Switching to Once a Week for Blood Test

I am currently dosing e3.5d but my Dr wants me once weekly even after i brought it up so I plan to switch back before doing the blood work. Will one week be enough or do i need to switch two weeks before. When spliting my dose like that how much would that half dose 3.5d before the draw effect the numbers.

I always switch it up two weeks out. I make sure I get a full 14 days and then pull bloods on trough day.

How do you feel? I just worry about a rush and crash

Well everyone is different but I dont notice much of a diff.

Do you switch back thinking you will eventually notice or do you just like to split it

You are not going to be successful with your current quack doctor, he is clearly inept to manage your TRT protocol are if you find success, it will be do to pure luck.

Twice weekly protocol are the most common according to my doctor who has seen tens of thousand of patients. There are other blood tests needed to determine which protocol you should be on, your doctor shouldn’t be concerned that you are injection twice weekly, he should be onboard with it as your levels will be more steady.

Just cant justify spending the money on private yet? I contacted my insurance company and explained that him undertreating me will just lead to expensive chronic illnesses and askes if they would partially reimburse me for private. Im going to see what he lets me levels get up to and how things pan out when i do my blood. If i crash those last two weeks i will tell him that and explain I want to change things up or ill go private. Its a little urgent care and my wife and i are repeat customers often so hopefully things work out

Your problem is insurance, most of the experienced hormone doctor are all private, I always tell people you are unlikely to find a knowledgeable doctors under insurance especially if you have an HMO, in this case you are very likely F********.

When it comes to my health and wellbeing, I can afford whatever is necessary. Your health should be priority number 1.

Problem is i have 3 kids and a wife that stays at home with them. I did manage to tap into the 6figures this year but i got lucky with overtime and prob will end up in the 90s which when saving for a house paying rent and supporting a family of 5 and keeping 2 cars on the road it doesnt leave a ton left over. I also already pay 200 a month in copays for methadone. But if it comes to it i will have to drop the extra each month on private because I keep this family afloat and need to be my.best.the wife has been really supportive even about spending the money but i think thats because of the sex more than anything. Figure id be am idiot to not at least ride it out the 6 weeks and at least see what this dr is willing to do for me

Just do like you’ve been doing and manage your own protocol. Sometimes docs are good for a script and thats it. Manage and take care of your family first and stay the course. Hit us up here with questions.

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I have low shgb. Right at the bottom of the range cant remember off hand. He wants me to do 100mg every Monday so I can test on a Sunday 6 days out.

If you can manage to run some labs we can help guide your protocol, discount labs offers a cheaper way to do labs, at a minimum you would need Total T, Free T, SHBG and estrogen to dial-in your TRT protocol.

Low SHBG guys typically do better on more frequent dosing, my SHBG is 22 and do well on EOD dosing. There aren’t many low SHBG guys doing well on weekly injections.

I will have labs in like a month. I just dont want to split it and my levels be high and he cuts my dose

The science behind that would be that there isnt enough shgb to stick to the t and a lot just gets quickly excreted?

As the T is excreted, estrogen remains long after making you estrogen dominant often canceling out TRT effects. Your doctor doesn’t understand and is operating in the dark. Your doctor is actually getting in the way by telling you to inject weekly when you were already moving in the correct direction.

The kidneys excrete testosterone into the urine, the same isn’t true for estrogen unfortunately. That’s the job of the liver.

The problem with a large 100mg dose is free hormones for low SHBG guys, Free T and Free E2 will be very high in the beginning of the week and testosterone low and estrogen elevated after about 3-4 days leaving the poor guy high and dry for the last couple of days before his injection.

I have notice if me Total T decreases by 100 ng/dL, my Free T decreases by a factor far greater, a Total T of 496 would see Free T at 20.8, 376 would see Free T drop to 14.7, I just went from top of the range (optimal) to a range men seek treatment. This is why most will say they feel a crash or feel low after 4-5 days after an injection.

I wonder how long it takes to replenish or unstick. Like if you did 50mg on Monday and 50mg on Tuesday you would have the advantage of breaking it up a bit but then you also. Have almost the full week for the trough.

I inject so frequently that I can do labs any day of the week, the difference between trough and peak is miniscule. If I did 50mg twice weekly, nothing happens, it’s like I’m not even on TRT. I did even better on a daily protocol, but my other bodily systems didn’t like it for some reason.

The answer may lie in iron storage, daily was so steady that it demanded more than my body could provide, it’s pure speculation but I have nothing else to go on. My iron stores was already at the bottom percentage wise.

Dr Crisler stated if your Total T is lower and Free T higher, that indicates your SHBG is grabbing on to androgens well. My Total T of 500 would see Free T 21 where most men with an SHBG of 30 would need 700-800 to achieve the same Free T level.

So high normal testosterone for me is 500, not 800 and that’s why we have reference ranges (264-916 ng/dL). SHBG is the one that hands out all the cards.

So you think going in at 3.5 days for a draw wont really matter? I mean i asked him straight out what number he wanted to see me at and he just kept saying its not really about the number its how I feel. Now hopefully that means if i come in at 1000 and feel good he will just say continue with what your doing and not try to bring me down. He did say usually on trough is like 5-600. The other issue is it was a rushed apt. It was a snow day and I had to come in early before they closed early and he was arguing with nurses threw some syringes in my hand and said sorry you are gonna have to figure this out i dont have time to show you this stuff today.

If I were to bet on a horse for the win, I would bet on 8-12mg daily injections for low SHBG, 20-25mg EOD would be a compromise if you really don’t want to inject daily in the beginning.

I felt best on a daily protocol when compared to an EOD.