Did I Screw Myself Up?

Looking for advice. I posted this on TRT board but looking for all the help I can get. Did about 6 cycles of anavar in my teens. Doc put me on 400mg test cyp per week in my twenties to treat nerve damage/muscle weakness from a ruptured disc. Did this for about 6years or so. Moved out of state and quit shots cold turkey.

Twenty years later my testosterone is in the dump and I feel like sh*t. Have for a long time. Currently on prescription Test Cyp 400mg per week divided in two shots. .25mg arimidex on shot days. .35mcg Cytomel T3 daily.

Going on 6th week and don’t notice any changes. Could the earlier use of anavar and test cyp caused my body to not respond to current program or is it too soon to notice anything?

No.

400mg a week!

Consider yourself Lucky! Your prior use is not the issue. I’d guess your e2 is still to high.

[quote]sbfitness wrote:
Looking for advice. I posted this on TRT board but looking for all the help I can get. Did about 6 cycles of anavar in my teens. Doc put me on 400mg test cyp per week in my twenties to treat nerve damage/muscle weakness from a ruptured disc. Did this for about 6years or so. Moved out of state and quit shots cold turkey.

Twenty years later my testosterone is in the dump and I feel like sh*t. Have for a long time. Currently on prescription Test Cyp 400mg per week divided in two shots. .25mg arimidex on shot days. .35mcg Cytomel T3 daily.

Going on 6th week and don’t notice any changes. Could the earlier use of anavar and test cyp caused my body to not respond to current program or is it too soon to notice anything? [/quote]

x2 on the high E2. 0.25mg twice per week for 400mg of test is too little usually.

Should I double and go with .5 twice per week?

[quote]sbfitness wrote:
Should I double and go with .5 twice per week?[/quote]

0.5mg 3xweek should be better.

Got my labs back today and my estrogens total came in at 251 range is 40-115

Didn’t separate out estrogens this time for some reason.

Last labs a month ago E2 came in less than 5. I was using same amount of arimidex but was on 200mg cream 2 x daily.

Is the high estrogen the reason I’m not seeing results?

[quote]sbfitness wrote:
Got my labs back today and my estrogens total came in at 251 range is 40-115

Didn’t separate out estrogens this time for some reason.

Last labs a month ago E2 came in less than 5. I was using same amount of arimidex but was on 200mg cream 2 x daily.

Is the high estrogen the reason I’m not seeing results?[/quote]

That is a fuckload of E2. Increase your AI, and have tests again in 4-6 weeks.


Do you give yourself injections or do they do them at the doctors office? Are they intramuscular glute or quad shots or have you had any subcutaneous injects with small insulin syringe and needle?

Read the stickies both in T Replacement forum and Steroid forum as you are taking just under the 250mg twice weekly steroid dose and way over the top for testosterone replacement therapy.

You now have discovered the sad fact that most doctors know less about male hormone replacement then anything else in medicine.

Do you have a lot of body fat? Estrogen control can be a nightmare with high bf%.

High estradiol levels, which you have, can cause prostate cancer, gynecomastia (male breasts with puffy itchy nipples)along with other things and it will crush your libido.

Lower your testosterone dose to 200mg or less. Doctors prescribe TRT doses of 200mg per week and many times 100mg/week (which is too low in my opinion.) The anti-aromatase you were taking was not enough to prevent conversion of excess 400mg/week testosterone into estrogen.

You’ve screwed yourself by not being more proactive in learning about what happens in hormone replacement. DHT and estrogen hormonal imbalances are just part of the equation.

It’s unfortunate but you have to become an amateur endocrinologist with male hormone therapy. These are a must read. Memorize them:

http://tnation.T-Nation.com/free_online_forum/sports_training_performance_bodybuilding_trt/trt_protocol_for_injections

[quote]conservativedog wrote:
Do you give yourself injections or do they do them at the doctors office? Are they intramuscular glute or quad shots or have you had any subcutaneous injects with small insulin syringe and needle?

Read the stickies both in T Replacement forum and Steroid forum as you are taking just under the 250mg twice weekly steroid dose and way over the top for testosterone replacement therapy.

You now have discovered the sad fact that most doctors know less about male hormone replacement then anything else in medicine.

Do you have a lot of body fat? Estrogen control can be a nightmare with high bf%.

High estradiol levels, which you have, can cause prostate cancer, gynecomastia (male breasts with puffy itchy nipples)along with other things and it will crush your libido.

Lower your testosterone dose to 200mg or less. Doctors prescribe TRT doses of 200mg per week and many times 100mg/week (which is too low in my opinion.) The anti-aromatase you were taking was not enough to prevent conversion of excess 400mg/week testosterone into estrogen.

You’ve screwed yourself by not being more proactive in learning about what happens in hormone replacement. DHT and estrogen hormonal imbalances are just part of the equation.

It’s unfortunate but you have to become an amateur endocrinologist with male hormone therapy. These are a must read. Memorize them:

http://tnation.T-Nation.com/free_online_forum/sports_training_performance_bodybuilding_trt/trt_protocol_for_injections

[/quote]

I give IM into glute. He’s open to sub q but was worried injecting into belly fat would cause conversion to estrogen. He’s researching it.

What’s the downside to taking this amount?

From what you’re saying NO amount of test will work if E is too high?

Current levels are 1056 Test and 25.2 Free range is 7-21

My bodyfat is high for me. I’ve put on about 40 unexplained lbs since starting TRT in the last year. Started with compounded cream and switched to injections 6 weeks ago.

I will read the stickies.

Thanks

[quote]sbfitness wrote:

I give IM into glute. He’s open to sub q but was worried injecting into belly fat would cause conversion to estrogen. He’s researching it.

What’s the downside to taking this amount?

From what you’re saying NO amount of test will work if E is too high?

Current levels are 1056 Test and 25.2 Free range is 7-21

My bodyfat is high for me. I’ve put on about 40 unexplained lbs since starting TRT in the last year. Started with compounded cream and switched to injections 6 weeks ago.

I will read the stickies.

Thanks[/quote]

Hopefully you will begin to amass an idea of what you are in the middle of from reading and rereading the stickies.

400mg/week is 100mg below what most steroid/bodybuilders use for first cycles.

A “cycle” is injecting for eight-twelve weeks, then they coming back down to TRT levels or some do a post cycle therapy to prevent their body from shutting down. A dead stop from T injections can have very bad repercussions. Never just quit without backing off dose and having something such as hcg to reboot the testes.

Bodybuilders/strength lifters generally up their dose on succeeding cycles some times as high as three grams of testosterone and stacked with other anabolic steroids. This is just a rudimentary explanation to let you know how high a dose you are taking for your hormone replacement therapy.

You asked:
“From what you’re saying NO amount of test will work if E is too high?”

That is correct. What can cause high E/estradiol? Your body in it’s continual pursuit to balance itself sees the excess testosterone and converts it to estrogen. This is called aromatase or estrogen synthetase.

You can have very high testosterone but with estrogen out of control it competes for the body’s receptors.

Estradiol/E2 binds to androgen receptors and renders them useless.

When testosterone binds to an androgen receptor, it activates the receptor and you get the effect you’re looking for. When estradiol binds to that receptor, it blocks testosterone from binding, yet it does not active the receptor, so nothing happens.

So you most likely are wasting your time using that high of a dose, unless you also take an anti-aromatase. Arimideax/anastrozole is the most commonly used AI with bodybuilders and sometimes in TRT.

Your only other option is to lower your injections to 200mg/week and also divide them into two 100mg injections, three-four days apart (twice a week 200mg).

Dividing the dose helps prevent a spike. T injected into muscle takes about 48 hours for peak absorption and the larger the dose, the larger the spike. So less injected and spread out over the week allows for your body to get a balanced hormone release which comes with the benefit of less estradiol conversion.

The stickies and especially TRT forum leader KSman are your best place to get this information. I’m just giving it to you in basic laymans terms.

Some guys here would very much be jealous of your doctor prescribing that 400mg/week. If I were you I would inject the lower dose, not mention it to your doc and just save the extra T. Who knows it may come in handy with Obamacare’s many unknowns.

Continue reading as much as you can. Most likely it will take some time before you understand this completely and then a little longer to find your T sweet spot or balance. Remember both high and low estradiol levels make you feel shitty and affect libido and energy. But men need some estrogen.

If you stay on TRT it will be most likely for life. Your testes will shut down, so if you come off, you are going to feel a lot worse and there will be excess estrogen screwing everything up.

One last thing… subcutaneous injections. In the past five-ten years more and more are going with injections into the belly fat with small insulin syringes. These shots are basically painless and there is less scar tissue. You need to rotate your injections using glutes, quads, delts etc… WalMart pharmacy sells these over the counter for about 7cents a piece and they hold one cc or one ml (same thing)

Sub q injections are easy and the T is absorbed a little more slowly in fat then intramuscular injections, making even less of a hormone spike. Look at the below video. Just watch how to inject in the belly fat. I use a 28G or 27G half inch needle, and rotate around the navel (out two-three inches away from navel.)

[quote]conservativedog wrote:

[quote]sbfitness wrote:

I give IM into glute. He’s open to sub q but was worried injecting into belly fat would cause conversion to estrogen. He’s researching it.

What’s the downside to taking this amount?

From what you’re saying NO amount of test will work if E is too high?

Current levels are 1056 Test and 25.2 Free range is 7-21

My bodyfat is high for me. I’ve put on about 40 unexplained lbs since starting TRT in the last year. Started with compounded cream and switched to injections 6 weeks ago.

I will read the stickies.

Thanks[/quote]

Hopefully you will begin to amass an idea of what you are in the middle of from reading and rereading the stickies.

400mg/week is 100mg below what most steroid/bodybuilders use for first cycles.

A “cycle” is injecting for eight-twelve weeks, then they coming back down to TRT levels or some do a post cycle therapy to prevent their body from shutting down. A dead stop from T injections can have very bad repercussions. Never just quit without backing off dose and having something such as hcg to reboot the testes.

Bodybuilders/strength lifters generally up their dose on succeeding cycles some times as high as three grams of testosterone and stacked with other anabolic steroids. This is just a rudimentary explanation to let you know how high a dose you are taking for your hormone replacement therapy.

You asked:
“From what you’re saying NO amount of test will work if E is too high?”

That is correct. What can cause high E/estradiol? Your body in it’s continual pursuit to balance itself sees the excess testosterone and converts it to estrogen. This is called aromatase or estrogen synthetase.

You can have very high testosterone but with estrogen out of control it competes for the body’s receptors.

Estradiol/E2 binds to androgen receptors and renders them useless.

When testosterone binds to an androgen receptor, it activates the receptor and you get the effect you’re looking for. When estradiol binds to that receptor, it blocks testosterone from binding, yet it does not active the receptor, so nothing happens.

So you most likely are wasting your time using that high of a dose, unless you also take an anti-aromatase. Arimideax/anastrozole is the most commonly used AI with bodybuilders and sometimes in TRT.

Your only other option is to lower your injections to 200mg/week and also divide them into two 100mg injections, three-four days apart (twice a week 200mg).

Dividing the dose helps prevent a spike. T injected into muscle takes about 48 hours for peak absorption and the larger the dose, the larger the spike. So less injected and spread out over the week allows for your body to get a balanced hormone release which comes with the benefit of less estradiol conversion.

The stickies and especially TRT forum leader KSman are your best place to get this information. I’m just giving it to you in basic laymans terms.

Some guys here would very much be jealous of your doctor prescribing that 400mg/week. If I were you I would inject the lower dose, not mention it to your doc and just save the extra T. Who knows it may come in handy with Obamacare’s many unknowns.

Continue reading as much as you can. Most likely it will take some time before you understand this completely and then a little longer to find your T sweet spot or balance. Remember both high and low estradiol levels make you feel shitty and affect libido and energy. But men need some estrogen.

If you stay on TRT it will be most likely for life. Your testes will shut down, so if you come off, you are going to feel a lot worse and there will be excess estrogen screwing everything up.

One last thing… subcutaneous injections. In the past five-ten years more and more are going with injections into the belly fat with small insulin syringes. These shots are basically painless and there is less scar tissue. You need to rotate your injections using glutes, quads, delts etc… WalMart pharmacy sells these over the counter for about 7cents a piece and they hold one cc or one ml (same thing)

Sub q injections are easy and the T is absorbed a little more slowly in fat then intramuscular injections, making even less of a hormone spike. Look at the below video. Just watch how to inject in the belly fat. I use a 28G or 27G half inch needle, and rotate around the navel (out two-three inches away from navel.)

[/quote]

Thanks a ton for the detailed response. I appreciate it. I’ve been reading the stickies over and over along with other’s posts. I think the 6 or 7 years I was on 400mg of test per week and quitting cold turkey is what got me where I am today. When I stopped I got super depressed and started gaining fat. I would literally want to cry when I was in public. I thought I had pesticide poisoning or something. (they were spraying a lot in my home) That started my journey of trying to figure out what was wrong. My biggest complaints since stopping have always been low energy, depression and major problems battling fat gain regardless of training and diet. All this time it was most likely elevated E2 and low T. NOT one doc ever mentioned that could be the problem. My guess is that I had low testosterone before I started getting the shots way back then. Coming off cold turkey caused it to tank even lower. Not sure if it’s genetic, but both of my brothers have extremely low testosterone also. They’ve never done test or anything else.

I’m going back in on Oct 18th to get blood levels checked again.

If I get my E2 under control what’s the downside to keeping my test at 400mg per week divided up?

[quote]sbfitness wrote:

I’m going back in on Oct 18th to get blood levels checked again.

If I get my E2 under control what’s the downside to keeping my test at 400mg per week divided up?
[/quote]

It’s too much even in divided doses and your body will convert the excess to estradiol and you will be weepy again.

Everyone thinks that if they just inject more testosterone “the male hormone” they will be a raging bull.

If you are just doing the 400mg/week for hormone replacement, more is not better. Too many side effects and complications.

T helps increase muscle. If you wanted to lift weights and build yourself up you would still need an anti-aromatase such as arimidex/anastrozole or aromasin/exemestane to combat estrogen conversion. You would also have to eat about 1.5-2 grams of protein per pound of body weight each day. Anabolic steroids also work by allowing bodybuilders to absorb more of the protein from his or her diet.

Otherwise you are wasting the 400mg/wk testosterone it will not do anything, except cause side effects.

Read the stickies in the steroid forum

By working, do you mean feeling better or building muscle? If feeling better, it’s the estrogen. Work with your doctor, it sounds like he is at least trying, and increase the arimidex untill you get your estrogen down to a good level. Then you should feel good and you can lift and gain muscle and diet and do cardio and you should be able to easily lose that fat you gained.

If your labs look good and you feel good, I don’t know how much downside there is to using 400. Poor blood lipids? I would keep the higher dose and use it to build muscle and burn fat. You could always go down to a lower dose later, but then of courese you would have to find the right amount of arimidex and anything else you are taking and try to get it all dialed in all over again.

Mostly though, don’t worry too much because things can get dosed right and you can feel normal again. It might just take time but you’re not permanently fucked for life like I’m sure you feel when you don’t feel good and are depressed and down.

[quote]Pretzel Logic wrote:
By working, do you mean feeling better or building muscle? If feeling better, it’s the estrogen. Work with your doctor, it sounds like he is at least trying, and increase the arimidex untill you get your estrogen down to a good level. Then you should feel good and you can lift and gain muscle and diet and do cardio and you should be able to easily lose that fat you gained.

If your labs look good and you feel good, I don’t know how much downside there is to using 400. Poor blood lipids? I would keep the higher dose and use it to build muscle and burn fat. You could always go down to a lower dose later, but then of courese you would have to find the right amount of arimidex and anything else you are taking and try to get it all dialed in all over again.

Mostly though, don’t worry too much because things can get dosed right and you can feel normal again. It might just take time but you’re not permanently fucked for life like I’m sure you feel when you don’t feel good and are depressed and down. [/quote]

By not working I mean I don’t really notice any changes other than increased sex drive. And that is through the roof. I might feel a little more pumped when training. For a long time I’ve felt like for as much as I do to stay healthy through nutrition, supplements, training and recovery techniques I sure feel like my body is going in the wrong direction. Fat gain and muscle loss being the primary physical complaints and low energy/mental issues right in there.

I’ve been training hard and eating super healthy since I was 12. I’m now 46. I’ve been lean and muscular most of my life so I know it’s not a genetic roadblock that’s preventing me from getting back there. It’s like someone flipped a switch and everything started going backwards.

I would think going on my seventh week using test and T3 at the level I’m at I would notice more fat loss and start seeing at least some gains in muscle. The weird thing is I haven’t seemed to have lost much strength over the last few years. That seems to be hanging in there. I remember when I was in my teens and early twenties messing with anavar it seemed like nothing would happen for about 8 weeks then overnight the gains would come like crazy. Maybe that’s just how my body responds?

i’m surprised you’re not leaning up with the added Cytomel (which is rare for hypothyroid patients to go only T3…generally they get T4 or a combination)…

your E2 is prolly the culprit… it is kind of weird that you’re getting that high of a test dose as well. from all the research i’ve read, the average male produces between 3-10 mg of test a day… assuming that you’re producing less than that (and requiring TRT), i presume you’ve only got about 14 mg of test in your body a week (2 mg/day or less)… injecting 400 mg/wk (and accounting for the ester, 280 mg available) is waayyy more than what you were producing, let alone a “normal” man…

I’m using 150mcg synthroid daily also. Thought I posted that. The doc I’m using was very open to upping my doses until I started getting results. He wants trough levels just above high end of ranges. Before starting any therapy my total t levels were in the 100s via blood and teens via saliva. My total estrogen was in the 250s last blood test. Doc put me on 4 mg arimidex weekly to knock it down. It’s been since Monday and today is the first time I’ve worked out where I felt a significant change in pumped feeling.

Literally felt like my arms were going to explode. Guessing estrogen has dropped and that was issue. Going in Monday to get blood checked on my own then back to doc for labs on oct 18. Want to see what e2 is now while I’m feeling pumps like this.

wow, 35 T3 and 150 T4? did you have your thyroid removed?

what are your thyroid panel levels? they have an interconnected relationship with your T and E levels, too…

TSH 3.74
T4 7.0 Range 4.5-11.7
T4 Free 1.22 Range .93-1.7
T3 95 Range 80-200