Low test / MENT "Cruise" log for the Semi Geriatric

[borkies]

I thought I would log this little experiment, hopefully it's helpful to someone. I sat on the fence about MENT for a long time now but finally said hell with it, lets try this out.

THE FACTS
46 year old male
6'3" 235lbs, 12% bodyfat (confirmed with hydrostatic test)
Solid sleep schedule, obsessive routine oriented "has fits if routine disturbed" type A jackass
Currently eating 3400kcals/day, at least 250g protein, low fat, rest is clean carbs and green veggies (maintenance cals for me)
Train 6x per week ~90 minutes resistance and 30 mins zone 2 cardio per day - currently doing Creeping Death
Deloads every 7th week by decreasing volume 50%. Cardio maintained during deload.
Supps: creatine (6g), fish oil (3000mg combined EPA/etc), multivitamin, vitamin C (750mg), vitamin D3 (4000iu), NAC (600mg)

THE DRUGS
80mg Test C / week (11.5mg/day)
28mg MENT A / week (4mg/day)
Injected daily at night before bed

Telmisartan 160mg/day
Amlodipine 10mg/day
HCTZ 25mg/day
Cialis 5mg/day
BP stable around 115/70

Sexually active 4-5x per week, no mental/emotional issues of note, "successful professional", family man, non smoker, no alcohol. Recent full review of cardiovascular system by cardiologist, clean bill of health except blood pressure issues for many years (see BP meds above). No kidney or liver issues.

Recent bloodwork shows HCT, RBC, Hemoglobin in range. AST/ALT in range.

DAY 1
Training: Feeling normal, normal energy and intensity, feeling good after workout
Sleep: Sleeping well, except waking up 3x per night to piss. Should stop drinking water after 6pm.
Libido: Normal.
Appetite: Normal. No indigestion, comfortable at 3400kcals, no strange cravings, normal hunger.
Estrogen sides: Not feeling moody, not wanting to cry during movies, nipples normal, not bloated
Mental/emotional: Feeling a bit down because winter but this is normal for me. Otherwise fine.
Androgen sides: Nothing of note. Prone to prostate swelling with DHTs, not prone to acne or hair issues.

From here on out I will only mention things that have changed against this DAY 1 baseline.

DAY 2
No changes of note

DAY 3
Sleep: Sweat the bed. Restless night because too hot.

DAY 4
Training: Feeling slightly more euphoric after a hard set. Noticeable, but not "wow" noticeable.
Sleep: Back to normal. Good nights rest, not hot.

DAY 5 (Yesterday)
Training: Nice pump, sweat a lot more than usual. Cardio lots of sweat.
Sleep: Hot again, sweat the bed again. I hope this doesn't become a thing. I have A/C in the room and keep constant temps. Dropping to 62 F.
Libido: Felt a bit more frisky than normal, but, its been 2 days since sex. Had some pretty good/fun sex, no erection issues.
Mental/emotional: Feeling a bit "dark" today. Able to function, but kind of in a funk.
Androgen sides: Zits. Really? Haven't had zits for many years - suddenly have 3 on my neck/face today. Also very sweaty today. Showered twice.
Blood pressure: Still sitting at 115/70 most of the day.

 

[borkies]

DAY 6
Training: Excellent pump. Not only that, but getting pumps thru the day doing normal chores/exertion. Kind of like anavar/dbol pumps. Strength has not increased, but lifts feeling good - enjoyed today's workout.
Sleep: Sweating the bed again, running hot. I wonder if moving my injection to AM might help with this. Or, if this is like tren sweats where minimizing carbs in the evening might help. Will play with it and find out.
Libidio: Like yesterday, feeling frisky. No performance issues.
Mental/emotional: Feeling dark again. Training is awesome, sex is awesome, but the rest of the day feels "bleh". Work day unfulfilling.
Androgen sides: Showering twice and changing pillowcases helped, zits going away. However, sweating more and getting a bit oily.
BP: 115/70

DAY 7
Mental/emotional: Slightly improved. Busy day though, kept myself occupied with chores and no time to simmer in my own thoughts.
Androgen sides: Starting to smell bad during training, just that kind of sour "tren" sweat stink even though I showered twice. Wife noticed it today. I have eaten an asston of onions though the last couple days, could be that.

I wonder if my dose is too high. Reduce to 2mg/day?

 

[borkies]

DAY 11
Training: Doing really well. Pumps are still great, and I'm seeing a bit of a strength boost now. I'm also maintaining a pump more thru the day with activity, my muscles seem to want to get pumped. No painful back pumps though which is nice.
Mental/emotional: Moody. Still dark, easily frustrated. Not feeling good about my job - kind of a dooming mindset (oh no I'm gonna get in trouble for X,Y,Z). I'm still not sure if this is the MENT or not, but it is out of the ordinary. I certainly don't feel the "MENT makes me feel great!" thing that people talk about.
Sleep: After dropping the temps and using less blankets and using wicking bamboo sheets it's much improved. The sweating is less too, probably cause of the lower temps. Dreams are good, nothing out of the ordinary like tren/nandrolone.
Appetite: Constant heartburn for the last couple days. Like I'm taking orals kinda heartburn. Started popping Tums like a madman. Hopefully this gets better.
Androgen sides: Skin getting a bit oily now, and sweating a lot of stinky sweat still. My socks smell awful at the end of the day. Having to really keep up with the hygiene now. Showering in the AM after gym, and again before bed. I feel like a stinky teenager.
Libido: Now I'm starting to notice I'm becoming more needy in that department. Feeling unsatisfied with once daily encounters with the old lady, rubbed one out in the shower the last couple days on top of that. This can't become a thing - cause then prolactin becomes a thing for me and then I feel like a sleepy unmotivated blob all day. Nothing freaky like with tren, just getting excited more often.

 

[borkies]

DAY14
My weight is up 4lbs in the last week and my nipples are getting spicy. Basically, I'm seeing some estrogen sides. Popped 1/2mg ADEX this morning and now later in the day about 10 hours later nipples are feeling normal. Hoping that I'll piss out some of this water too.
Mental/emotional: Feeling better today. The "dark" is starting to lift away a bit over the last couple of days. I'm hoping that this clears, or I think I will stop the MENT entirely. I don't like feeling like a moody-ass somber emo kid. It's kinda like the nandrolone blues except worse. At least I don't have the nandrolone/tren jealousy issues happening - I hate that shit.

 

[DECLAN]

@borkies did your doctor prescribe telmisartan at that dose? From what I read, it is optimal to add another type of medication and keep telmisartan at 80mg tops, but since you are already on another, I am curious why you doubled the dose.

How high is your bp on cycle?

 

[borkies]

@borkies did your doctor prescribe telmisartan at that dose? From what I read, it is optimal to add another type of medication and keep telmisartan at 80mg tops, but since you are already on another, I am curious why you doubled the dose.

How high is your bp on cycle?

Yeah man - glad you asked. I was on 80mg for the longest time, with 5mg amlodipine and it was mostly working. It got to the point where I was hovering around 130-135 / 80-85 and that just wasn't cutting it for me.

So, I started working with a cardiologist and he started by bumping up the amlodipine to 10mg. This helped a little, but still had me 125-130ish. It also gave me crazy edema in my legs, so he added in the HCTZ which seemed to only kill the edema and didn't do anything for the BP. So, eventually we were sitting in his office and he was ruminating on it and finally said "we're gonna try this, lets do 160mg telmisartan and see what happens". He said the pharmacy might give me beef about it and the insurance might not cover it. The insurance part was true. But, taking me to 160 (80 in the AM 80 in the PM) knocked me down to 115/70.

This dose seems to keep me locked down to under 120/80 even on blast.

Am I comfortable with it? Not exactly. I feel like I don't really have room to grow if my BP starts to worsen in the future. Which, really was problem #1 with me wanting to try MENT and kept me from trying it for a long time. Like - if it gets worse, what the hell else am I gonna take?

We ruled out kidney issues, did imaging, did a sonagram, looked at my diet - but because of my awful family history of BP issues on both sides I am genetically gifted to have crazy high BP issues.

Oh yeah - what is my average resting BP without meds/intervention? About 165/95. Once was as high as 205/125. Scary bad.

 

[DECLAN]

Yeah man - glad you asked. I was on 80mg for the longest time, with 5mg amlodipine and it was mostly working. It got to the point where I was hovering around 130-135 / 80-85 and that just wasn't cutting it for me.

So, I started working with a cardiologist and he started by bumping up the amlodipine to 10mg. This helped a little, but still had me 125-130ish. It also gave me crazy edema in my legs, so he added in the HCTZ which seemed to only kill the edema and didn't do anything for the BP. So, eventually we were sitting in his office and he was ruminating on it and finally said "we're gonna try this, lets do 160mg telmisartan and see what happens". He said the pharmacy might give me beef about it and the insurance might not cover it. The insurance part was true. But, taking me to 160 (80 in the AM 80 in the PM) knocked me down to 115/70.

This dose seems to keep me locked down to under 120/80 even on blast.

Am I comfortable with it? Not exactly. I feel like I don't really have room to grow if my BP starts to worsen in the future. Which, really was problem #1 with me wanting to try MENT and kept me from trying it for a long time. Like - if it gets worse, what the hell else am I gonna take?

We ruled out kidney issues, did imaging, did a sonagram, looked at my diet - but because of my awful family history of BP issues on both sides I am genetically gifted to have crazy high BP issues.

Oh yeah - what is my average resting BP without meds/intervention? About 165/95. Once was as high as 205/125. Scary bad.

Damn, thats a tough spot to be in. I asked because mine also hovers around 130-80 if I neglect cardio but I usually lower my telmisartan dosage when I am off cycle.

Some guys have supplements aside from meds to help with it, but most will certainly say its the extra weight that bumps up the numbers greatly. For me its genetics but becoming out of shape enhanced my hypertension.

It’s great you’re monitoring it, I know you already are proactive and looking for ways to improve so you can blast and grow safely.

 

[borkies]

Damn, thats a tough spot to be in. I asked because mine also hovers around 130-80 if I neglect cardio but I usually lower my telmisartan dosage when I am off cycle.

Some guys have supplements aside from meds to help with it, but most will certainly say its the extra weight that bumps up the numbers greatly. For me its genetics but becoming out of shape enhanced my hypertension.

It’s great you’re monitoring it, I know you already are proactive and looking for ways to improve so you can blast and grow safely.

Yeah cardio is definitely a must for me too, I'm fairly religious about it. I am sure my BP would start to creep if I stopped cardio.

Also your comment about weight is on point - my doc also mentioned that me having a BMI of almost 30 wasn't helping things, whether I'm lean or not. I'm fairly certain that if I got down to under 200lbs my BP would improve.

I probably don't have many more blasts left, if any at all. Maybe just one more... lol

I hope your BP situation goes well for you. It can be a tough animal to deal with.

 

[DECLAN]

Yeah cardio is definitely a must for me too, I'm fairly religious about it. I am sure my BP would start to creep if I stopped cardio.

Also your comment about weight is on point - my doc also mentioned that me having a BMI of almost 30 wasn't helping things, whether I'm lean or not. I'm fairly certain that if I got down to under 200lbs my BP would improve.

I probably don't have many more blasts left, if any at all. Maybe just one more... lol

I hope your BP situation goes well for you. It can be a tough animal to deal with.

Thanks man, I’ll be following your log and I hope you attain your goal on this run.

 

[borkies]

DAY 16:
Weight still creeping up. ADEX didn't seem to reduce bloat at all the other day. Also, BP starting to creep up - it's about 5 points up on both systolic/diastolic thru the day. Starting to feel lethargic. Classic estrogen symptoms. Going to try more ADEX today, 1/2mg. WTF man.

 

[borkies]

DAY 21:
Training: Feeling tired. I'm thinking I need to deload early.
Libido: Still up. Not freaky tren thoughts, but feeling pretty horny a lot of the time.
Appetite: Normal. No intense hunger, no lack of hunger. However, the heartburn continues and I am still popping a lot of Tums. This is out of the ordinary for me unless I am taking a lot of anadrol, which I am not.
Estrogen sides: See above re: tired in training. Lethargic. Sleepy, unmotivated. ADEX is not helping and I don't feel like eating more than 1mg per week especially if I'm not having any other symptoms (gyno, etc). I have some ASIN on hand I might try that and see if it makes a difference.
Mental/emotional: Improved, not so dark, but still not back to a normal baseline and the lethargy isn't helping things. Sleep is at least better, no strange dreams, no insomnia.
Androgen sides: Backne. The facial acne has subsided with regular washing like I'm a teenager, but there are now zits all over my back.
BP: 120/75

Day 21 conclusion... I dunno about this shit, man. Pressing onward though.

 

[borkies]

Day 38:
I have decided that this experiment isn't really worth it. I'm not seeing any benefit from this, at least nothing better than just running my normal cruise dose of testosterone. Slightly enhanced libido but that is it. My lifting / progress isn't anything to phone home about. Really, all I'm getting is a lot of pimples and smelly sweat and difficulty sleeping.

So, with that being said, about a week ago I decided to see what 10mg felt like. For the last 7 days I've been bumped up to 10mg MENT - and I definitely feel it the last couple days. I'm going to do this for maybe another week or so just to see, and then stop entirely and bump my test back up to cruise. If I decide that I like the higher dose MENT then it might be something I put into future blasts. For cruising though... meh. Not impressed.

 

[borkies]

So I ran the 10mg MENT plus test base for another 10 days. Made me feel like Jello. Like, bloated and jiggly and just wanting to sit there on the couch. I definitely felt more strength in the gym towards the end of it. Interesting compound, but not for me. I'll stick with the staple compounds for now. No gyno symptoms, nothing bad like that - just lethargic and watery. Made me lazy.