I changed to test cyp injections EOD and have a good year or so. I had to adjust recently due to levels getting too high for me but now feel better mentally and physically than I did before levels really went up. Don’t get me wrong when the cream worked it worked great. I really have found out that it is about feeling more than your dose. When my levels get too high I am irritable, spacy, have headaches, angry, etc., I have read where a guy is on 35 mg/wk and has levels in the mid range. Since I have secondary hypogonadism the mid range is about 3 times higher than I was so I benefit. I only take test cyp and nothing else.
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Interesting. I suspect my low T and thyroid was brought on by years of high stress and then my knee replacement.
The TRT honeymoon period is temporary, so don’t chase it.
I felt like a God that first week, never again.
My body found equilibrium, what that looks and feels like will be determined by your current health status.
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Agreed
Not sure whether you were asking me, but I’m currently trialing sublingual Preg at 5mg EoD and I get significant benefits from it.
If I take more or more often I start feeling lethargic and getting bloated, I think from the increase in Progesterone and maybe E2 downstream, but Prog is a direct one step conversion from Pregnenolone I’m pretty sure.
Someone described they realized after a while that when they took Preg several days in a row things would go down quickly. They’d take Preg the day before and the next day woke up feeling great. If they took it again they started feeling like shit.
I’ve felt the same way with Preg, I think it might be one of those things where you can go overboard very easily.
The issue with Preg and DHEA is that the dosages are all over the place because of the different routes of administration and also the differences in absorption between micronized and non-micronized, matrix lipid, instant release, slow release, etc…
When you look at dosages in research and anectodal ones, people take everything from 2.5mg/day to 500mg/day.
Personally with sublingual Preg, 10mg/day is way too much and it’s not placebo. After a couple days at 10mg/day I stayed up for 3 days completely manic with insane energy, strength and libido. Then of course I crashed and felt horrible.
it’s also something that clearly builds in your system and of which reserves are created. I think many people give up on neurosteroids from just taking way too much, but they are in fact extremely beneficial to anyone getting older and especially if you are on exogenous Testosterone, which shuts down the production of those hormones to varying degrees, even though not everyone will realize or suffer consequences right away.
Anyway, huge difference for me for sure. Still not anywhere close to optimal but there’s no question Preg has to be part of my protocol. HCG is much harder to dial in for me, although I might also just need a very small dose, I’m going to try something like 30-40iu/day only.
Finally I think some Estrogen control is good for older men. There’s a study out there on another excel(lent) forum showing that older men have inherently greater rates of aromatization than younger men, even when accounting for higher body fat % on average.
The problem is that Adex is notoriously hard to fine tune, especially for men on TRT since intratesticular E2 production is resistant to the action of Adex but that IT E2 production is lost on TRT, so a man on TRT will crash his E2 much more easily than a natural, despite potentially higher E2 levels on paper.
That’s the reason so many men on TRT crash their E2 even taking 0.25mg of Adex 2x/week.
So what’s the solution? I have a friend taking 30mg/week of Masteron on top of TRT Test, and he said it made a huge difference in decreasing bloating and improving sleep, concentration, libido, drive, etc…
If you’re only after mood/cognition benefits from some slight E2 control (Masteron acts somewhat as a SERM, specifically but not only in breast tissue. After all it’s incredibly close in molecular composition to DHT), even 20-30mg/week of Mast is enough to see significant benefits. No need to take minimum 200mg/week.
I even saw a guy taking 2mg/day of Mast E along 12mg/day of Test C saying the Mast was what finally made him feel like he was on TRT.
That’s definitely my next protocol attempt, starting in a few days.
Either way, Pregnenolone is part of my protocol forever, no question. I’ll run some labs and see if it raises my DHEA-S as well; if not I’ll probably add some sublingual DHEA also.
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