Hello everyone, new to these forums. I’m 24 years old, 187lb 11% body fat. I blast and cruise. I’m on week 4 of test enanthate 500mg a week right now to bulk up and I’m very confused about the estrogen control.
I normally cruise at 175mg test e and .5mg arimidex twice a week. This keeps my nipples normal and no pressure/sensitivity. My test stays around 900-1100 and estrogen at 21.
Now my test is ~2000 and estrogen is 42. My nips hurt when I push them and I feel small little lumps forming behind them that are painful to touch. But my estrogen is only 42. I know people who run cycles no AI and have their estrogen in the hundreds with no effects. So I bumped my arimidex to .5mg ED for now while running 20mg nolva for a week to prevent it from getting worse while the arimidex works.
My question is this: on cycle, since your testosterone levels go high, should you still keep your estrogen in normal levels (under 39?) or is it okay for it to get over too?
And if it’s okay for it to go over, then when do you add AI, normally it’s when you have painful nips but I already have them at 42.
Not sure what to do, I don’t wanna crash estrogen and i don’t want boobs. Painful nips scare me. Puffy nips are okay I know that’s temporary on cycle but when there’s small painful lumps forming, I find it hard to believe I can just leave my AI low dose and let estrogen ride up just because test is going up. Any advice?
I’m planning on doing .5mg arimidex ED now (was doing it EoD) and finishing this week of 20mg nolva. Then will repeat labs a week afterwards to see how levels are. I’ve always gauges my estrogen levels and AI dose based on how much it hurts when I push my nipples lol.
200mg/week TRT w/ no AI. I’m prone to gyno and have no gyno from running this way for a while. Try no AI and see how you feel. Feeling in your nipples is not necessarily gyno and even if it was tamoxifen is good at reversing it without risk of crashing E2. I kept my E2 low using anastrozole as well for a while (probably read the same shit you did) but feel much better without it. You can always just go back to using an AI if you decide it’s what you want to do. I’m sure the guys more experienced running cycles will chime in and may have a different answer.
But is it good to have a high estrogen level also, cardiac wise?
Also, when you get your labs on a cruise, how many days/hours after your last pin do you get them?
So you’re saying if my test is 2000, estrogen 42, and my nipples are puffy, but not itchy, but sensitive and slightly painful to push down on, to not go too high on AI but keep it the same or only go a little higher?
If the only estrogen issues you are having are nipples then tamoxifen is great for that and comes with basically little to no risk compared to an AI. High estrogen promotes cardiac health especially compared to lower estrogen. Plus I have zero joint issues with higher estrogen. When I was taking even low dose AI I had random joint issues every now and then.
I do daily shots on TRT so my estrogen is always 80. I just feel better on more frequent shots than less frequent but that’s totally subjective.
That’s a good idea. I always was steered off of tamoxifen on cycle since it reduces IGF to some extent and that it interacts with arimidex and lowers its efficacy. And idk if I feel comfortable doing a 500mg year cycle on nolvadex only with no AI.
I’m also on finasteride so I have almost no test turning to DHT and it all goes to estrogen which is why I’m nervous about no AI because I probably need more than the average man since I have more converting to estrogen and not DHT.
When I cruise on 175mg test a week and .5mg adex twice a week my levels are around 900 and estrogen is 21. I feel fine no sensitivity in nips etc. but soon as it goes over 35ish I start feeling lumps forming that I can feel with my finger and they hurt when I press on them.
I’m probably going to do 2.5mg adex weekly for now with 500mg test weekly and try to keep estrogen between 20-35. Maybe I could let it go up and see if the sensitivity goes away or at the very least doesn’t worsen and turn into actual gyno but that’s risky and I don’t wanna end up focusing on gyno reversal on my bulk instead of focusing on gaining mass.
Thanks for the advice, I appreciate any and al of it!
From a cardiovascular perspective it’s far worse to alter the ratio of T/E in terms of inducing endothelial dysfunction, lipid dysregulation etc.
Think about it from a rational perspective. Testosterone, when elevated converts to various metabolites, within physiology this is pivotal for homeostasis. What you’re saying is somewhat similar in regard to saying (albeit a totally different set of effects on physiology are apparent) “my T is 2000ng/dl, but my DHT is high, clearly I should crush the fuck out of my DHT”… You’d expect DHT to be elevated in correlation to an elevated level of testosterone, thus why would you expect estrogen to differ? Furthermore why is there such a vehement dislike/stigma against this hormone, it’s pivotal (within ratio) for optimising neurotransmission, lipid/ glucose, it metabolism even aids in anabolism…
I know this is not the TRT section but for me it was from reading a senior member’s (no longer active here) many posts (and stickies) saying estrogen of 22 is the key to survival and anything above that and you’ll die of an estrogen overdose. I was part of the E2=22 crew and repped that shit until the second crashed E2. After that I started second guessing the TRT Gods until I found an 800 post long thread from my current TRT higher power @physiolojik questioning that logic and have been happy ever since. I’m still bitter about those 6-8 months of hell though.
The Dyllan Gemelli guy from various forms (promotes sarms, liver detox products) has this vehermont stigma against E2, you should take a look at his posts.
“you’re using 10mg dbol? GET ON FUCKING EXEMESTANE RIGHT NOW, CRUSH THAT FUCKING ESTROGEN… take that you punk ass hormonal metabolite, exist NO MORE!”
We should probably stop quoting Dr Sir in these conversations at this point.
Next thing people are going to say we have to inhibit any formation of aromatase related hormones, so now we need drugs to inhibit estrone sulfatase and 17 HSD… (for certain subtypes of breast cancer this would actually be beneficial)… I also wonder whether aromatase inhibition alone can induce reserves of other estrogenic hormonal metabolites/subtypes (potentially with less affinity for the ER) to build up
Idk dude, I’m not particularly muscular (bigger than him though), knowledge and experience are somewhat difference (though the two certainly overlap). For instance I’d never give advice on how to run a bulking cycle as I’m not comfortable dispensing that style of advice and I’ve never ran a “bulking cycle”, but theoretically I know enough about the pharmacology of such drugs to dispense advice on what to expect when one would use them.
If one looks at his cycle logs (actually pretty heavy cycles) his workout routine is insane, he runs like 8+ miles per day on top of exercising like a madman.
Was gonna say, I’d waaayyy rather have his physique than mine… Regardless of overall bulk/mass, his aesthetics (within this particular photo) are pretty insane, he could probably place in a mens physique comp looking like that
A lot of women actually don’t care for that extreme of physique. The vascularity alone would put some off. He’d pull more with a couple percent points higher of bodyfat. And he’s just too skinny to be taken seriously, that is really not much actual muscle mass, on top of just plain looking like a douche in the Youtube vids (Disclaimer - I’ve never actually watched one - the pic that shows before you click on it is enough to let me know who I’m looking at)
Huh, he is super thin… Got good/decent delts, aside from that his physique is easily achievable naturally… which makes me think… Why the fuck does he run like 100mg var/day 800mg primo/wk 200mg test? He’s used tren before… Where does all that gear go?
Agreed. I read that forum a few times, he runs pretty heavy cycles but his physique looks achievable with a good bulk and a cut consisting of something like 300mg Test prop and 50mg/Var, and thats pretty high dose.
Hell I looked not too far off that as a natty. @unreal24278
I understand that and I personally have no problems with having higher estrogen but whenever it gets over 40 I start feeling painful little lumps behind my nipples. I guess I could cut AI to minimal dose (.5mg 2x a week) and just take 20 nolva a day throughout cycle but when do I know too high estrogen is too much? I’m on finasteride and I’m predisposed to having higher estrogen by default now so at what point do I stop covering symptoms of high estrogen with nolvadex and start upping AI? My goal was always just to use AI to prevent gyno.
Thanks again everyone! You’ve all been very helpful
