@dextermorgan has said that everytime he changed his protocol there would be a 6 to 8 week adjustment period. I know at 100 mg E5D,(5 weeks) more muscular and I have a wiry build. Went from 50 to 70 push ups, daily, without any strain. On the downside, E2: 65 and weight gain around the waist. For all of us, it’s about erectile function and only when added anastrazole did I start having a few nights of nocturnal erections. See, conflicted over 100 vs. 50 vs. AI vs. no AI.
Understand. Went from E7D to E5D and that made a positive difference, though E2 went up and weight gain.
Any particular reason you decided the reduced dose all of a sudden?
Edit: lower dose and drop AI*
Reading the thread on excel. The OP had spent 12 years on various protocols and doses, never resolving erectile issues nor anything other issues. It was when he went to 60 mg, weekly, he began to see improvements. Then dropped it to 52(I have no insight into why 52 mg) and over the course of several weeks, erections began to return and general improvements continued as time went on. Seems like it’s worth trying. Yes, as I said, feel good at 100 mg E5D but I’ll halve the dose in the interest of possibly restoring erectile function with a lower dose.
It’s counter intuitive, but less is more is the principle behind homeopathy. Even in psychiatry, its been shown that as little as 150 mg of lithium, per day, for a year, can slow down rapid cycling bipolar. Unfortunately for me, even low dose lithium gives me problems.
While I get your point on the less is more comment I fail to see the connection between using a physiologically relevant TRT dosing regimen and fraudulent pseudoscience (homeopathy).
Maybe that is not your point and if so then my apology in advance.
Yeah I made multiple posts a while back talking to @tareload about it that AI was the only thing that fixed my TRT after trying for over a year, but I had never severely reduced my dose and try that route.
I am starting to think long term too now and I rather have over all better feels including boners and libido instead of just looking jacked. With AI for me it’s a lot better but still not perfect.
I always said if I jump to TRT my goal is not to be average and wouldn’t settle for average doses/levels… but what I do to rationalize it now is ask myself if push comes to shove would I not love and be happy to have the same levels I did from 15-23? Some guys may be unlucky to be on the genetics side of things but my physique in early years was always respectable as hell.
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Excellent! Right out of a TOT video. 
Our bodies decide the above. We dont get to pick the dose where we are jacked / feel good / and provide long term health. Only some dudes can run above average dosing for gainz and feelz and health. Be careful what you are dosing for. Hence, some dudes will need below average dosing. Oh the horror!! Below average.
Figure 2: Distribution of testosterone (T) concentrations measured with established immunoassay (IA) and gas chromatograpyhy-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) methods in 3174 serum samples from the European Male Ageing Study (EMAS) population. The similar distribution of the concentrations measured indicates good agreement between the two methods. The two horizontal arrows demonstrate that a 50% decreased level of T from the upper part of the reference range (10– 30 nmol l−1) still remains normal (white arrow); whereas, a 50% decrease from the lower part becomes hypogonadal (grey arrow). This figure is modified from Huhtaniemi et al .43 with permission.
Yeah the problem there is a lot of us don’t start TRT with levels of <300 so it’s a bitter pill to swallow. I started TRT with a level of 400 TT and untracable E2, but that was non sensitive E2 test I think.
But I am thinking more conservative now, if my average was 400 then a trough of 400 on E5D dosing is still that much better, and the benefit of obtaining a traceable E2. Which will probably mimic my early 20s self.
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No problem. I had a good friend who was an MD and also studied homeopathy, utilizing it in his practice. He told me he saw good results with patients and it remained a mainstay of his practice. Understand there’s a quantum difference between a lower but effective dose of testosterone and the infinitesimal doses used in homeopathy. No experience with it, other than what my friend related to me. We can agree to disagree.
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Started at 130mg Test-E once a week on Saturday morning. After about 3 weeks, I noticed that I had cold and flu-like symptoms on Thursday and Friday. My trough after 72 hours (Tuesday morning) was at 950TT. I felt great Sunday to Thursday morning, then the crash.
Spoke to the doc, went to 120/wk. I chose to change dosing to E3.5D at 60/mg each. I don’t have the Thurs/Fri crash, but I don’t feel as good overall as I did on the Sunday to Thursday morning run.
Theory: now that my levels have stabilized/normalized after 9 months, I’m thinking of going back to weekly. It’s a large bolus to inject, but the normalized/stabilized state of my T on Thursday and Friday might overcome the crash. I’ll be pretty high Sunday to Thursday a.m.
–OL65
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Coming up on first week on 50 mg. Perhaps coincidental, but feel more tired, though I slept 8 hours. Actually, feel lousy. Don’t want to drink tea or cola because it will screw me later in the day. Feel like I’ve crashed, but with untreatable bipolar, it’s difficult to sort out what could be going on, making it easy to ascribe it to lowering my T dose. My body feels like it’s stuck in first or second gear and serious brain fog. The only positive is that I had a strong nocturnal erection, as well as my almost daily late evening erection.
It’s almost like the body/brain is trying to restart. Maybe more of my hope than an actual rebooting process.
Was this coming on as you were taking the arimidex? It may be crashed E2 as well.
Could be. Last dose was on Monday, too. I’m so accustomed to feeling lousy mentally and physically and it’s only when I feel worse that it gets my attention, LOL. But libido was strong last night, along with my evening erection and the nocturnal erection. If my E2 was too low, presuming I’d have no sexual desire or function…unless I’m one of those men who has better function with extremely low estradiol. That’s still unresolved. If I could afford it,(which will never happen) hire a phlebotomist to do hourly blood draws and have a courier pick them up. When I was in-patient and the doctors were trying to figure why I drink so much water, I was having blood drawn every two hours, from before breakfast, until before bed, checking my pituitary gland. That was 31 years ago.
Didn’t want to take caffeine but I caved and having a mug of tea with two tea bags. Just sipping it. I don’t need to be functional for anything but I feel so effing lousy and want it gone.
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Good updates Mip.
As an aside, and counterlogical to the “estrogen makes libido” crew, it is fairly established that estrogen increases serotonin. Serotonin is the inhibitor neurotransmitter of libido, or, at least the ability to orgasm.
Look at SSRIs for example. Most have sexual issues when taking them, and it’s because of the increase in available serotonin floating around in the synapses.
SO, my point is, that I tend to disagree that increasing estrogen increases libido. I’m NOT saying the controlling it to the point of it being low or zero is a smart/healthy thing either.
Lol I can attest to this, I wish I had this high libido with higher E2. It ain’t so atleast not in my case.
Don’t know if you’ve ever read Ray Peat Ph.D, an endocrine physiologist or checked the Ray Peat forum, which is about his work and people trying his dietary & supplement recommendations, based on using himself as a lab rat. He’s written extensively about the negative effects of serotonin and SSRIs.
My experience with Prozac was a disaster, though maybe more because it was antidepressant. I was living in Baltimore, experiencing dramatic mood swings after the death of my father from a short illness. Went to Hopkins and the psychiatrist put me on 20 mg, daily. After a month, no better, so he doubled the dose. Within 48 hours, I went manic. Up for 40 hours, hallucinating and hypersexual. I officially now had bipolar illness. In all fairness, I believe any antidepressant would have jacked me into mania. I’d had a history of episodic depression since I was 19 and mood problems afflicted my father and grandfather, who killed himself in 1953. I tend to believe I’m more like my grandfather. Anyway…didn’t do well on Wellbutrin. Made me hyper and edgy. Antidepressants aren’t good for those of us with bipolar, at least Bipolar 1/rapid cycling/mixed state. And though I’m highly sexual when I’m hypomanic, it’s a risky/dangerous place to be, even though you feel so alive.
As I’ve written, it’s why I never tried to control E2, because of Dr. Rouzier, Jay Campbell, Danny Bossa and others. I don’t want to trash their perspectives, since they might actually do well with elevated estradiol. Maybe we’re the outliers or biochemical misfits but if one needs to control E2 in order to have some degree of sexual function, then so be it!
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I am familiar with Ray Peat. I like his writings. Quite informative.
I’ve played around with Wellbutrin, mainly in terms of trying to get a libido, or, more specifically, better arousal when with a woman. Didn’t really work well. Also tried ropinirole and a few others.
Buspar did seem to help. But it’s affects are short lived. Only lasting a few weeks. I have read that it does decrease serotonin and increase dopamine, but after awhile, the opposite occurs… so it needs to be tinkered with a bit in terms of frequency.
I’m curious as to how you react to the new lower test protocol. Thanks for posting.
SSRI are Rx’d now in low doses to help prevent PE
Too early to tell. I feel more aroused; more sexual, but I think it’s too early for that to be the case. The ragweed and mold counts are high here in Flroida and when my histamine goes up, I get horny. Histamine does that and I’m accutely sensitive.
I’ll know better in a month, IMO. I’m waiting to be surprised by this low dose protocol. I want to be surprised! Even though my wife is ill, I still want my erections. Erections go with being a man. And if T doesn’t do it, my doctor will prescribe Trimix. Eventually, I’ll have a sex life, again.