Next blood test will be Monday. After review I am going to consider jumping on Boron mentioned by Physio. Also going to ask Dr. if there’s any reason I can’t start having caffeine. He never told me I couldn’t but I stopped myself one year ago due to thinking maybe I had adrenal issues. Haven’t touched it since.
I feel like my estrogen is a little high today as I feel kind of teary eyed at the stupid shit and had erection issue performing this morning. I feel like my testosterone dose is to small and frequency of EOD to be causing me to have high estrogen. I am thinking it might be the HCG. Will know more soon.
If you haven’t been on the same dosage for at least 6 weeks, stay the course. Your levels aren’t stable yet and levels will be fluctuating wildly until 6 weeks.
Yea good reminder. At the point of my blood test it will only be 4 weeks on this change I made. I agreed to let him test me at 4 weeks because he is scared after he crashed my E2 and caused me to become suicidal. I will probably suggest to him that if we don’t see anything to worry about, to wait another 2-4 weeks on this protocol and adjust after that blood test versus this one.
Test Cyp - 30mg x 3 times weekly (Monday, Wednesday, Friday)
HCG - 350mg x 2 times weekly (Monday, Thursday)
I currently feel like things are starting to improve. I definitely do not feel like “I am dialed in and right where I want to be”. My mind is getting sharper, energy levels rising and I am actually finally able to do workouts.
My Hematocrit is the only thing I am wondering about. Doctor keeps saying go donate blood. There are so many discussions about this and doctors stating that it’s nonsense. My Hematocrit was 50.7 the day I walked into the doctor’s office before ever starting anything. This was with no drug use, no prescriptions, no drinking, being mostly healthy all my life. I have never been obese or anemic etc. I just don’t know what to think or make of this. It went from 50.7 to 51.5 after 6 weeks, then to 52.7, then down to 49, now back to 52.2. I just don’t know if I really have an issue or not to worry about.
@physioLojik would you be willing to please tell me what you think based on my bloods?
What do you all think is a good direction for me to go from here? I am feeling just slightly high E2 sypmtoms (cry easy) but otherwise great. I am not playing with that because the numbers are good and I am coming from being crashed below 5 so I imagine my bodies trying to adjust to being up again in normal ranges.
Thanks everyone and looking forward to your input!
@physioLojik Let me also add that I do not live in an elevated location. I live in michigan in the city just in case you’re wondering if I live in the mountains etc. for my seemingly naturally high HCT levels. Is there some other lifestyle condition that can cause this (I stay hydrated). Thanks!
Your Free T is pretty low at 12.9 pg/mL, I see men here scoring higher looking to go on TRT because they feel off. Your Free T percentage is 2.43%, I don’t start to feel relief until I hit 2.5%. It seems like your doctor is holding back your levels because of HCT.
We don’t start to get concerned until HCT gets to 54%, again doctors are treating higher HCT as if it were a form of cancer that causes blood clotting, the problems is no one can agree how to treat higher HCT it while on TRT. We do know higher HCT is caused by TRT and if blood clotting disorders are rule out by fore TRT commences, I believe doctors anxieties are unfounded.
There are people living at high altitudes and live their entire lives with high HCT. Olympians train at high altitudes to take advantage of the oxygen carrying capabilities of higher HCT. If your doctor visited the villages in the himalayas and drew the blood of the villagers and saw their HCT at 53%, you don’t think he would ask them to donate blood do you?
Thanks Guys great video. Any idea what Defy Medical’s position is on an HCT level as high as mine? Would all providers stop increasing my dose with those numbers?
Don’t waste your time with defy. They would probably not take you at your hct levels. Well they’d take you but no T script until you get your lvls under 50. Maybe the Dr Rouzer has better medical malpractice insurance
I know for a fact Dr. Nichols will take you. He’s well informed and wouldn’t deny you. He really wants to help us feel better no matter the levels needed. He’s all about optimization. Dr rouzier is who he uses as his guide and referee me to his sire when I have questions. He gave me a pamphlet about optimization that was written by rouzier.
Either of those two docs are your best choice.
If you want a clinic then contact lowtnation.com they are in the middle between crappy clinics and awesome docs. Only problem is you don’t really talk to a doc. I never did. But they don’t freak out and pull scripts if Hct is high. I know this for a fact.
This whole HCT conversation is pretty interesting. I was researching it further and found that the higher the HCT and Hemoglobin levels, the better the oxygen and improved endurance. Interestingly enough (this is just me speculating for a moment), when I was in the military I was the number 1 fitness person on the entire military base and everyone knew it. I could do more pushups, situps and run faster than anyone (I wore an award patch for this). I was able to score higher than the max scores of all areas of fitness. Researching this, I would say that put me in the “elite” category of fitness. I was always very lean (huge guys would say skinny) and could play any sport or run all day long every day.
Knowing that I walked into my doctors office before ever doing 1 thing and being at 50.7 while not being obese or anemic that I know of makes me wonder if this high HCT and Hemaglobin is the reason I was always able to outperform everyone in endurance fitness?
This is just me speculating against what I am reading such as some of the best cyclists had high HCT. I am seeing that the ones that do not are usually because of iron deficiency and becoming anemic. Those people usually felt as if they were “overtraining”. I just wonder if there’s an actual benefit to this number sometimes and people are just afraid of it because it mimics some effects of a disease.
Just food for thought since I haven’t made up my mind what I will do yet knowing that I feel better now than when I started TRT. I seem to hyper respond to any counter treatments like AI, lower dosage etc. and it just completely fucking destroys me. Makes me feel like a dead pile of dogshit. I have a very strong reason to believe that me donating blood will lead me down the crashed path of feeling like shit as I have read many people have become.
Still deciding what I will do. I sure wish that I had test results from all those years of feeling so amazing!
I am also noticing that my iron levels are on the high side. My iron saturation is high out of range and my iron is closer to the top of the range.
Iron Saturation - 41.9 (range 15-35)
Iron - 129 (range 25-156)
High levels of iron can raise my HCT as well which goes along with what I stated above. They said they used to do iron IV’s for anemic athletes to raise their iron and in turn it would raise their HCT.
I will say you are more than likely one of those outlier. I look forward to reading your progress and what your new trt doc says about all this. I hope you will keep us posted.
Yes it is why but you also have genetics at play that allow for better endurance. Like v02 and lactic . You were able to perform at a higher pace because of this. Hct is what cyclists increase with epo. That’s why I had a 37 Hct when I started trt and quickly realized why i was barely able to keep up with the boys. Now that I’m reaching normal I can’t wait to start training again and kicking ass… your on the money.
Listen to the last several mins of this video. This is dr rouzier a highly regarded hormone optimization doc. He runs a certification type organization for potential hormone therapy docs. He’s an educator. He pretty much says what’s being said here.
