
 
Last edited:
Well said!


Deep down I always knew that I felt better at lower level, but I didn't want to believe it. Everyone thinks that they can make extremely high levels work - mainly because they think it'll confer them an 'advantage' over naturals re: muscle, sexual function, energy, etc - but for most, it doesn't work that way.




Unfortunately, many are mislead into thinking such when jumping on trt!
 
JoeMatts said:
This was my experience with TRT, too.

On weekly injections I always found that I felt the best a day or two before my next shot was due, around 650 ng/dl. Then, a day or so after my next injection when levels hit > 1000 ng/dl, erections and libido would disappear again, water retention would go up and brain fog would return. As I moved to a higher injection frequency and higher levels were kept more constant, my sexual function was lost outright.

Deep down I always knew that I felt better at lower level, but I didn't want to believe it. Everyone thinks that they can make extremely high levels work - mainly because they think it'll confer them an 'advantage' over naturals re: muscle, sexual function, energy, etc - but for most, it doesn't work that way.

Instead of acknowledging that it was the high testosterone itself causing the issues, I instead looked for scapegoats in estradiol, HCG, adrenal hormones, etc, as the cause of all my hormone-related issues. In reality, the real problem was staring me in the face the entire time, but I chose not to see it.

Years of time and energy wasted due to that mindset.
Click to expand...
May i ask on what protocol you ended up now?
 
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JoeMatts said:
This was my experience with TRT, too.

On weekly injections I always found that I felt the best a day or two before my next shot was due, around 650 ng/dl. Then, a day or so after my next injection when levels hit > 1000 ng/dl, erections and libido would disappear again, water retention would go up and brain fog would return. As I moved to a higher injection frequency and higher levels were kept more constant, my sexual function was lost outright.

Deep down I always knew that I felt better at lower level, but I didn't want to believe it. Everyone thinks that they can make extremely high levels work - mainly because they think it'll confer them an 'advantage' over naturals re: muscle, sexual function, energy, etc - but for most, it doesn't work that way.

Instead of acknowledging that it was the high testosterone itself causing the issues, I instead looked for scapegoats in estradiol, HCG, adrenal hormones, etc, as the cause of all my hormone-related issues. In reality, the real problem was staring me in the face the entire time, but I chose not to see it.

Years of time and energy wasted due to that mindset.
Click to expand...
Interesting anecdote. I’m curious what what your SHBG and current protocol are?
 
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