This is my first post so I wasn’t sure where to post this but here I go. I’m 19 years old, in decent shape (although I’ve seen very minimal gains from 3+ years at the gym.) I feel generally tired and experience a lot of the symptoms of low T, but most notably is ED. I’ve been in over 20 sexual encounters, and maybe once I was able to get an erection with a lot of stimulation. I’m sure performance anxiety is an issue, but I don’t wake up with morning wood or have spontaneous erections anymore either. I took a blood test and my first one revealed total T of 225 which is extremely low. I took another one earlier in the day the next week and had slightly better results. Here they are:
I’m sure I should test for more stuff but my doctor didn’t tell me anything or what these numbers even mean. Any suggestions/ideas? I really don’t want to get on TRT but god damn it I am 19 years old and just want to have normal sexual relations. Thanks in advance.
You need a lab for E2 (Estradiol) amongst other things.
Read the stickies and take notes; some pretty heavy reading but very useful and somewhat required (specifically the advice for new guys). Take morning and afternoon temps as the thyroid sticky prescribes and tell us about your iodine intake (iodized salt?). The lab work sticky will give you an idea of what to test and the advice for new guys sticky will teach you what some of the jargon means.
I feel like I’ve been writing this to several of the younger guys here, but have you considered that you might try talking to someone about your issues instead of pursuing TRT at that age, given that your labs are in the normal range? You might just naturally be on the lower end of the testosterone scale, and the gym gains and erectile dysfunction may respectively be due to bad/inconsistent programming or diet and psychological hang ups. That’s not to say you don’t have issues, but that jumping to TRT right off the bat might not be the wisest long term option for you.
It’s one thing for the 30+ crowd on here to come on and describe their lab values and symptoms, but for a 19-21 year old to come on and say “my labs are in normal range but not as high as I’d like and here are my symptoms,” with symptoms like not being able to make the gains they want in the gym and having performance issues, is jumping the gun a bit imo.
This is not to say that TRT couldn’t help you in the medium term, but just to say that (a) TRT isn’t a magic bullet where one day you wake up feeling awesome and (2) there might be other avenues for you to pursue that would resolve your issues.
[quote]MinusTheColon wrote:
It’s one thing for the 30+ crowd on here to come on and describe their lab values and symptoms, but for a 19-21 year old to come on and say “my labs are in normal range but not as high as I’d like and here are my symptoms,” with symptoms like not being able to make the gains they want in the gym and having performance issues, is jumping the gun a bit imo…[/quote]
I’m part of the 19-21 demographic of individuals and while you do bring up a very good and legitimate point (that the symptoms we’re describing may not have an organic root) a lot of us know our body really well. I can’t speak for OP but the change in my sexuality was so drastic and to say it’s all in my head or that I simply need to talk to myself is a bit of a jump. The change in my ejaculate, the volume of my ejaculate, the fact that my penis was numb for almost 1.5 months most certainly aren’t things that are imagined.
[quote]MinusTheColon wrote:
It’s one thing for the 30+ crowd on here to come on and describe their lab values and symptoms, but for a 19-21 year old to come on and say “my labs are in normal range but not as high as I’d like and here are my symptoms,” with symptoms like not being able to make the gains they want in the gym and having performance issues, is jumping the gun a bit imo…[/quote]
I’m part of the 19-21 demographic of individuals and while you do bring up a very good and legitimate point (that the symptoms we’re describing may not have an organic root) a lot of us know our body really well. I can’t speak for OP but the change in my sexuality was so drastic and to say it’s all in my head or that I simply need to talk to myself is a bit of a jump. The change in my ejaculate, the volume of my ejaculate, the fact that my penis was numb for almost 1.5 months most certainly aren’t things that are imagined.
[/quote]
My point was not that it is impossible that such problems exist: my secondary hypogonadism was found when I was 22 (I’m almost 30 now), and it was suspected that it’d been going on for a long while. My point was only to say that particularly when blood markers aren’t pointing at a direct problem (eg in my case, a T level in the 30s and severe anemia), TRT should be considered one of several possible ways to address a given issue and probably not the first one. Fact is, you’re at an age where a lot of changes can happen that may have chemical foundations or may not. Just seems to make logical sense to approach it as if they may not before deciding that it is chemical and aggressively pursuing that route. And I’m not saying you need to talk to yourself–I’m saying that considering a psychological consult isn’t a bad idea before seeing an endo with the types of symptoms most of the people in their teens and early 20s on this board describe.
Talking about the volume or viscosity of one’s ejaculate sounds like something that is probably assessed by most in a highly unscientific way, and regarding things like psychological evaluations, I’m simply saying that exploring that possibility is probably a good idea before deciding that you need to permanently take your body chemistry into your own hands.