Here you’ve got the whole text:
DISCLAIMER: Please take these two stories with a grain as they say. The best advice that I think has been given on this site is to not jump on bandwagons. However, with that said, I have seen a lot of new evidence that we should be working on our brains. I am currently reading the books suggested in these stories, and have noticed that I fit the bill. Maybe some of you do too.
Also, If I could make one request. Please no negativity here. It’s very important that we don’t just shoot down every possible solution because the truth is none of know what will work.
Story 1: (patient suffered severe anxiety, low libido, ED)
I have always said that the problem is a brain neurotransmitter and adrenal exhaustion issue, and I think that this article you found is the medical evidence that fills in the missing part of the puzzle, and finally adds proof to what all of us have been telling our doctors all along.
I think that all of us should make copies of this article and fax it or give it to as many doctors as possible, because then maybe there will be medical things that begin to happen that gets the medical community working with us and showing propecia for what it is instead of them just ignoring us.
As you have known, I have always recommended The Edge Effect book for the brain neurotransmitter information and remedies, and the Dr. Wilson book for adrenal exhaustion. I have always known that these were what needed to be corrected, but now your article explains in a medical way why.
I wrote about Dr. Shippen in tzanne Somers book saying that finasteride shrinks the brain by not allowing DHT in the brain to convert progesterone into the brain-repairing neurosteroid allopregnenolone. THerefore, without the DHT, the brain cannot repair itself, and neurtransmitter problems, hormonal-manufacturing problems in the brain, etc., cannot take place.
Your medical research article adds complete power to Dr. Shippen’s comments, and it also explains the brain neurotransmitter/adrenal fatigue connection that I have written about on here.
Your article completely shows everything and I thank you for it.
Looking at the article, it shows how important allopregnenolone is, and how propecia causes a deficiency in allopregnenolone by the reason that Dr. Shippen gave, with DHT not being able available in the brain to convert progesterone into allopregnenolone.
The article also explains medically how the brain neurotransmitter GABA becomes deficient as a result of all of this. From reading The Edge Effect, you know that GABA is the neurotransmitter that brings about calmness and no anxiety. Many people on here have spoken about very high levels of anxiety when taking propecia or after taking it, especially if coming off of it cold-turkey. This high anxiety is now explained medically in your article.
I know people who I have helped to recover from propecia, and one of the main things that brought about their recovery was the natural progesterone cream treatment that I recommended to everyone a few weeks ago. This cannot be synthetic progesterone and must be natural progesterone cream from a compounding pharmacy like I spoke about before.
In looking at your article, this progesterone therapy makes total sense now, and also it shows logically how adrenal fatigue can be caused by propecia.
We now know medically that propecia causes a deficiency of allopregnenolone and GABA. This is caused by blocking DHT, which stops hair loss but damages the brain where DHT is needed.
Looking at this logically, we can see that while on propecia and when stopping propecia, our brains have a deficiency of DHT in them, which is what propecia does in order to stop hair loss.
The deficiency in DHT causes the hormone progesterone not to be converted to allopregnenolone, so brain repair does not take place as it should and there is a deficiency of GABA that can lead to high levels of anxiety. The body then tries to correct this problem of a lack of brain repair.
This attempt logically does one of two things to the adrenal glands. Firstly, this attempt could possibly create such stress on the adrenals that they wear out and get fatigued, or else, secondly, the adrenals might know the body needs allopregnenolone and so tries to make the needed allopregnenolone by producing more and more progesterone.
This progesterone never gets converted into allopregnenolone, though, because the DHT is blocked. The adrenals may eventually get worn out by contiuing to produce more and more progesterone that never does anything because there is no DHT. The progesterone may even not be converted as it should into testosterone, cortisol, DHEA, etc., in the adrenal cascade, because it is being saved in the attempt to make the crucial allopregnenolone, thereby resulting in deficiencies in other hormones that are normally made from progesterone.
If the adrenal glands get burned-out, as medical evidence shows that they do in at least some cases of propecia users, then the adrenals stop being able to produce anywhere near enough progesterone. After propecia is stopped and DHT begins to return to the brain, then the brain now has the DHT it has needed, but it no longer has the progesterone that DHT converts into allopregnenolone, and so allopregnenolone still cannot be produced and the brain still cannot be repaired without allopregnenolone. GABA levels still cannot be raised back to normal without brain repair, and so people remain very anxious. Other hormones like testosterone, etc, remain low because there is not enough progesterone to be converted into them.
The solution to all of this is to provide the brain and adrenal glands with what they need. Without propecia they now have DHT, but they now need natural progesterone cream. With progesterone, the brain can now be repaired as the DHT can convert progesterone to the needed allopregnenolone, and the high levels of anxiety because of the GABA deficiency can be corrected, and as the recovery continues then after a period of time of a month or two of using the progesterone cream and when the brain does not need as much of it, then some of the progesterone can be used to convert into testosterone, DHEA, etc.
Following the GABA plan in The Edge Effect will build up your GABA levels to help to stop anxiety, and building up dopamine neurotransmitter levels will also help people like yourself who want to. Following the Dr. Wilson book for adrenal fatigue will build back up the adrenal glands so that they can produce progesterone again and help recovery.
However, for extreme cases like many men have on here, then progesterone cream also needs to be added because it is needed so much that waiting for the adrenals to recover is too long a wait. Using progesterone cream also helps the adrenal glands to recover quicker because it keeps the adrenal glands from having to make the progesterone to begin with, which uses a lot more adrenal energy than just converting progesterone into other hormones like testosterone does. So the progesterone cream helps in many ways.
I know of people who were struggling to recover from propecia with just The Edge Effect and with taking care of the adrenals, but that when natural progesterone cream was added to the two therapies, then full recovery from propecia took place within 3-4 months of being on the progesterone cream. It only takes about 3 days for the progesterone cream to start to create a benefit in how youy feel, and this improvement will continue to improve each week until full recovery.
When the adrenal glands fully recover, then the progesterone cream can be reduced and removed. It also costs about $16 per month for a 5 mg per day amount of cream, which is the amount for a man, so it is not expensive.
Your article was also interesting because it gave several supplements that someone could take to lessen the bad effects of propecia. Many of these, like L-Theanine, I have been recommending on here for a year, and so there must be a benefit from such supplements.
It was also interesting in the article to see how people with certain conditions should not use propecia because propecia impacts the same areas of the brain as these conditions do. One of these mentioned was heavy metal poisoning, which is very easy to get in the current environment, and so everyone on here should look into getting a hair analysis to see if they have high levels of any toxic metals because removing such metals will help recovery from propecia.
I would also like to add that many men on here may have some candida/digestive bacteria issues, because they can be caused by propecia and by adrenal fatigue. When someone has these problems in their digestive system, then the adrenal glands cannot recover until the problem is removed. If you think that you might have such a problem, then the very best product is Tanalbit, which is made by Intensive Nutrition and can be purchased on their website. It is an all-natural plant tannin product that can be used by anyone because it has no side effects, but it is amazing how it works. Adrenal glands can recover within a short time of using it if a digestive system. Even if you are not sure if you have a problem, then using it can do no harm because some people use it all the time as maintenance.
Also, you asked me about raising dopamine levels, and said that you had trouble with tyrosine. I had the same problem with the amino acid L-Phenalalanine, and found that L-Methionine was easy to take for dopamine and that it was good in other ways also.
However, my feeling is that dopamine levels will come up on their own after the recovery takes place, and so I think that the GABA levels are more important to try to raise, as per your article, while you are taking care of the adrenals and using progesterone cream. Eventually, your GABA levels will get to normal and you can stop using the GABA plan supplements.
I wish I had a low progesteron… but as a matter of fact it is not.
