TAKE A BREAK

[Fattyone]

I am glad that you spotted the entire purpose of this thread. Going back and reading from the first post, even the title, it is clear that this is about nothing more than my narcissism, and, of course, my greatness, which you should all closely mimic.

Which is what I figured.

I am all for health. I am in agreement that plenty of people lower there dose and think they are being healthy when in reality they are still in blast/cycle territory.

I’m just saying if you want to set numbers for what’s considered healthy, the weekly dose ain’t it.

And I’d bet my left arm your bloods and mine look complete opposite on 100mg/ weekly. As soon as I can get into labcorp I plan on posting a couple labs and getting your opinion

 

[RiceNKimchi]

Which is what I figured.

I am all for health. I am in agreement that plenty of people lower there dose and think they are being healthy when in reality they are still in blast/cycle territory.

I’m just saying if you want to set numbers for what’s considered healthy, the weekly dose ain’t it.

And I’d bet my left arm your bloods and mine look complete opposite on 100mg/ weekly. As soon as I can get into labcorp I plan on posting a couple labs and getting your opinion

The numbers are irrelevant but the concept is relevant

 

[malfeasance]

The male body produces on average, 6-7 mg a day of testosterone. Circulating Testosterone as the Hormonal Basis of Sex Differences in Athletic Performance).

Following puberty, testosterone production increases (16) but remains <2 nmol/L in women, whereas in men testosterone production increases 20-fold (from 0.3 mg/d to 7 mg/d), leading to 15-fold higher circulating testosterone concentrations (15 vs 1 nmol/L).

6 x 7days = 42 mg /wk.

If 100mg a week does not provide you normal levels of testosterone, then you have a problem unrelated to dosing.

I have no idea what your physical condition is (no idea), but the typical cause of low testosterone is high body fat.

The fact that reference ranges are consistently lowering, should strike alarm in both clinician and patient. Applying normal to a sick population is not acting in the best interests of the patient, this drop in the new normal cannot reflect evolutionary change. There are countless contributory elements including ‘Endocrine Disruptors & The HPG Axis‘. However, we believe obesity and lack of physical activity are the largest contributory factors resulting in a decline in Testosterone levels, discussed in depth in ‘Me & My Fat – The Role of Fat on Your Hormonal Health‘. The aromatase enzyme, which converts Testosterone to Oestradiol is located in both peripheral and visceral adiposity. This is the biggest single challenge for both patient and clinician in attaining a healthy Testosterone to Oestradiol ratio for optimal well-being.

Microdosing TRT – The Future of Testosterone Replacement Therapy - The Men’s Health Clinic

Microdosing is the most effective way to mimic natural Testosterone levels and minimise side effects. We explain why in this article.

themenshealthclinic.co.uk

 

[DECLAN]

My break is at 100mg a week, and my test levels do not drop to 5 ng/dl, so I am not sure what to tell you. And my high HCT/hemoglobin also went down into the normal range.

Sorry, I meant mine dropped to 5 ng/dl when I stopped to get HCT/Hemoglobin in check. I have it under control now by donating blood.

My question is regarding how do you approach your doctor if you're getting prescribed and yet your testosterone shows up below range. I get mandatory blood test every 10 weeks, so about two and a half months.

 

[malfeasance]

I’m just saying if you want to set numbers for what’s considered healthy, the weekly dose ain’t it.

I provided evidence regarding the weekly dose and its effect on the heart.

I am standing by for contrary evidence.

If you don't have any, then find some. If it does not exist, then we need to take a careful look at the evidence that does exist.

You have valid criticisms of the strength of the study cited. The results are what they are, though, and the most you can say is maybe that evidence is not strong or conclusive, but it is nevertheless evidence.

Until there is contrary evidence for me to consider (and I will consider it if I run across it) then I let what evidence there is guide me.

They injected persons with 4 injections at 200mg a week. They had controls. They had a group with nandrolone. They got results.

Not a large study - check. True. Valid critique. I do not think the researchers would claim this is the be all end all on the question.

But nevertheless, there it is. 200mg had a bad effect, and in a ridiculously short period of time, and irrespective of the response to testosterone dose in blood levels, which was not even considered. That got my attention. It should get yours.

I would not dismiss it out of hand based on conjecture and speculation.

If your argument is that persons with higher body fat will be healthier by injecting 200mg or more, because their higher body fat means higher aromatase, then take a look to see if somebody has studied that very question and looked at the heart for effects.

I can only post what I found, and it outweighs conjecture and speculation (at least until you turn those into a testable hypothesis and then test it to see what's what)

 

[Isrrike]

The 65% EF is not shown in the attachments, or am I missing it?

You mentioned


in the first post. Could you tell us a little more about your situation? What was a "trt dose" in your case? I see nebivolol and Ramipril. Did you make any other changes? If so, what? Bodyweight? Cardio exercise?


What made you get the first set of tests?

Is cardiac MRI a common test? I only see echocardiogram and calcium screening usually.

Sorry for all the questions, but you raised a lot of curiosity in me, and I bet others here would like to learn from your experience, too.

First thing yes sir kid on the way.
Secondly no I don’t have an mri or results showing that my most recent echo showed 65% I might ask for an mri in the new year.

Mri is considered the gold standard for estimating ejection fraction as echos have a margin of 5% as I am told from my cardiologist.

I started going because I am always exhausted and would get winded very easily. My body would have pain all over like Doms like soreness. I was basically a slug that felt like I couldn’t do much.

My first cardiologist referred me to one of the top heart hospitals in Canada where I was actually seen by a heart transplant specialist. Even though I wasn’t near being a candidate he specialized in ejection fraction and myopathy. My resting heart rate was 100-120.

When I was diagnosed at the 39% mark he started me on 5mg Ramipril. My blood pressure was always in the somewhat normal range of 130/80
His reasoning for Ramipril was the way its mechanism works is relieves the horizontal pressure of the ventricles allowing it to relax and make it less stressful to pump out the blood. The next mri results was only on the Ramipril making the ejection fraction 43%.

Still feeling terrible my heart rate was still high
My normal cardiologist ( not the specialist at the hospital) at the time started me on bisoprolol. This slowed my heart down to about 85-90 but made me so lethargic and even more tired than off of it.
I decided to ween off it under the cardiologists orders. Resting heart rate back up to 110 and the cardiologist who wasn’t the specialist told me “you’re too young to worry about your heart rate. So why don’t you let me worry about it.” Told my family doctor and ended up seeing a different cardiologist as well as the specialist.

New cardiologist referred me for another mri and did an echo. Tried to put me on carvedilol. I looked it up and asked if I can try nebivolol. She said sure why not.

I believe not running tren for years and quitting smoking with the help of the medication has definitely been the helping factor in all of this. I’m now committing myself to do more cardio as well.

I’m actually trying to steer clear of a lot of compounds now that I am getting back into things. I have 2 small liver cysts from a CT scan which has turned me off of orals. I’m not going to be running any big blasts anymore. I’ll probably stick to gh primo npp mast and test for the foreseeable future.

To be completely honest I ran gear like a retard compensating slacking on diet and training for more juice since the age of 16. Never drank or rec drugs my only vice was smoking cigarettes.

Ended up working at a supplement store with a pro who was a coach that was pushing his own lab had me on 1500 test 1200 eq and 800 tren and 60 clen at one point. That was at 18 years old and like a dummy I followed through with it.

Now I just started titrating my gh up to 4 iu again.
Running 200mg test for now may drop to 150 while I cut to my desired weight and then I will run a small blast of 350 sust 300 primo and 150 npp with 4iu of gh. I see my cardiologist every 6 months for an echo and have follow ups to see about the liver cysts

 

[malfeasance]

Sorry, I meant mine dropped to 5 ng/dl when I stopped to get HCT/Hemoglobin in check. I have it under control now by donating blood.

My question is regarding how do you approach your doctor if you're getting prescribed and yet your testosterone shows up below range. I get mandatory blood test every 10 weeks, so about two and a half months.

I understood what you meant. And I get it that you can "stand it," but I would tell you that it is not healthy for a man to stay at such a low level for a third of the year or longer.

That is why I posted for you my own example, which is on trt, my high HCT/hemoglobin also decreased. Maybe going all the way off just for this purpose was unnecessary.

That is what this thread is about. Taking a break. Getting healthy. Getting markers like this back into normal range.

5mg/dl for 4 months is not what I am advocating at all. A couple weeks after competing on stage and taking a month off? Sure, ok. No harm no foul. But I would not want to stay there, and I would not tell anybody else to stay there. Of course, you probably would not stay there forever. The body has a way of recovering over time.

With that having been said, for fertility, I went all the way off. And, like you, I have kiddos to show for it. Going all the way off = best chance for fertility. I did not want to do half measures. But I was off for longer than four months and began to recover and so eventually was back up in the normal range.

 

[malfeasance]

First thing yes sir kid on the way.
Secondly no I don’t have an mri or results showing that my most recent echo showed 65% I might ask for an mri in the new year.

Mri is considered the gold standard for estimating ejection fraction as echos have a margin of 5% as I am told from my cardiologist.

I started going because I am always exhausted and would get winded very easily. My body would have pain all over like Doms like soreness. I was basically a slug that felt like I couldn’t do much.

My first cardiologist referred me to one of the top heart hospitals in Canada where I was actually seen by a heart transplant specialist. Even though I wasn’t near being a candidate he specialized in ejection fraction and myopathy. My resting heart rate was 100-120.

When I was diagnosed at the 39% mark he started me on 5mg Ramipril. My blood pressure was always in the somewhat normal range of 130/80
His reasoning for Ramipril was the way its mechanism works is relieves the horizontal pressure of the ventricles allowing it to relax and make it less stressful to pump out the blood. The next mri results was only on the Ramipril making the ejection fraction 43%.

Still feeling terrible my heart rate was still high
My normal cardiologist ( not the specialist at the hospital) at the time started me on bisoprolol. This slowed my heart down to about 85-90 but made me so lethargic and even more tired than off of it.
I decided to ween off it under the cardiologists orders. Resting heart rate back up to 110 and the cardiologist who wasn’t the specialist told me “you’re too young to worry about your heart rate. So why don’t you let me worry about it.” Told my family doctor and ended up seeing a different cardiologist as well as the specialist.

New cardiologist referred me for another mri and did an echo. Tried to put me on carvedilol. I looked it up and asked if I can try nebivolol. She said sure why not.

I believe not running tren for years and quitting smoking with the help of the medication has definitely been the helping factor in all of this. I’m now committing myself to do more cardio as well.

I’m actually trying to steer clear of a lot of compounds now that I am getting back into things. I have 2 small liver cysts from a CT scan which has turned me off of orals. I’m not going to be running any big blasts anymore. I’ll probably stick to gh primo npp mast and test for the foreseeable future.

To be completely honest I ran gear like a retard compensating slacking on diet and training for more juice since the age of 16. Never drank or rec drugs my only vice was smoking cigarettes.

Ended up working at a supplement store with a pro who was a coach that was pushing his own lab had me on 1500 test 1200 eq and 800 tren and 60 clen at one point. That was at 18 years old and like a dummy I followed through with it.

Now I just started titrating my gh up to 4 iu again.
Running 200mg test for now may drop to 150 while I cut to my desired weight and then I will run a small blast of 350 sust 300 primo and 150 npp with 4iu of gh. I see my cardiologist every 6 months for an echo and have follow ups to see about the liver cysts

First, congratulations on the child!

Second, congratulations on the ejection fraction, that is quite an improvement. It was scary low at 39.5%


Thank you for providing the extra detail. I still have one question unanswered, though. You mentioned that you were on trt for two years as this was improving. What was the dose or dosages for your trt during that period of time? I know you are only a sample of one, but it worked, and I am curious what it was.

Congrats again on the child.

 

[malfeasance]

I am all for health. I am in agreement that plenty of people lower there dose and think they are being healthy when in reality they are still in blast/cycle territory.

This is the main reason for this thread, and we are in complete agreement here.

I don't want to drag this thread too far off topic.

I’m just saying if you want to set numbers for what’s considered healthy, the weekly dose ain’t it.

And I’d bet my left arm your bloods and mine look complete opposite on 100mg/ weekly. As soon as I can get into labcorp I plan on posting a couple labs and getting your opinion

And you may be 100% correct that the weekly dose ain't it, but now that I know there is a study where the dose folks recommend more than any other here for "TRT" showed bad heart remodeling after only 4 injections - well, I cannot in good conscience recommend that to folks for taking a break, anymore.

 

[malfeasance]

So are you saying even guys on legit trt should stop for a few months? If so, is it worth the hormonal imbalance and hypogonadal symptoms?

No.

I just wanted to be clear, here, because apparently something is getting lost in this thread.

If you are on TRT (by which I do not mean a high testosterone "cruise" to keep from losing My Gainz), then you are already on a break.

If your TRT is from one of these clinics where they TRT you with 250mg of test, 100mg of Deca, and 50 mg daily of anavar, however, that is again not what I am talking about when I say to take a break. You need a break at some point if you are doing that.

Your heart will thank you one day.

 

[Isrrike]

First, congratulations on the child!

Second, congratulations on the ejection fraction, that is quite an improvement. It was scary low at 39.5%


Thank you for providing the extra detail. I still have one question unanswered, though. You mentioned that you were on trt for two years as this was improving. What was the dose or dosages for your trt during that period of time? I know you are only a sample of one, but it worked, and I am curious what it was.

Congrats again on the child.

Thanks friend. Well to gain my fertility back I was off everything for two years. I took enclomiphene for 6 weeks and 8 weeks of hcg at 1500 iu a week. When I was on trt it was between 100-150 depending where I wanted to sit. I think from now on I’m going to keep hcg in at 500 iu a week during a cruise

 

[AlexDavis43]

Oh, by the way, if you read the linked study, that 22 year old bodybuilder stopped steroids only because he had "an acute MI."

He was also 330 pounds.

 

[malfeasance]

He was also 330 pounds.

GAINZ!!!

 

[malfeasance]

He was also 330 pounds.

Thanks for linking that. He was not a bodybuilder at all, but a powerlifter. Note, however, a couple of things. First, stopping steroids lowered his bad LDL number by more than half and more than doubled his low HDL number in only 24 days. Presumably he was still a 300+pound behemoth only 3 weeks later. Second, his family members tested all had normal cholesterol values, meaning he likely did not have a genetic predisposition.

I am impressed that they tested family members.

 

[malfeasance]

One more note - they cite a study for bodybuilding style weight training without steroids showing improvements in cholesterol values over non-training, and bodybuilding weight training being superior to powerlifting for cholesterol values.

 

[DECLAN]

No.

I just wanted to be clear, here, because apparently something is getting lot in this thread.

If you are on TRT (by which I do not mean a high testosterone "cruise" to keep from losing My Gainz), then you are already on a break.

If your TRT is from one of these clinics where they TRT you with 250mg of test, 100mg of Deca, and 50 mg daily of anavar, however, that is again not what I am talking about when I say to take a break. You need a break at some point if you are doing that.

Your heart will thank you one day.

I am on 120mg every two weeks as prescribed by my Urologist. I know, it's a very conservative and outdated protocol but at least I got a script plus he orders bloods for me regularly. I have actually made it 100-120mg per week instead of two weeks and go down to prescribed level 3 weeks before blood draw.

Anyway, that aside, I have always been wondering about this in general for sometime now. I know there is not a free ride, even at true trt levels there is some price to pay somewhere in the long run. However, I've not heard anyone mention any major impacts on people I know personally who are on trt.

I hear what you say on taking breaks, people's priorities change too, you might be interested in keeping your gains now but in 10 years you don't even care about that and your main priority is just to be able to wake up with a boner lol. That's why I wonder if even guys on trt need to take breaks too. Suck it up for a couple of months then go back on.

Thoughts?

 

[AlexDavis43]

Second, his family members tested all had normal cholesterol values, meaning he likely did not have a genetic predisposition.

I am impressed that they tested family members.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around this.

Seems some missing variables unless we're just staring at the perfect storm: life-long obesity (?), gear abuse, valsalva powerlifting, zero cardio,,,

 

[RiceNKimchi]

I do find it interesting how, I am skeptical too, but we doubt things and are highly critical of things that say we would drop dosage but popularly accept studies with higher dosages.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

I want to read the actual full study but I currently do not have access. the people who conducted the study stated it was minor LVH on the abstract

 

[UncleBuns]

The male body produces on average, 6-7 mg a day of testosterone. Circulating Testosterone as the Hormonal Basis of Sex Differences in Athletic Performance).



6 x 7days = 42 mg /wk.

If 100mg a week does not provide you normal levels of testosterone, then you have a problem unrelated to dosing.

Don't forget that different ester have different amounts of T . I believe test cyp is 70% test by weight so 7mg test per 10mg test cyp.

I would imagine that being on trt and keeping a fairly steady state of test in the body would have different effects as well versus the daily ebb and flow a natty has. Not sure if that would have any negative effect but I bet constant high T would accelerate any bad health effects to some degree.

Great thread!