AI - Period of adjustment?

[S1W]

For those of you that have introduced an AI and like it: is there a period of adjustment when you start taking it?

For example, you didn’t feel quite right for the first few doses but stayed the course and ended up feeling better once your body adjusted?

 

[fifty]

Should be within a day to notice some improvement if you're truly having high E issues.

 

[Vince Carter]

And then it's generally said that you need 4-6 weeks to reach a new homeostasis where you can judge how things are going. Though Anastrozole goes to work almost immediately and lasts about 50hrs and you can have some subjective improvement the longer time period is key to is is working well enough to adjust the dose up or down.

 

[S1W]

Well damn - guess I'm going to have to settle in with the "no AI for me" camp. I took two doses of .125mg Anastrozole.

Trough numbers:

TT: mid 800s
FT: 25
E2 (sensitive): 46
SHBG: 23

I had discussed my relatively high E2 with my doc, and he asked if I was having any symptoms, which was hard to answer since E2 has been somewhat elevated since I began TRT over a year ago. Basically that's all I've ever known since beginning TRT. So we decided to try low dose AI to see if it made a difference.

First dose on a Monday made me feel "off". Nothing extreme, but noticeable. Felt dumb/slower mentally, very mild anxiety, noticeable fatigue, lower libido, poor mood, mild nausea. Figured "meh it's probably not the AI could be something else...maybe I'm getting a cold...". Decided to not take any more that week, make sure I wasn't getting sick, etc, and try again the following week. Gradually felt a little better towards the end of the week.

The following Monday I tried another dose - same effect. And I definitely wasn't coming down with a cold or anything else.

So even though at trough my E2 is high out of range and I have lowish SHBG, I guess for some strange reason my body either just feels better at those levels or doesn't like something about the AI.

Note: I'm still not "anti-AI" - they just don't seem to be for me. There are plenty of guys who use AIs for whom AIs work well. Just thought with my lowish SHBG and high E2 I might be one of the guys who would benefit from an AI and was honestly surprised that it made me feel worse, not better.