Surprized your T isnt lower with such high Prolactin. Are you exibiting any gynecomastia? He’s on the right track. Bringing down the prolactin should raise your T. Probably percribed you Bromocriptine. If thats what he prescribed that will also raise your dopamine which should help alot with mood, libido and even ejaculate volume.
Have you been taking any DHEA supps prior to testing?
On the positive side your Vite D is in range. Thats rare for us.
no gynecomastia, well maybe a little… or im just soft from lack of exercise… cant tell… will pay more attention if it gets worse. fingers crossed…
possibly pyronies… bumps and rings under skin on penis. anyone else get this? it doesnt seem as severe as some guys here, but its troublesome nonetheless. made an appointment with a urologist.
i hope its Bromocriptine and it helps with head fog/mood/libido… should get the script in a few days… a month of that, then it seems clomid for a few…
no, wasnt taking DHEA supplements… is it common for PFS sufferers to have high DHEA Sulfate?
im back on taking:
6000 i/u vit D per day
goats weed (4 per day)
ashwagandha (4 per day)
fish oil 1200mg day
resveratrol (just started, gonna do 4 days on, 3 off, as ive heard effects wear off)
vitamin B12 - starting tomorrow.
Zinc - 25mg/day
ANYTHING ELSE supplement-wise recommended to help mood/head fog?
again, sorry i seem to always have a ton of questions… i am going through as much of this site as possible… with work and headfog and just the realization that this is happening, it is difficult to pile through all the sad stories here…
also, this week i am bringing all my blood results and info from this site to my friends father who is a Endo and runs a large endocrinology testing lab in LA for 30 years. He is pretty concerned, actually believes me that this was caused from finasteride, and may be able to help us. Has many contacts in this field. stay tuned.
*** Cabergoline is the prolactin lowering drug jacobs prescribed…
Cabergoline should also raise your dopamine so theoretically should have improvement on mood and libido.
Thanks for getting your freinds father up to speed with PFS. More docs we can recruit the better. Does he have any theories as to cause or possible treatments?
Maybe consider going over Awor’s treatment protocol and see what he thinks? According to Jacobs last blog he is also leaning toward this as a cause.
-thanks youngbuck… thats exactly what mine is… sometimes my dick is really limp and rubbery and the bumps/rings arent there, my balls also hang really low when this happens… then when it seems healthier (lack of a better word) its fuller, bigger and yes, more dense or something. the tissue seems harder. and the rings are there… they dont look like blood vessels… hmm. Still have pains throughout the day in my shaft and head of penis now… not so much testicles.
made an appt with a urologist for next week. hopefully its not peyronies. will keep you guys updated.
yesterday when erect, i was normal size and fullness but the head seemed much smaller, like there was a clog (sounds ridiculous) or something. anyone else have this?
-i met with Dr Anju Mathur today. shes not an endo, but an anti-aging MD here in LA. She had never heard of PFS, but is very anti-drug and knows what Finasteride can do to the system. I brought lots of print outs and she read through them all. Seemed genuinely interested in the whole thing.
she takes a much more natural approach at getting things back to normal. Amino Acids, HCG, strong supplements, and Bio-identical hormone replacement as well as a strict dietary regiment.
heres some info:
angelmedcenter.com/male-hormone-replacement-therapy.html
angelmedcenter.com/
obviously i want to get back to normal asap, but im a bit nervous about using drugs like clomid, cabergoline, and synthetic hormones to try to get there, as FDA approved drugs got me here in the first place… they have rough sides, aren’t proven and could ultimately make matters worse.
i don’t know what to do. Go more natural or go for the drugs that Jacobs wants to put me on.
and lastly, i have always been very ADD. Jacobs wants me to try Ritalin. He thinks it will help me immensely…
Anyone have any thoughts?
thank you guys
thanks boston. havent spoken to him yet… will get him a copy of Awor’s treatment idea when i do…
I had seen several (close to ten) local endocrinologists and urologists in Los Angeles, who each performed a number of blood tests on me. Despite seeing serious anomalies in my blood work, these doctors all failed to offer me any ideas as to the cause of my problems, or to even prescribe any medications to help me cope with the devastating symptoms that I’d been experiencing. I was extremely dissappointed by their failure to provide me with help.
I know what I’m about to say sounds harsh, but it is a fair appraisal in my opinion; local doctors (at least in LA in my experience) have no idea what the heck they’re doing and I wouldn’t trust them to treat me for anything related to the issues many members have brought up on these forums. Even though I provided them with several copies of blood work conducted by other doctors, they all order additional blood testing in their office that just revalidates what they already had in front of them; I sometimes even got the impression that many of them were only interested in wasting my time and milking me and my insurance to the greatest extent possible and that treatment protocols were an afterthought. They have never heard of post Propecia problems, and didn’t know how to treat it despite seeing anomalies in my blood work, and some even insisted that this whole thing was just a mental problem, etc…very depressing experiences indeed, and the sum total of all of the emotional hell I was going through nearly pushed me over the edge. All in all, dealing with them cost me a ton of money, months of delays, and some really uncalled for emotional anguish.
I ended up deciding to bite the bullet and just pay to see one of the doctors recommended by this website and deal with the required travel to do so. The local doctors were not helping me, and in the end, I think it would probably have been cheaper if I had just gone to see one of these “Post-Finasteride Doctors” first right off the bat, gotten better asap, and then forgotten about this whole horrible episode in my life. I would advise anyone who’s really serious about getting their life back on track to schedule the first available appointment with any one of these doctors, and find a good laboratory locally and have a (single) very thorough hormonal panel conducted at this facility and bring it with you to your appointment (testosterone, DHT, LH, FSH, TSH, estradiol, prolactin, etc). Don’t let local doctors screw around with you.
By the time I made the decision to see one of these “PFS” doctors on this website (or far prior, actually), I had made the decision that the best thing for me to do was to just throw as much money at the problem as possible in order to get this over with as soon as possible; you’re only 24 and 25 years old once, and Propecia had already ruined the larger portions of those years of my life so my goal was to do anything to end this before my 26th birthday if it was at all possible. I do not reqret the decision to see a doctor specializing in “PFS” or sexual medicine issues one bit; the only regret that I do have is that I was not more aggressive in seeking treatment earlier (for the first few months the depression and everything else got the best of me and I essentially went into a hole to hide).
I saw several names on this website and elected to see Dr. Goldstein in San Diego; I am living in Los Angeles, so he was the closest. I assumed that the doctors listed on this site must be talking to each other in regards to the best treatment plan for persistent Propecia side effects (since this list of doctors is very small), and so I assumed that the treatment I got would be the same or similar thus I went there to try to get this over with as quickly and efficiently as possible and mimize the amount of time I would have to spend away from work.
Several blood tests have revalidated the fact that I have low Testosterone (free and total), low Dihydrotestosterone (DHT), low LH, low FSH, and high Prolactin. Some of my other hormone levels are within normal range, but are near the edges of these ranges (I am borderline hypothyroid, for example).
Dr. Goldstein performed thorough diagnostic testing on my genitals. The testing revealed that my penis has increased perception thresholds for hot and cold stimuli (I need hotter and colder stimuli, respectively, than an average man in order for me to be able to begin to feel it). In addition, the testing also revealed that I have reduced arterial blood flow to my penis (roughly half what it should be for a man my age, according to Dr. Goldstein).
A couple weeks ago I began the drug therapy prescribed by Dr. Goldstein (Clomid, Cabergoline, and Arimidex) to try to correct my hormonal problems. At the moment, I believe the drug treatment is beginning to help me cope with many of the ongoing Propecia side effects; but unfortunately, my improvement thus far has been very marginal, as I presently still feel much closer to “the floor” I hit after taking Propecia than I was to “the ceiling” before taking Propecia.
My plan is to first correct my libido, muscle mass, and the rest of the post-Propecia issues by dealing with the hormonal problems before I consider any other options to improve the quality of my erections (i.e. revascularization surgery to improve blood flow to my penis). I did not have any difficulty achieving or keeping erections before starting Propecia, thus I believe (or perhaps hope, actually) that once a healthy hormonal profile is restored my erectile performance will also be restored.
I want to get my life back on track as soon as possible, but I would also like to try to avoid surgery if I can (and again, I want to reiterate that erectile difficulties are the least of my concerns at the moment with respect to my ongoing Propecia side effects).