Hello,
I recently had blood work done after feeling lethargic, low drive at work, tired all the time even when I get a decent amount of sleep, low confidence overall feeling down. Took the blood results to a Urologist who is reviewing the results, but agreed that my testosterone levels were low for my age (25 years old). I am overall a pretty healthy individual who works out regularly. He had mentioned that I could benefit from trying low dose Clomid to attempt to get natural production up. Test results:
FSH - 5.2 (1.6-8.0 mIU/ml)
LH - 2.8 (1.5-9.3 mIU/ml)
Total T - 338 (250-827 ng/dL)
T4 - 1.3 (0.8-1.8ng/dL)
T3 - 3.4 (2.3-4.2 pg/ml)
Free T - 55.6 (46.0-224 pg/ml)
I am skeptical after seeing some posts here about feeling good for awhile while T levels are up, but still feeling the side effects down the road from elevated e2. I haven’t discussed what I’ve read with him yet, but wanted to hear some input if possible. I appreciate and input you may have
Dont do it. Its a dumb way to increase testosterone. Your numbers may increase but your symptoms wont subside. The worst part for me were the headaches, and blurry vision issues that came with the protocol. Its a great way for doctors to buy themselves time and for you to waste yours. Its your choice, but sooner than later you will see that injections is the way to go. Clomid is not good longterm either so once you stop, you head back down to low T levels. Why fuck around?
I’ve only taken clomid as part of PCT and never for hormone therapy. It does work for HRT and is used as a treatment but it’s not as effective as TRT. I agree with @middleages that you’ll probably decide on TRT at some point so why waste the time. There’s quite a lot of research on it which also point to libido issues, so I’d take that into account too.
You can try it for a month, start very low dose - 12.5mg or 25mg EOD.
In 1/2 out of 10 guys it works well for a few months. The others will feel way worse than even before starting.
Thanks for the responses. I will eventually do TRT and would rather cut straight to that… but I want to be fertile for the next few years so that’s the reason Clomid was offered and I’m not sure that there are many other options. I’ve already exhausted the natural attempts.
I would give it a try. On average it will double your testosterone. Side effects are rare. All the studies I could find say it’s as effective as TRT. I’d be curious to see studies that say otherwise. There is also no evidence that it’s not safe long term.
Thanks for the response. I’m hoping you’re right, I see a lot of negative results from it through posts on here. I feel like it’s always a possibility for sure, but also people with problems are going to come here seeking advice. Not sure how many people would come to talk about how great Clomid was lol.
I talked to him about this is well, and this is the avenue I would prefer to take. He said that for my age it’s like playing with fire for fertility and should at least attempt a more natural method before he would ever recommend it.
I’d definitely try to go that route first (and I did). You can still switch to TRT later on. Just try to cut out any bias in regards to clomid because if you strongly believe it’s not working - it won’t…
So if that’s the case - there are no natural restart options available in your view That are successful. Everyone that is below 30 years old has no option but to start TRT and also utilize HCG in hopes to maintain fertility? That’s your view?
To answer the question in the original post, I was on Clomid Monotherapy for 1 year, in which I tried varying doses of 1/4 pill every other day, 1/4 pill every day, and 1/2 pill every day, with each regimen tried for 3-4 months before changing. Clomid brought my Total T from 150-250ng/dl pre-treatment to 550-650ng/dl, my Free T to 100-110pg/mL, and my Estradiol to 23-27pg/mL, all “within range”, with the higher ends of the ranges reached on the higher Clomid dosing. There was a point of diminishing returns in that Clomid doses higher than 1/2 pill every day didn’t do much to my levels and made me feel worse. Side effects were lots of bloating and weird estrogen-like effects (erectile dysfunction, moodiness, huge appetite swings), which got worse on higher doses. I did not have vision issues but understand it is a risk.
After a year I transitioned to testosterone-only injections (1.5 years now on TRT), and have been trying to dial-in ever since (based on symptoms) after achieving “normal range” results on TRT. I still have issues with libido on TRT, and note that libido was slightly higher on Clomid, but still far from normal/ideal. I personally would not go back to Clomid unless they can make a better version of the drug that has less symptoms with the same (or higher) testosterone levels. I also scoured the forums on Clomid during that time and didn’t really find any success stories.
Note these are my personal experiences on Clomid and everyone is different, so monitor your bloods and talk to your doctor. TRT is also not the golden solution but has been better on average than Clomid for me.
Restart implies that there was shutdown. It works great for shutdown. If everything works but you are shutdown for a specific reason (like a cycle of anabolics for non-medical reasons). If you have a problem, the cause needs to be identified if possible and corrected. The problem is that most of the time the cause cannot be identified, so the problem cannot be fixed, so restart attempts fail.
Freeze some sperm or use HCG but get on TRT instead. Fertility can be attained while on TRT. Doctors that prescribe Clomid are experimenting. My Endo gave it to me and within 2 days I was having visual disturbances, and Im not prone to having side effects. Stuff usually does what its meant to do in my body. Clomid is simply a way for an Endo to not prescribe Testosterone. Its the system that they work for.
To restart, you need to have what to restart from, like doing a steroid cycle that has suppressed your production. This is where clomid can work.
But as I understand the case is not such with you, so you are not looking for a restart.
You can try clomid, no harm in taking it in small doses, but the likelihood to feel better is rather low.