I have been on Nebido for about 6 months and just received my first blood test results. Unfortunately, my doctor refuses to test E and that will never change (don’t ask, I live in a country with social medicine and patient has no say in treatment), so I just have to figure things out best I can with incomplete information.
The good news is that my T is 840 ng/dl, which is near the top of the range, even though it was two months after my injection. I have noticed a lot more erections and slightly better gains in the gym (though probably still not as good as say 10 years ago when I was 30 with healthy natural T production).
The bad news is that my Free T appears to be my much much lower, at 47.5pmol/L in a range of 30.2-190. I figure I should at least be in the middle of that range.
Other blood tests I have taken that included SHBG never showed any troubles with that hormone. Is it reasonable to figure I probably have high E2 now?
Any opinions on what you would do in my position would be greatly appreciated. I generally do feel somewhat better than I did before TRT. But I would say my libido is still on the low side and therefore my most pressing goal with TRT has not been achieved yet.
I’m not sure about my libido. At times it’s been reasonably good and I’ve thought to myself “thank god, the TRT is working”, but a lot of the rest of the time it’s still poor. I do notice a lot more erections, though.
I could order myself some Arimidex from an online pharmacy. If you were me, what dose would you start with? I assume my T is higher shortly after injection than it is right before the next one at 10 weeks. However my blood results do show that it’s still nice and high even at 8 weeks.
No I go in to the doctor and they inject it there. I’m getting the injection every 10 weeks rather than every 12, though, and my 8 week blood result shows that perhaps my levels are still quite reasonable even at the end of my cycle.
Might it not be sensible to just dose conservatively and perhaps remain a little elevated in E at the beginning but still be better off overall than if I didn’t take anything at all?
If so, what do you think might be a sensible dose to try? Maybe I could try something conservative and then seek out a private doctor to conduct a test once (will be very expensive but sensible to do if only once). Or perhaps there might be some saliva test I could buy?
No one here knows what to do with saliva test results.
TT=840 after two months is decent, but FT lower. SHBG+T cannot convert to E2, only Bio_T–>E2. Lower FT = Lower Libido.
You could try 1.0mg anastrozole per week soon after injection then somehow drop to 0.5mg/week towards the end. A solution of 1mg/ml in vodka and a dropper bottle would allow for a sliding dose of drops twice a week.
Thanks for the help. I notice that people who take bodybuilding doseages of T also take somewhat similar dosages of anastrazole. For example, 1.5 mg per week.
Is 1 mg per week really very common for TRT doses? I might have thought that people taking 5x the amount of T would need 5x the amount of AI.
How would you generally recommend tuning the doseage at least in the beginning prior to later blood test? I mean, should I go by whether or not I feel dry, or libido, or what?
The body building community rarely does any lab work and does not understand what has been learned in the TRT realm. It is typical to see a BB guy brag about how much gear he will be taking and might use anastrozole if he gets any sides [itchy nipples or gyno].
We know from TRT that if you double your T dose you are probably going to need to double your anastrozole dose. A for 500mg/week T, I do not know where the 1mg anastrozole per 100mg T starts to become non-linear. If BB guys did labs we would know more. They are often taking many different T esters as well as fake testosterones, so its always apples and oranges.
Yes, 1mg/week is a good starting point with 100mg T per week. Then labs are used to calculate dose corrections to get nearer to E2=22pg/ml
When you start TRT, if you are an anastrozole over-responder, not rare, you will crash E2 and feel like crap, impacts energy, joins, mood and libido. The effect is quite rapid. If affected, stop anastrozole for 5-6 days to wash out, ~two half-lives, and resume at 1/4th the dose. No way to know in advance, few doctors will know this.