Testosterone Levels Are Stuck

100s is crazy low. TRT should get you to 800+ at minimum.

Also, you can donate blood to manage hemocrit levels.

I have been donating blood to help curve the higher hemocrit levels. O+ is highly sought after so they usually welcome me every time I go in there.

ZMA before bed

Tongkat Ali and Fadogia Agrestis in the morning

Dumb guy here

What are the downsides of injections? Will it make you too wired or affect sleep?

Rough estimate of cost?

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This is one of the scarier threads I’ve seen on this board. Yikes.

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yea the amount of people jumping on trt without understanding what is and why they are taking it.

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You're shooting in the dark right now, but yes I'd go injection only and at least once/week since the half life of most common testosterone esters is a few days - so by the end of the second week you're deep in a trough and experiencing wild swings in your serum levels.

Quitting cold turkey is something guys I've known have tried under the theory of a "reset" but it will lead to a crash that will be miserable and frankly there's no reason to put yourself through that. Your current provider must be dropped but... Go to weekly injections (common starting dose is 100mg/wk and adjust up/down based on stabilized labs) and stabilize at ~8 weeks and during that time check out the telemed providers and you'll have stable blood level for your baseline labs with them.



ETA: you're 40 yrs old - done having kids? If you're not it'll get a LOT harder to conceive on TRT. Also you should know that once you begin TRT it's for life and your natural production, limited that is, will shut down completely. Some try a re-start with clomid but I hated the stuff when I tried it before going to injections. And it bears mentioning because some guys have issues with this - your testicle may shrink considerably; mine didn't but I've heard guys say they nearly disappeared. Wasn't an issue for me, but my doc spent a lot of time making sure it wasn't a concern for me. That can, BTW, be mitigated with the use of HCG but I'll leave that to your discussion with a good provider.

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OP, you need to listen to this guy. he is spot on, im gonna give you some general info.

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Go to weekly injections (common starting dose is 100mg/wk and adjust up/down based on stabilized labs) and stabilize at ~8 weeks and during that time check out the telemed providers and you'll have stable blood level for your baseline labs with them.

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do this!!

if you are not done having kids, i suggest stopping now. and starting the following


HCG-3000iu eod
clomid- 50mg eod (opposite day of hcg)

if needed you can add hmg and a stronger SERM, i suggest starting with Nolvadex. on top of that, cut out alcohol, start lifting and moving more. also get diet in order focusing on red meat (look up anabolic diet or vertical diet). also get checked for a veracosile.

i have heard very good things about Defy medical. If you doctor needs guidance i suggest having them consulting with baylor medical scott department of urology. they are one of the worlds leaders in hormone tratments and fertility treatments.

as far as the test levels, you want to start at 100mg/week or split up twice weekly. you want to take subq as there are many benifits to that over intramusclure. in 8 weeks get your levels taken and adjust as needed. you want to be in the range for your age group, so disregard the 800 ng/dl comment that was mentioned earlier. you may need to be there to feel good but you want to get into your age groups bracket, preferably toward the top and see how you feel. if you feel great keep it there. you dont want to overtake if not needed.

I appreciate the help here Aquila. I’ve been reading up on this for 6 months but it seems I run into more medical opinions rather than factual intel. Given the complexity of TRT I can understand why now.

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Pretty scary when your living it too. Reaching out to learn is all I got at this point. I don’t want to put all my chips in one doctors basket. Coming here and talking to folks that have had similar experiences that I can learn from has been more beneficial than speaking with the doc as of late.

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i have told my story before but

was early 30s and married with 2 kids which had no problems having. both boys. wife wanted to try again and after 6 months we figured out i wasnt producing anymore for some reason.

When i was in the military i had fell and racked myself very bad and turns out that caused a vercosile where essentially my left testical was essentially dead. it was causing my natural test to be in the 100-150 range.

local "specialist" doctor thought that it was a good idea to put me on test replacement. I already knew that was a bad idea for fertility from the limited research i had done. on top of that he wanted once a month shots. when i started asking about half lifes and why not once a week he realized i prolly knew more than him.

i asked for a referal to baylor medical in houston, specifically Dr Khera as he was considered one of the worlds experts and had written many of the treatments and papers used today.

he straight up told me, never to see the original doctor again and that he was an idiot. Dr khera put me on the fertility/post cycle therapy protocal listed above. we discussed hmg and other SERMS that may be needed. we also discussed the vericosile and how i would prolly need surgery to make it happen.

in short i stayed on the original hcg/clomid protocol from aug to april. i had surgery scheduled for april. we got pregnant like 10 days before the surgery but didnt find out until i had already had it.

i stayed on hcg and clomid until she reached 16 weeks. at that point i came off and had levels tested at the 20th and 22nd week. both times i was in the mid 50s. obvioulsy i was not going to restart my natural test levels.

so i went on trt. started at 50mg twice weekly. after 12 weeks we adjusted and settled on what works out to be 135mg a week. that keeps me between 700-800 at peak(24-48 hours after the shot) which is where i want to be as a 39 year old.

before i went on, we did mri's to make sure no damage to the hypothalamas and had a mammogram to ensure that i had no formation of gyno.

then we started the treatment. he monitors all of my hormones and actually wants me on an hgh peptide but im not spending the money on it.

same doctor did my visectomy last year and i had more damage in the left testie then originally thought. right side took less than 5 min, left took so long the numbing medicine wore off.

i have done a ton of research on all of this and can now speak with most doctors intellegently about it and know more than almost all that dont specialize in it.

my recommendation is go to subq shots. give them to you yourself. start 1 time a week at 100mg/week adn then adjust as needed. monitor free test and estrogen.

you should be way higher by now.

edit: shoulda read further before responding. i would go with injections only. thats what id o and is working well for me.

are you using a family physician or hrt clinic? from the stories i gathered most family physicians prescribing test will waaaayyyy under dose you.

my stats:
6'1
223 lb (16-17% BF)
40 yr old
two tests for testosterone, 150 first, 200 second with free 4

i started with 80 mg SQ injections twice a week (160 week). after 3 months test was 790 and free 26.

is you rbcs on the upper limit or just rising? There are work arounds to increased rbc while on trt like blood donations or medical phlebotomy.

Testosterone cream got me into the 600’s. Had to apply twice daily. Just put it by my toothbrush so after I brushed my teeth, I applied.

Pellets got me to 1000. But the pellets had me all over mentally due to the high increase. Once the levels leveled out it was great. Last 3-4 months.

Switching to injections so avoid the spike and hopefully have a more consistent level. I paid out of pocket with good rx and it was $40 for 10ml of 200mg/ml.

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Fadogia Agrestis

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Would not LINK