I’ve been on 120mg test cyp split into 40mg MWF for the last 12 months. Labs were drawn Friday morning before my shot. Overall I feel good and have zero complaints. I’ve only started experiencing issues with acne after using HCG for 4 months. These labs are 1.5 months after stopping the HCG. Acne has reduced about 50% since stopping.
My estrogen is out of range and I suspect this is why I’ve started having acne issues. I’ve never had acne, and during my initial labs before TRT my e2 was 26. Also my e2 has never been above 30 during follow up labs. I’m not sure if the HCG spiked my e2 and it’s just taking a long time to come down or what is going on here.
My HCT is above range. Last time I had labs done it was 52. I’m not experiencing any high HCT symptoms, and I’m not sure if I should donate or this was due to dehydration since my hemoglobin was within range.
My DHT is on the higher side of the scale. I’m also wondering if this is contributing to my acne.
I have dropped my dose and changed my protocol in hopes of reducing e2, DHT, and HCT. I’m going from 40mg MWF to daily 16mg (112mg weekly). I plan on doing labs in 6 months.
My E2 was 62 last time I checked and I just increased my dosage and have no worries about having higher E2. My hematocrit was 52 recently and is expected to rise after the dosage increase, again not worried about it.
The internationally recognised top end of the reference ranges for hematocrit is 54%, not 51%. It seems not all lab companies on on the same page, last week a member came in here and top end was 47%.
Don’t worry about the ranges saying too high. Go with symptoms. If you have symptom relief, but acne is a problem, try lowering the dose by a tiny amount.
Maybe try to dose daily (pain in the ass I know), but it’ll create less spikes and be a bit more smooth in delivery of your T.
If you had acne before, you might not be able to do much bout it. I think acne normally occurs due to fluctuations in hormones. Trying to reduce spikes in Hormones should help. I’m sure someone around here will chime in with more personal experience .
Other option is to try 35 instead of the 40, but be patient. Small changes and one thing at a time.
You added hcg and it caused more acne. It’s not because of estrogen (I think). Instead, I found it was due to the fluctuation I mentioned. Even if you address this, it might not go away totally.
For example my wife had this issue when she started HRT. It lessened when we got her dose evenly dispersed and on time. In the end she still had acne, and it only went away with some pharmaceutical.
Your DHT and E are in a great range. I wouldn’t say they are too high. E is the hormone that protects your organs and keeps them healthy. E is very CV protective. It also is the hormone that produces libido and so much more.
That’s good to know that the standard HCT is 54, so I don’t have anything to worry about there. I wasn’t having any symptoms. I understand that high e2 isn’t something to really be concerned about unless you are having symptoms associated with it. Not everyone will respond the same way to high e2. I wouldn’t be concerned if it wasn’t for this damn acne. At this point I don’t mind the daily shots and I’m hoping a smaller daily shot will have a lower conversion to e2 and in return will lower my e2 and reduce the breakouts. That’s honestly all I want out of the reduction in dose and protocol change. Overall everything else is great.
I belive that 54 used to be 56 or 57. they keep lowering ranges because its based on a snapshot of today’s men. Its lower because we are not as healthy as we used to be. Its sad that people just accept that these new ranges are our new normal, instead of trying to fix the issue.
HCT on the higher end by itself doesn’t mean substantially blood is thicker, it’s the other blood components (platelets) that can thicken up the blood.
I’ll give this a try after I get board of daily shots. Currently i preload them for the whole week and it’s just grab and go in the mornings. 30 seconds and I’m done.
Quick 4 month daily injections update. From 120mg/40mg MWF to 112mg/16mg daily.
HCT has stayed the same at 53%
E2 has gone down from 53 to 32
TT reduced from 1037 to 670.
Thinking about bumping the daily dose up to 126mg/18mg daily to increase my TT. I would
Like to see it closer to 1000. I’m surprised that e2 dropped so much. I also expected TT to stay relatively the same, but I guess going to daily you need to increase your dose slightly to keep the same TT #s. I’m also waiting on free testosterone results.
i would wait and see what FT looks like before going back up. Daily injections could have lowered SHBG a bit. That seems like a reasonable assumption given the significant drop in E2 and total T with a small change in dose.
I received all of my results back. My hematocrit only slightly changed from 53.7 to 53.9 over the last 4 months, but my PCP says it’s nothing to be concerned about since hemoglobin is in range. According to him, I should donate if my hemoglobin gets any higher. I don’t have any high hematocrit symptoms.
Also looks like FT along with TT dropped by going to daily’s and lowering my weekly shot from 120mg MWF to 16mg daily (112mg weekly).
I have increased my daily dose from 16mg (112mg weekly) to 18mg (126mg weekly) in hopes of returning my FT and TT back to the top of the range. Over the last two years both have been at the top of the range with a MWF protocol, but e2 was always out of range high. I don’t mind daily shots and I feel better with midrange e2. I will get labs done in 12 weeks to asses the difference/increase an additional 2mg daily makes.
