Hi there. I have started my 1st attempt at a restart today.
My labs show that my testosterone (free & total) are way below the reference ranges, estradiol is in the mid levels, dhea is low, thyroid (tsh, T3/4) are okay.
I am doing the restart to sort out the hpta and to feel better.
will be starting with 1000iu’s hcg eod for 10 shots, at the same time starting with aromasin @ 20mgs / day. When the shots are finished, will be doing 2 weeks on Clomid 50mgs / day along with Nolva 20 mg’s / day. Nolva will be for 30 days ed, then tapering down to eod and then e3d, all the while continuing with aromasin as it seems that I aromatise real quickly. I have dhea & pregnenolone on hand to supply the raw materials needed by the body.
I will be doing labs after the last shot and after the clomid and then after the nolva to see where I stand. I should be able to get some improvements in the next 3 months or so…
advice for new guys — need more info about you — note the first paragraph
things that damage your hormones
protocol for injections
Without LH/FSH, you do not have a diagnosis.
Post labs in list format with lab ranges.
Need the numbers, “in normal range” is not enough.
Labs:
TT
FT
E2
LH/FSH - must be done before TRT
prolactin, follow up with MRI if elevated
AM cortisol
CBC
hematocrit
fasting glucose
fasting cholesterol [can be too low]
Vit-D25
AST/ALT
TSH
fT3
fT4 [please not T3, T4]
TSH should be closer to 1.0
T3, T3, fT3, fT4 should be mid-range or a bit higher
It’s been a week since the beginning of my HPTA restart attempt.
To recap, I have been shooting 250IU hCG EOD, with Aromasin 20mg ED.
To report (minus labs, will be doing those after 5 weeks), the following:
Tingling in the testes, not sure what this would mean, could they be waking up? Testicular size started to improve towards the end of the 1st week. Experienced fatigue and moodiness during the 1st week, but seems to be getting better now. Actually started having spontaneous erections as well as morning wood towards the end of the 1st week. Actually had sex with my wife, spontaneously, something that has not been high on the list of late. Hopefully these results would continue as the anecdotal evidence seems to indicate that T levels are increasing and the T to E2 ratio is improving. Meaningless opinions of course, the labs will prove or disprove either way. But so far so good. I would however not like to have the fatigue / moodiness over again…perhaps I not primary after all…
Thyroid labs look decent. Damage from extreme diets could show up as fT3 interfering with fT3 leading to lower body temperatures.
Please post oral, body temperatures when you first wake up and also mid-afternoon.
Interesting thing I picked up today in the T-Nation stickies, amongst other things low LH can cause a “tight” or pulled up scrotum. I had that before going on the restart and it persists even during the hCG injections and it being high summer (intimating that temp. is not the problem)
HI All, updated the temperature table above, it concerns me though that my temperature is going down and not remaining stable…could this be part of my problem?
Not much has changed iro the way I am feeling, still getting the tingling sensation in the testes, and they are feeling dense but not any bigger,in fact they seem to ‘feel’ to go soft, then hard, small then big, all in the course of two days, but that could very well be my imagination. I am also still very fatigued, I usually have to go and have a sleep at around 10/11 am and then in bed again by around 10pm to sleep and wake up not refreshed at 5:30am. As you can imagine, it is difficult to function like this. I also still have mornings where I am irritable / depressed. Some cardio usually helps, but the fatigue mentioned above makes it all the more difficult.
My question now is, should there not have been a more apparent improvement to date? I do understand that it’s only been two weeks, but I was sincerely hoping to be feeling better by now, especially since I am coming off of such a low base iro fT.
2 more weeks (for a total of 4 weeks of hCG & Aromasin) and then I will re-do the bloods to see if there is any improvement in the labs and to decide if I should even bother with Nolvadex.
[quote]Klippe wrote:
Hi All, end of 2nd week update.
Not much has changed iro the way I am feeling, still getting the tingling sensation in the testes, and they are feeling dense but not any bigger,in fact they seem to ‘feel’ to go soft, then hard, small then big, all in the course of two days, but that could very well be my imagination. I am also still very fatigued, I usually have to go and have a sleep at around 10/11 am and then in bed again by around 10pm to sleep and wake up not refreshed at 5:30am. As you can imagine, it is difficult to function like this. I also still have mornings where I am irritable / depressed. Some cardio usually helps, but the fatigue mentioned above makes it all the more difficult.
My question now is, should there not have been a more apparent improvement to date? I do understand that it’s only been two weeks, but I was sincerely hoping to be feeling better by now, especially since I am coming off of such a low base iro fT.
2 more weeks (for a total of 4 weeks of hCG & Aromasin) and then I will re-do the bloods to see if there is any improvement in the labs and to decide if I should even bother with Nolvadex.[/quote]
It depends on the person, per the threads on this board. For me, I didn’t feel any different after two weeks. Some others have (though who knows where psychology of being on the medication fits in there).
This is quite low:
SHBG: 12.8 / 17.3 / 11.1 - 78.1 (nmol/l)
It would be good to know:
height
weight
waist size
fasting glucose
A1C
fasting cholesterol
pulse
blood pressure
It depends on the person, per the threads on this board. For me, I didn’t feel any different after two weeks. Some others have (though who knows where psychology of being on the medication fits in there).[/quote]
Thanks for the reply Minus, yeah, I do realize that this is very individualistic and I do not think that I am covering all my bases yet, but I was hoping to eliminate one item at a time…
[quote]KSman wrote:
This is quite low:
SHBG: 12.8 / 17.3 / 11.1 - 78.1 (nmol/l)
It would be good to know:
height
weight
waist size
fasting glucose
A1C
fasting cholesterol
pulse
blood pressure
testes hanging lower?
Cortisol is low
DHEA low
points to adrenals
fT3 OK, but temperatures low
need to consider rT3 and adrenal fatigue
read the thyroid basics sticky
[/quote]
Hi KSMan, thanks for the reply. Below (most) of the info that you are looking for…
height ~ 5’11"
weight ~ 119Kg’s
waist size ~ 40" (across the navel)
fasting glucose ~ Will provide
A1C ~ ???
fasting cholesterol ~ Will provide
pulse ~ 72
blood pressure ~ 132/85
testes hanging lower? ~ Nope, one of my observations, sac still seems to be tight regardless of hCG or summer temperatures
Cortisol is low ~ I think that I have passed stage 4 of adrenal fatigue… this / these symptoms have been going on for the better part of 15 years now…
DHEA low ~ See above
points to adrenals ~ agreed, but given testicular trauma, is it possible to be both primary and secondary hypogonadal at the same time?
fT3 OK, but temperatures low
need to consider rT3 and adrenal fatigue ~ wanted to test rT3 last time out, but the test is prohibitively expensive (± $ 400)
Given my baseline labs and to support the hormonal cascade (indirectly supporting the HPTA as well, in my limited logic) I have been supplementing with DHEA, pregnenolone and progesterone cream