I’ve also found this study that adds to what I was saying in your log:
Exogenous testosterone has been found to increase cortisol and stress response to an external stimulus. But the author concluded is not sure if it’s the result of testosterone itself or of the aromatization to E2:
Second, although we provide evidence of testosterone’s direct effects on stress responses, the broader gonadal endocrine system should continue to be explored with regards to stress responses. For example, some of testosterone’s effects within the central nervous system depend on local conversion to estrogen metabolites such as estradiol (Naftolin, 1994). Further, estradiol administered to men has been shown to increase HPA-axis responses to stress (Kirschbaum et al., 1996). Thus the effects reported here may depend on estradiol conversion, but future research must rigorously test this dependency in humans by blocking testosterone conversion to estradiol or antagonizing estrogen receptors.
So hear me out. Stop using HCG for 2 weeks. If nothing changes get back on it. Its not going to cause permanent anything. Just try it. Be adventurous. Before Covid19 hit our shores, I went on a trip to Costa Rica and didnt use HCG for 3 weeks. Nothing odd happened. Came back home and got back on HCG. Balls swole up again and I feel fine. Who knows maybe you will see a difference. Have fun. Nothing is permanent.
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@middleages The last 2-3 weeks I feel shitty. But sleep is good, Im taking 250mg magnesium glycinate before bed. The early morning wake ups are gone @appassionato
I feel shitty in a sense of not optimized and like many of my low t symptoms came back to some extend or another. Possible reasons:
5-6 weeks ago I reduced my dose from 22.5mg to 20mg but this is including the bubble. I did that for terms of sleep resolution. Is it possible so little decrease to affect me?
There was a point I was taking 6000mg of Vitamin C at some point and I felt really tired then, but I stopped last week and things improved.
Still Im a bit tired, a bit unmotivated, libido is worse, and a bit depression start to crawl back. Im not sure is it like before TRT or something in the middle. But I feel a bit dull
I explore several options:
- For some reason TRT stopped working so good
- The stress of the last weeks takes me down like many other people. Danny Bossa made a special video about that
- The small decrease in dosage from 22.5 to 20
- My T has deteriorated in the bottle for some reason, maybe exposing it on the light in the room or whatever
I will run blood work the next two days. I hope the lab offers home visit, I dont wanna get COVID on top of all(provided I dont already have it)
I would also explore stopping HCG at some point for a while but not yet
Are you working out at all? I know gyms are closed but are you getting in some cardio? I felt like that in the beginning. But Im on Test C. Its hard to stay motivated while not doing much but staying home. Ive been organizing my garage and have been allowing myself 2 beers EOD. Its either that or sit and watch movies. So life itself sucks. Get a proper workout routine at home, and organize your domicile. Contact old friends over the phone, and make plans to see them once the world is in better shape. My city is shutdown for the most part, the news are depressing, and life is on pause. These things take a toll on our mental health. So be proactive and be strong.
17.5 mg of testosterone reduction weekly shouldn’t be enough to make you hypogonadal again.
Did you change something in your supplementation regime? As personal experience, supplements are either making me feel junk or don’t provide any benefit.
I just take vitamins and minerals I have been proven to be deficient. Many companies loads their supplements with fillers, don’t really put what they declare on the label and so on.
Are you still taking HCG? Did you switch to enanthate?
Yes I understand all of that, and I get that this affects me for sure. Im worried what will happen to me economically, whether I will survive this virus and how it will affect me, what will happen with my parents and so on.
But still there is more to that. I fee many of my pre TRT symptoms.
I manage to workout a bit, first week was going to UGL gym, second week going on street fitness before they put 2500 euro fine for that, this week going street fitness night time at a very dark and hidden place and I ordered training bands for home.
I dont think that changing in workout regimen would affect me mentally. Ive never been the guy who loves working out, I do it by duty mostly because I have to.
I hope I soon find out whats the issue because in this hard times I need all my energy and focus
I havent switched to enanthate because they closed the border just when I planned to. Except this 2.5mg reduction no other change in TRT regimen.
I added some supplements due to the epidemic yes - Inincreased Vitamin C to 6g for a few days, started to feel way crappier even than now and cut it back to 1 gr. I added some garlic oil capsules, enzymes for diggestion and increased magnesium with 200mg
Now I will stop all supplements for a few days. I will continue take only my fish oil that Ive taken aince started TRT
Are you still taking caber? I’d really try dropping that and seeing what happens if I was you. Insomnia is pretty common on it and I don’t recall your prolactin being super high but maybe I’m forgetting
Yes I take it for now I will not touch it. I no longer have insomnia just most of my low t stuff returned
I had issues with caber only the first 1-2 months
I would keep only vitamin C with your TRT for a while and, when you will feel better, you can add back in one supplement at a time.
Are you still taking HCG? If you dropped it, that would explain why you started feeling your hypogonadal symptoms coming back.
Probably you should compensate with a higher dose of T the lack of HCG, but it’s wiser to do labs first.
Never said I dropped it man i said I didnt change anything except the 2.5mg
I would get labs done first then and see what comes out. But I’m afraid you’re just another one that doesn’t do well on HCG like me and many others.
What was the reason you dropped the T dose?
To tackle the early wake up issue. But still so small drop of 2.5mg, I dont know can it affect me so much? Im back to the higher dose since one week
I heard from the pharma test I use there are fakes on the market. Tomorrow I ordered blood test at home so we will see what is the case
If the pharma test turns out to be fake this will be great.
Otherwise Im f*cked…
Pharma as in pharmacy? Like the pharmacy is giving you fake testosterone? Doesn’t seem likely they’d fake something that’s readily available and cheap/easy to make. I’d hope not at least.
Welcome to Eastern Europe. They fake it.
I met a guy who has released a few hundred fake ampules of it in the pharmacies exporting the real product abroad on much higher prices
Also in neighboring Serbia they have a great enanthate product that I didnt start with initially because it has a lot of fakes. And yes it is very cheap as well but the fakes are much cheaper
@dextermorgan @appassionato @middleages
My bloods are normal. Prolactin and cortisol were high. But because I gave blood from my home when the team arrived I literally run for the ATM because it turned out they could accept payment only in cash. So I guess this might have affected prolactin and cortisol, right?
Seems my drop of well being was due to too much supplements for COVID prevention purposes and the dosage decrease. My well being started to get back in the last few days.
Today I decided to do another experiment. Because of your advice @dextermorgan and also in the Danny Bossa’s group I decided to try IM for the first time instead of sub-q. It felt really potent in terms of energy and libido and no it is not a placebo. My libido suffered the last weeks and a few hours after the injection it rocketed. Also on the street fitness bars I did more reps than ever before. I will continue with IM for now.
The issue is I feel a small pain from the injection in the shoulder and I fear it will build up. Some people say it is from the propinate in the sustanon, but it is very small. @dextermorgan is there something to do wrong in the delt injection? I still use the 29G which is quite small. Tomorrow I will buy anestetic spirits to process it with that after injecting.
Do you mind sharing your labs?
Cortisol and prolactin could have definitely have been elevated due to the stressful event you went through and they usually recommend to repeat them a second time in normal conditions, but I guess it’s not an option now.
As I said before, supplements most of the time mess up more things than they fix, especially if taken at insane doses like you are doing. Never heard anyone taking 6 gr of vitamin C.
Feeling pain in the deltoids is perfectly normal. I even did an injection with a 23g on the right deltoid once and it has been painful for 2 days.
Just man up and don’t worry about it.