Hello from a wife of a suffering man

[Cuson]

Hello everyone,
I hope to find support from the community members here.
My husband (actually, both of us) is suffering from the loss of the sex function.
I am going to post on Testosterone replacement forum, but give you a short version.
I came here to ask for an advice from people who actually are more experienced in TRT than any doctors out there.

My husband tried all therapy options and did not get a relief from ANY of them.
He is suffering from ED, PE, no orgasm and no libido. You can imagine what he must go through... My heart just aches for him.
And he is only 42 :-(

I will post our story in my profile and make a thread in the appropriate forum.

 

[Vettester Chris]

Cuson, let me first say thank you for joining our forum. I can only imagine the frustration you guys are experiencing. I'm sure you have a lot of details to post that are relevant to this subject, as I know there's a lot of questions on our end just the same.
I'd personally be curious with just some chronological details that led up to this ... I presume once upon a time that things were great, no issues, correct? Can you pinpoint a time period when it started changing? Were there any other issues that either one of you started experiencing at/around the same time the libido went south (mostly speaking health, anxieties, stress, changes in lifestyle, ...)? One of the key items you will hearing us asking for is LABS. I'd personally like to see full comprehensive panels with both of you, BUT, maybe take one at a time and see if anything stands out.
Talking from a hormonal standpoint, your husband's issues could easily go well beyond just testosterone. There's a whole variety of variables that can factor into this, including estrogen (E2) and prolactin, and a litany of other topics like adrenals and thyroid can further contribute to the well being with both of you.
Tell us what you can to help us have a better understanding. With your husband, it would be good to see any of his baseline labs before starting any treatment(s), and labs thereafter. With yourself, would want to know if you're experiencing menstrual changes (peri or post menopausal)? If you post your personal story, please post it in our NEW forum area for Female Members. Our team will be here for both of you!

 

[Cuson]

Thank you Chris for kind words. Yes, there are much more to the story than I can put in one intro post. Yes, everything happened out of the blue. He lost erection in the middle of the sex. We did not have anything that could indicate the problem, so we just decided that it was one of the "it happens to everybody" cases.
But erections did not return for couple of weeks, which prompted my husband to see a urologist. Uro offered him Cialis and did testosterone measure. T was a little over 200. So husband was diagnosed with hypogonadism and had a choice to start TRT therapy right away. We decided to go "natural" way first. So we went on Atkins diet.
To our relief, in a month everything came back, our sex became even better than before. But it lasted only 4-5 months and then all bad stuff returned. He has not been able to recover since. 2 years of nightmare. We tried to get clues from the improvement, but everything checks out to be good.
We know about hormones and their roles. My husband read so much, he could take endocrinology exam in his sleep . His thyroid hormones were in the middle of range. We tried T3 - he had no reaction to it, which just proved that his thyroid is not the issue. He checked cortisol, estrogen, adrenaline, nor-adrenaline, dopamine, serotonin - you name it.
the numbers were if not in the middle, than slightly off, nothing alarming. His estrogen on another hand was all over the place. Initially our assumption was that he needs to have it at 25-30 level, so when he tried HCG and his E was over 40, he took arimidex, which killed E to a single digit. Since then it was anywhere from 8 to 50. Now, on testopel his E does not go over 20 without any arimedex. His prolactin is normal.
He is in better shape on paper than 2 years ago. But he feels miserable...
With regards to me, I have no problems in sex area (knock on the wood), except the main component - the other participant . I feel so bad for him that I do not enjoy intercourse. He has nothing out of it - not the process itself, not the outcome, has no desire to have sex. I feel that I cannot push him to have sex, because it makes him feel really bad.
I could post his recent labs if it will help anybody to give me an idea. My husband strongly believes that his condition is purely physiological. His indicator is nocturnal erections. He does not get them. Random erections do not happen either. Porn has no effect on him - was not a case before. Two years ago we could watch 10 minutes of porn and it was enough to start fun activities. Now - he can sit there and watch it like a sitcom ("meh, whatever")
So anything you guys have....

 

[James]

Any stress in this guy's life? Work, children, health, elderly parent?

 

[Vettester Chris]

Yeah, I'd like to see the labs ... In regards to thyroid, what was his free T3 and Reverse T3 numbers? Sometimes free T3 can be sitting within "the range", but it's not getting into the body adequately due to a variety of reasons. In this case, Free T3 will "usually" be sitting to the right of Free T4, meaning FT3 is higher in the reference range compared to FT4 (usually the case, BUT not always ..). TPO & TgAb antibodies checked out? On the cortisol, was it 4x saliva?

When the initial testosterone serum lab came back at 200ng/dl, no doubt that anyone here will disagree that it qualifies as "Low T". My question to that is, what form of hypogonadism was he diagnosed with (Primary or Secondary)? With either diagnosis, did they run any MRI's or testicular exams? Sticking to that category, I'd also be curious to know his free testosterone %, hopefully they checked and/or ran SHBG. Also, the E2 "all over the place" could be a real factor here. I've had it crash just the same, and I know it's a total libido killer when it's in the tank. On the E2 assays, were they running Sensitive or Ultra-Sensitive?

I'll keep an eye out for the labs ... Knowing the importance of this situation to both of you, have you guys considered looking at one of the physicians/clinics like Defy or Dr. Crisler, who specialize in this exact area of practice? I'm with Kaiser, and my relation with my GP is better than ever, BUT, for HRT, I go out of state to a specialist. I keep my GP informed on the protocols and various treatments, which at this point and time is far from being implemented at PCPs like KP.

Yes, please post labs, I'll be keeping an eye out for them.

 

[Gene Devine]

I too want to see labs as something is clearly off.

I wouldn't be too quick to dispel physiological cause as well IF all labs are in the optimal range.

Just overthinking it and worrying about it all the time can kill libido.

Post most recent labs with reference ranges and we'll give a good review with our opinions.

 

[Cuson]

He is going to do new full panel some time next week, but here some numbers from March, T and E from May

Pregnenolone, Stimulated 27 ng/dL Adult Males: 20 - 200
Candida Antibodies IgG 37 High U/mL 0 - 29
Candida Antibodies IgM 43 High U/mL 0 - 9
Candida Antibodies IgA 21 High U/mL 0 - 9
Vitamin B12 1152 High pg/mL 211 - 946
Folate (Folic Acid), Serum 16.9 ng/mL >3.0
T4,Free(Direct) 0.97 ng/dL 0.82 - 1.77
DHEA-Sulfate 392.7 ug/dL 102.6 - 416.3
TSH 2.550 uIU/mL 0.450 - 4.500
LH <0.2 Low mIU/mL 1.7 - 8.6
FSH 0.2 Low mIU/mL 1.5 - 12.4
RA Latex Turbid. 207.6 High IU/mL 0.0 - 13.9
Reverse T3, Serum 9.6 ng/dL 9.2 - 24.1
Vitamin D, 25-Hydroxy 25.7 Low ng/mL 30.0 - 100.
Iron, Serum 88 ug/dL 40 - 155
Thyroxine (T4) 4.7 ug/dL 4.5 - 12.0
Triiodothyronine (T3) 94 ng/dL 71 - 180
Zinc, Plasma or Serum 89 ug/dL 56 - 134
Progesterone 0.8 ng/mL 0.2 - 1.4
Ferritin, Serum 40 ng/mL 30 - 400
Triiodothyronine,Free,Serum 3.3 pg/mL 2.0 - 4.4
Vitamin A, Serum 65 ug/dL 18 - 77
Sex Horm Binding Glob, Serum 10.2 Low nmol/L 16.5 - 55.9
testosterone, serum 502 348-1197 ng/dL
estradiol, sensitive 38 3-70 pg/mL

We checked out candida - they don't know what is causing the numbers
RA factor - ruled out as idiopathic. He does not have RA - did all the tests