TL;DR below
Just found this community and I’ve been reading a lot of helpful posts here so thanks for that. I’m right at the edge of considering going on TRT as I have been working for over a year with one of my doctors to raise my levels “naturally”. Looking for some advice on how realistic this is based on my current health state (I will post my labs below)
Just a quick background, 38 year old male, 5’7" currently 170-173lbs at about 19%BF. From 2012-2016 I worked a rotating swing shift working days/nights 12-14 hour shifts. During this time I gained about 30lbs (heaviest was 190lbs) over theses years while working a physically demanding job and watching my diet, was going through family stress as my wife was working full time, doing her masters degree and both of us taking care of our two young boys. I was experiencing mood swings, brain fog, up and down libido, pre hypertension and a lot of fat gain in the belly area specifically. I took a lot of brain support supplements, libido “herbs” and alcohol to try and maintain. I ended up researching hormone issues and went in to see a physicians assistant who begrudgingly ran a testosterone panel (only total T and Free T) which was low somewhere around 300 total T (i don’t have my records from that test) of course she said I was normal. By the end of 2016 I changed departments at my company and am on a 4 day, 10 hour shift schedule no nights, got fed up with this doctor and am currently at a private clinic that does “functional medicine”. There is a Naturepathic doctor and a regular doctor there that specializes in mens health and Testosterone optimization among other things. October 2016 I had the naturepath doctor run a very large panel, Total T and Free T were sub clinical, low vitamin D, sub clinical hypo-thyroid etc. He basically prescribed weight lifting and good diet including stopping the beer to raise my T.
Fast forward to this year, I checked back in with this doctor after almost 3 years since seeing him. Been regularly doing strength training 3xweek and some form of cardo/HIIT about 2xweek which is usually Krav Maga or HIIT class. Dropped weight from 190lbs to where i’m at bouncing between 167-173 lbs which I seem to plateau at this weigh. Been taking iodine, zinc, Ashwaganda, multi-vitamin etc. Still experiencing all my symptoms. Just have had an over 2 week period of Zero libido, couldn’t get it up even with the herbs that usually make me hard all day long, my dick actually felt numb to response. I have most of the stress out of my life and have cut back a lot from the alcohol. Got labs done again, things minimally better, vitamin D improved quite a bit.
TL;DR what do you guys think of the chances of naturally recovering my hormones and quality of life? I wanted to do this naturally and not be on medication for the rest of my life but I am getting closer to biting the bullet and going TRT route.
Labs 10/10/2016 (Huge panel, I’ll post relevant)
TSH 4.79 Ref. .450-4.50
T3 3.4 Ref. 2.0-4.4
T4 0.88 Ref. 0.82-1.77
Vitamin D 17.7 Ref. 30.0-100.0
Total T 369 Ref. 348-1197
Free T 15.6 Ref. 8.7-25.1
Estradiol 17.2 Ref. 7.6-42.6
Labs 2/12/2019
TSH 3.310
T4 1.11
T3 3.1
Vitamin D 32.6
Total T 430.1
Free T 16.2
DHT 26 Ref. 30-85
DHEA-Sulfate 426.8 Ref. 102.6-416.3
Cortisol 14.7 Ref. 6.2-19.4 (AM)
Estradiol 29.8 Ref. 7.6-42.6