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How did this feel? I would think this, with some daily hCG added to bump the numbers up a little and fill in some gaps, ought to be a decent protocol for you. Look at you! Very impressive sir - not much room for improvement here. Still, give the 5/8" needles a shot (hah) if you ever return...

You don't care about E2 numbers but are trying very hard to keep your E2 at a specific number. Got it. No, I've never seen it used for this purpose before. Metformin is a cutting edge adjunct in the TRT space. Let us know what happens if you try it.

I would suggest the second statement follows from the first. Excessive E2 has anti-dopaminergic effects via at least three distinct mechanisms: disinhibited prolactin release (prolactin reduces DA synthesis and firing), downregulation of D1 and D2 receptors, and a serotonin/GABA crosstalk...

Looks like the lack of DHT raws caught up with alphagels, and they don't have the integrity to stop selling it.

I concur with the others: I would restart with T alone, no hCG, no AI. The prominence of the doctors you consulted with, and your weight, are immaterial with regard to how you should approach this to optimize your chances of success and health outcomes. The difficulty of dialing in rises in...

Also, please watch this video (my goal is for the entire TRT-using population to watch this video):

It's probably fine for many purposes as a TRT adjunct. My friend is only able to use .25 ml of the alphagels product every other day because it's so potent, and testing suggests that is only ~10% DHT.

Your only hope of dialing in anastrozole is frequent bloodwork, and even that can be misleading, as the blood levels of E2 don't necessarily correspond to the effects of aromatase inhibition in tissues. Without the bloodwork though, your already low chance of success is reduced to pretty much...

At-home test: https://www.maximustribe.com/lab-tests

I'm doing it - taking 150 iu daily right now, and if I have to drop something lower, it will be the testosterone. That's a far cry from running hCG alone or test suspension though, either of which will produce a 24 hr testosterone AUC that is somewhere close to my natty test AUC. Please don't...

The decay rate of her follicles is the determinant of ovarian failure and it doesn't seem to matter whether you are stimulating them and releasing them or not. Their lifespan seems relatively fixed and finite either way (and is only about half of the woman's lifespan, strangely). I just read 4...

That's all pretty normal. What you're missing that is really important here is SHBG, so you could calculate your free testosterone. You'll want to repeat the total T, and this time I would add SHBG, estradiol (ultrasensitive) and LH. Free T is basically all that matters for hypogonadal...

That probably would work pretty well, but I'm not prepared to give up the physique advantages of actual TRT just yet. Maybe down the road if nothing else works.

Possibly for someone younger. I wouldn't think it would be too effective as you approach ovarian failure (and not at all effective afterwards).

Crucial point here. Giving my perimenopausal wife TRT only without estradiol did not work out well long-term. It gave her a strange mix of libido at times, combined with pain/discomfort during intercourse due to lack of estradiol.

Wow! Let me get this straight: you added 250 iu EOD to a protocol that otherwise would produce 10-20 pg/mL e2, and your E2 is now 86 pg/mL? If so, that's the craziest hCG e2 spike I've ever heard of. And yeah, that could certainly explain the loss of libido and moodiness. What effect did it...

Same here

So far, there have been some windows of improved libido, that have varied between a few hours to most of a day. I have no idea. It seems like most of the people who benefit from hCG use it continuously, although I've heard at least one anecdote where it only worked when cycled. I know what...

DHEA can raise it somewhat. The most reliable method is to supplement E2 directly though, crazy as it sounds. Your clinic will almost certainly help if you want to go that route, or you can procure it yourself from sources that cater to the trans market: Home - DIYHRT.Market I like injections...

Just to be clear, I'm not advocating for abnormally high estradiol levels. When I was talking about honesty around trade-offs, I meant being clear-eyed about the likely damage of inhibiting aromatase. Some people have the idea that if you modestly and carefully inhibit aromatase, just the...

Friends don't let friends start with subq. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CXF7V7BV 5/8" into the delt, ventroglute or quad. Lower dose isn't a bad idea either if your initial reaction is so unpleasant.

That's totally fair, as long as we are being honest about the tradeoffs we're making.

Please give this one a watch, and then tell me, in what scenario outside of possibly ER+ breast cancer are you going to improve anyone's health (man or woman) by inhibiting aromatase (even a little bit)?

Yes, that sounds plausible that it could, but inhibiting aromatase will not optimize for libido or health if these are important goals.

I don't understand how anastrozole brain penetration is relevant to our discussion, which has not been focused at all on anastrozole. What point were you trying to make? This approach to TRT protocol design is meant to optimize sexual function, not anabolism / body composition. Much higher...

In my case, and with my current SHBG of high 30's (as critical for context when interpreting E2 as it is for T), I think that translates to an e2 of less than 40. You don't actually need any labwork to determine that though. You would simply start with hCG at a target dose, start with...

Berberine is very similar to metformin in its metabolic effects. I think it's reasonable to start with berberine and see how you do with that. I would probably experiment with metformin also at some point to compare effects and tolerability if you'll be using one of these long-term. With...

Dr. Anawalt won handily. Dr. Handelman's fixation on difficulties with measuring free testosterone did nothing to dispute the validity of the free hormone hypothesis. He had no answer to the numerous human epidemiologic studies which support it.

Yes, but the negative feedback from oral native testosterone is minimal to begin with. We have internal data showing, on average, men's LH only dropped by 0.8 IU/L (non-significant and within margin of error) when using a single 600 mg dose of native oral T daily. Yes, it certainly is, unless...

Very interesting result with the test suspension results. I think there are a percentage of men that do maintain long-term libido on testosterone alone, another group that maintains it long-term with hCG, and I would imagine the fraction that cannot maintain libido despite the combination is...

Mine is also like this (lower end FT4, midrange FT3) and past experiments with supplementing thyroid hormone only made me feel worse. Knowing what I know now, I never would have messed with it at all.