I don’t know. They come with their own set of possible sides. Also I can’t really recommend to go inhibiting enzymes, that’s why we’re here to begin with.
MAO-I are antidepressants and will raise dopsmine etc that’s just my point.
Well, I didn’t want to write an update post this soon, but there’s clearly something wrong going on. My condition has been worsening through all this week. Despite the return of the regular morning wood, the quality of this so-called “wood” leaves much to be desired. Sometimes it even resembles erection though.
But now I can’t get hard at all now. Absolutely zero. It reminds me of my state on higher dose of Roa, but I haven’t taken it in months. Even my skin is terribly drier now. And my mental state is still OK, way better than on Roa. I decided to stop the majority of my supplements until I find out what could be wrong.
I feel you man; PAS state especially for me follows a zigzag path. Like sometimes i feel really good and sometimes really bad. There are some variables which effects our libido, ed, brain fog or any other symptoms which can be different for every individual and we need to detect these variables. For me this is quite related to what i eat. If i consume too much sugar or fat every side effect goes worse. Or if i not sleep enough same goes as well.
I hope you get well better soon. I think you are right to stop what you are using. I started to think we should just let our body to do the work of healing.
Speaking about myself, it’s been three days since i took the last pill of Flagyl. Erections are still stronger than before but i am sure that my libido is decreased. I don’t know how can this even be real. One problem is solved(?) and another one came with it. Just stay strong and be patient as always. I am just amazed how an antibiotic has affected my erection quality and libido that much and i wonder how long will it last.
In an addition to that, i started to using probiotics with a suggestion of my gastroenterologist. It’s been 2 days and i feel much better. I quit going gym before a week i don’t know if that’s related to that by reducing some physical stress on my body or just a benefit of probiotics. Btw i realised i started to losing some fat on my face. My face looks way older and tired like i haven’t slept for hours despite i feel like rested enough.
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Thank you, I really appreciate your compassion. I thought I was almost cured in summer, then I crashed, later in the end of September-October I was constantly slowly improving bit by bit, but then this weird phase began. I did try some supplements but there was nothing potentially dangerous among them. I don’t know what to expect next tbh.
Well, I guess our sexul function now is a complete mess. Like all the processes that used to work as parts of one mechanism determined for one function now each to its own. And there’re all weird combos: PE with numbness, ED with strong morning wood and so on.
What kind of probiotics are you using? What would you recommend?
I decided to start taking some fermented food each day as I’ve heard of a research showing it would benefit your gut microbiome diversity. And now I’m concerned with my gut health as it plays significant role in overall body health.
What I decided to do now is to focus on healthier lifestyle and acquiring some knowledge over all my issues. I know I won’t find a cure like that as it must take at a team of qualified researchers at the very least. But I don’t want to try anything blindly no more. So I just want to optimize my conditions for healing. Or waiting for a cure research progress if my body won’t eventually handle it on its own. Also I want to have a thorough health screening to evaluate the possible damage. It seems so odd to me that some people on this forum don’t do that. It’s always good to know what you are dealing with.
I’m really sorry to hear about your face condition. I haven’t thought it could be possible in such young age. I’m a bit older and therefore everyone is keep telling me it’s my ageing. But now I’m sure it isn’t.
I noticed I started to look exhausted, with eyebags and deeper mimic wrinkles, when I was on Roa. The change was quite drastic. It’s all crazy. But we gotta stay strong.
Take care.
Well i can only say what i am using now i am not sure if that can help to you too. It says “NBL Probiotic Optima” on it i don’t know if this is a famous brand or not but i feel like it makes me feel better.
I agree with you about that we should monitor our problems. At least for me %70-80 of my problems are gut related. My mood changes during the day drastically and this is easily observable from other people. I am going to have a job in next month and i can’t imagine how i will deal with this situation in a more stressed environment.
You take care too, i really appreciate your compassion too. I wish you good luck. I will keep sharing information and my observations under your story, let’s keep in touch.
I will definitely add some probiotics to my routine as I want to fix everything I could to figure out what’s the main problem.
My mood used to change quite drastically too. And the worst part was before sleep. Almost each evening before going to bed I used to experience overwhelming rush of negative emotions. It used to hit me so hard I was afraid one day I could do something to myself. Sometimes I was just a poor weeping being curled up before falling asleep to see some restless dreams.
And it’s all gone now. My mood is pretty stable all the day. This evening shitshow also disappeared like it never happened. Is it a positive effect of me improving my circadian clock? Or is it side effect of emotional blunting as part of the PAS? I simply don’t know.
But I believe you could manage it too. Having a job sounds good actually, just take it easy to manage all the stress. I hope you’ll do fine.
Looking forward to hearing some good news from you (well, any news, I just wish all the best 
). I’ll post an update if I notice any change in my condition. And of course, an update after my screening in the end of the month.
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Short update.
Despite some minor positive moments I consider my situation to be worse.
My hair is still better, much thicker and healthy. The hairloss level seems normal, 10 times less than what I used to have.
Looks like my feverish reaction to the vaccine shot triggered restarted smth in my body and I began to experience morning wood again. Also it seems to me that my libido is slowly going back to its normal level but only psychologically. Like mentally I almost terurned to my former self but there’s no response from the body. I could get pretty excited but my organism doesn’t produce the natural reaction.
Worst of all, now I understand what people on the forum mean by “hard flaccid”. I don’t have normal erections anymore. At best, my dick feels like hollow rubber with surprisingly soft tip. It’s kinda scary, I’m afraid of tissue damage. I can’t remember when and how it started. Obviously, at summer it was more or less normal. Even September was kinda fine and I had some hopes it would get better soon. Now I’ve realized I’m dealing with something much more formiddable.
Besides, I got more acne. It’s still not like my teenage horror but it’s exactly the same state which brought me to my grave mistake with accutane. Kinda ironic, now I have to deal with that same very problem and with complete disruption of my sexual function.
I can’t wait to start my large medical screening. I need to know the current level of damage.
Also I’m going to read lots of scientific papers, hope there’ll be something useful.
Pretty frustrated now, but keep going.
I consider the returning of acne is a good sign because it was that exact moment when my acnes returned i started to experience some progress. If your only problem right now is ED, like you no longer have some libido issues i think it’s a better scenerio. Problem may be solved with a drug like viagra but if you do not have any animal instinct and horny urges anymore like me, i think this is a far more serious problem which i believe is about some neurological problem in our brain.
I am waiting for your medical screening. But i have to say that; i made every possible hormonal, vitamin, mineral, blood sugar, enzymes… etc panel and test but nothing has been found. So it would be really normal if you can’t find it either in your blood tests. I really started to think my brain can’t produce beneficial neurotransmitters like dopamine or serotonin anymore. In that case i decided to try antidepressants for try to rebalance this chemicals in brain. But this is risky too because there are so many people who had same problems like us because of antidepressants. But at this state i assume we don’t have anything to lose right? Almost every doctor said to me this can be some psychological issue and accutane maybe pushed some buttons in brain and activated some serious anxiety-stress disorder. I will wait some more time and give it a try.
Well, on the one hand it means Roa wasn’t able to make permanent change in my body with its main target, and my androgen receptors are still responding to androgens (at least in the skin). On the other, now I have two really frustrating problems to deal with. And also it means I suffered all these sides for nothing. Still wonder what was the trigger: the time of me taking isotretinoin or the increased dose (I’m leaning to the latter).
Now any libido brings me more disappointment as I still experience high level of numbnes in genitals (not so long ago I noticed the balls were affected too). But still it’s nice to have at least some drive, it reminds me of the good old days:slightly_smiling_face:
I do think accutane triggered something in our bodies. Once I had a brief period of PAS that lasted only a week or so. Afterwards I recovered completely and almost forgot about that(If only I knew it was only a trial version). So this must be reversible. But I warn you against antidepressants. They tend to induce sexual sides in much higher amount of people than isotretinoin. So think carefully about that and discuss with the doctor if you really decide to try antidepressants.
I don’t expect much from my future screening but I want badly to know if I have tissue damage or not. Also could be interesting to compare with your results.
I also wait for your test results. You are right about antidepressants; for now i decided to working out like once i do, eat clean and try to stay positive as much as i can.
I want to ask to you which test can we do for understand if we have tissue loss or not? Is it penile doppler?
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Yes, I am going to try penile doppler first(already tried ultrasound + doppler for testicles this year, nothing found). Also prostate and abdominal ultrasound. I expect them to find nothing(maybe venuous leak, but I doubt that).
My pre-sleep and night anxiety surges have returned. So I experience sleep issues again. I considered that as already solved problem. But nope, it’s back, strong as it used to be. I hope I’ll manage to beat it again.
A couple years ago a friend of mine(now former) suggested me to take some anti-depressants(she was a psychotherapist). But I refused as I didn’t want some drugs to mess with me mentally. She didn’t warn me about the very likely sexual sides. And now I feel like I escaped a real threat that time(unfortunately to be taken by accutane later). I guess there’re severe cases when such potent(but poorly understood) drugs might be necessary. But in many other cases they will bring more harm than help.
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Hello mate, i hope you do better. I just wanted to ask if you made any tests, hormonal panels or even doppler and what are the results? I will see a neurologist next week because that’s the only doctor i haven’t seen yet. About myself; my sleeping and digestion got better. Erections are still same and libido is still not good enough. Not much difference it seems.
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Hey man,
Unfortunately, I’m stuck on the same level. I’ve managed to recover my more-or-less normal sleep and keep pretty stable emotional background again. Although I’ve recently experienced a whole week full of nightmares and anxiety(and I thought I’m done with this shit).
Talking about digestion: looks like consuming some fermented foods regularly works quite well for me.
Today I’ve made all hormonal tests I wanted. So, I’m waiting for the results now. Ultrasound is still on my list, I hope to do it this week, as well as some more screening. Brain MRI showed me some things to be concerned with, gotta do some more checks.
What do you want to ask your neurologist in particular?
I see, sorry to hear about anxiety problems. Yes, fermented foods make me feel better too.
What exactly made you concerned about MRI? Is there some observable changes on it? If that’s the case i can try it too. I got a MRI test 9-10 months ago and everything was normal but it’s quite possible if something has changed after it.
To be honest, i will talk about all my psychological and physical symptoms and will tell how i have anhodenia, no longer able to feel sexual urge, or any motivation towards to anything. I will ask to do some research if there is any signalling problem between brain and organs in my body. I don’t know if this is possible to detect but i hope they can give me some clues about what should i do next. Also i started to think that this whole situation can be about neurosteroids. I am not sure if this is what neurologists are working on but i am now sure that i felt better while i was on Flagy. Later that, we found out Flagyl is some kind of antidepressant and works on Dopamine, i will talk about that too. Probably they will send me to psychiatrist and i will do the same speech one more time. I just don’t want to give up until i believe that i tried everything.
It’s kinda interesting that now I can clearly see when my anxiety isn’t normal, it even helps to resist it. Talking about nightmares I mean not just some scary dreams but periods of pure existential horror(related to sleep paralysis, I guess). Fortunately, my normal state appears to be stronger than that. Now I feel almost like my former self, with enough energy to work out and enough motivation to pursue my goals. And experiencing enough positive emotions too. But despite all the cheerful moments a huge and very significant piece of my life is still missing completely. So in the end I’m far form being OK.
About MRI. I need to consult a neurologist and endocrinologist before talking about my condition. Actually, my MRI description mentions some small individual residual lesions(if I translated that correctly) in the white matter of the frontal and parietal lobes and a suspicious signal change in the right half of my anterior pituitary. I don’t know much what stands behind all this yet. Maybe I should worry, maybe not yet. Also it could have no connection to Roa at all. But 5 years ago, before me taking isotretinoin, my MRI was absolutely clear, no lesions whatsoever.
I’m pretty sure you’ll be suggested to see a psychiatrist(I’m curious what would be the explanation). I would appreciate it if you share what clues you’ll get or just any realistic explanation from any doctor you’ll discuss it with. I talked to my dermatologist and I can hardly describe how disappointed I was with this conversation.
I also checked my heart and blood vessels in the eyes. Nothing to worry about.
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Updated my symptoms in the opening post. Now it’s better describing my situation and what I was able to recover.
Gonna post my screening results after consulting the doctors (and when I collect them all).
I’ve talked to a neurologist. She convinced me that there’s actually nothing to worry about in my MRIs. These suspicious regions are very likely to be with me since my birth, and weren’t observed before probably because of older MRI machines.
I am happy to hear that man. I will be waiting for your other results too.
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Today I’ve got the last results I was waiting for and discussed my condition with an endocrinologist and my dermatologist(again). Maybe, I’ll add detailed data later, but there’re so many of them and I don’t understand much.
Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to have prostate and penile ultrasound yet(I’m gonna do it in a couple of weeks, also gonna see an urologist who’s said to have some background in oncology). I hope it’ll make the situation a bit more clear as now I have only a few clues.
As planned I’ve had:
- Brain and spine MRI – there’re some tiny suspicious spots but the doctors say there’s nothing to worry about and I’ve been living all my life like this
- ECG and heart ultrasound – it seems my heart hasn’t changed much since I was 18 (I found my old ultrasound to compare), nothing life-threatening, some minor imperfections
- Checked my eyes – my vision seems to be pretty stable and the blood vessels are OK
- Checked my blood biochemistry and urine – everything seems to be back to normal, even better than it was in the summer
- Checked my hormones: T4 & TSH are OK,
Testosterone & Free testosterone are within the normal range, but closer to the minimal reference level(will have another test soon),
LH & FSH are OK, Estradiol is OK too, Prolactine is close to the minimal normal level, SHBG is OK too, DHEA-S seems fine as well.
Now goes what I find weird: very low level of progesterone (there’s no even a particular value, just below the minimal norm) and 3α-Androstanediol glucuronide (3α-ADG) is very high [26,6 ng/ml, almost two times the upper normal limit).
Currently, I don’t know what it means but at least it seems like I’ve found the first clue to what’s going on with my body. My DHT result is still missing, but I’ve already read some information that low progesterone level corresponds to sexual dysfunction. So I need to investigate this part further.
I am happy to hear that most of your results are normal man.
Actually that’s kinda weird. I read some stories on that website our issue (PAS) can be about progesterone system. They claim a few of them managed to heal sexually with using Mifepristone. They say this drug can make our body resynthesis the progesterone receptors. But nobody knows if this is legit or not. I will check my progesterone levels too but i am too curious about your investigation. Have you talked with any doctor about your progesterone level? Did they agree with you that your progesterone level can effect your libido/sex drive?