My Recovery Story

[tumbleweeds]

Hi Guys

Quick post from me.

Long story short - got on 100mg Testosterone depot, once a week.

And guess what ? It works really well. Not perfect. But I can date, have sex, have a gf, or get married without worrying about being cheated on.

The key with testosterone depot is to inject the exact same amount, the exact same time, on the exact same day. Once a week. Religiously. After a few months, the positive effects begin to build. Libido, desire, arousal, night and morning erections. Etc.

Shot splitting and imprecise dosages and timing did not work for me. Causes hot flashes and loss of libido and erections.

But when taken super consistent. Exact same dose. Exact same time. Exact same day. Once a week. It works. No doubt about it.

Further, I added Kegels, 5 mins a day. They work wonders.

Further, I added around 4 grams of Horny Goat Weed a day. That helps

Further, I added some P5P for prolactin suppression. That helps reduce refractory period.

Further, I started some light penis exercises and a penis pump. This also helps

Backstory. I developed PFS at the age of 30. I’m 47 now. My body never healed itself. I got on testosterone at the age of 38?

I made the big mistake of shot splitting and playing with dosages. Huge mistake. Wasted years and years and years doing this. Hot flashes galore. Big side effects

Finally adopted a strict application regime and it works.

I’m not impotent anymore. I could get married and have a gf easy and not worry about being cheated on

When everything is dialed in correctly , I can have sex without Viagra maybe 1/3rd of the time!

This is huge. I was basically totally impotent prior. Had to use 100mg Viagra each and every time for sex

Now, if I need Viagra, I only need 50mg. And that’s alot. Moving on with my life now.

I know lots of guys have tried TRT and claimed it doesn’t work. It does. And it will. They just never gave it long enough of a chance. Or they screwed up their dose and shot timing. Inconsistent. Then assumed it doesnt work. It will.

Good luck to everyone. Get on TRT. 100mg a week. Same amount. Same day. Same time. One shot a week.

Also. No estrogen blockers. Never. Just test depot. Nothing else. The body recalibrates to a natural level.

Start Kegels. 5 mins a day. Huge improvement from that as well

Then get some HGW.

I’m good now. Enough crying boys.

[HAT-Y]

Congratulations!
Did your sleep and cognitive function recover?
Are you cured, or just having sexual improvements?

[tumbleweeds]

Thank you sir.

Yes my sleep recovered alot. Sleep is much better. I used to wake up 12 to 15 times a night untreated. Now I wake up a few times a night. 3 or 4. . Cognitive function was never that bad.

The non sexual benefits from testosterone are profound. Confidence. Aggression. Sociability. Stamina. Etc etc.

[LondonUK]

‘Enough crying boys’

Is that really necessary?

[tumbleweeds]

Yes it’s really necessary.

I’ve been through this shit for 17 years. I paid my dues.

Now the rest of you can follow this advice and get your life back.

Quit complaining and crying and get a script for testosterone.

[Legalmust]

Did you have muscle and joint pain? Loss of mass and muscle tone? Weakness to do elementary things? Besides libido and ED, what symptoms did you have? How did they improve over time if you had other symptoms? What do you recommend for those like me who have muscle and joint symptoms with weakness and inability to do elementary things? Thank you for your testimony

[tumbleweeds]

Good questions.

1. I did not experience any muscle or joint pain, related to PFS.

2. Experienced slight muscle loss and tone, from PFS. Which can be expected. Most PFS guys are all low range Testosterone, on their bloodwork. Within range, but at the bottom end of the range. Lower testosterone + higher estrogen = muscle loss. This can be expected. Don’t sweat it. Just get back into the gym. And start walking/cardio.

At the age of 37 (7 years PFS), I was in the top 10 strongest guys at my gym. This was before treatment with TRT. I highly doubt the “muscle wasting” spoken of here, is permanent. Its more like shrinkage of muscles. Thats all.

3. Weakness to do elementary things? Yes. Sure. I was depressed. Lethargic. Constantly exhausted. Waking up 10-15 times a night. Urinating 5 or more times a night. Small, short pees. Developed a really pronounced Baby Bladder. Which I still have. Everyday, for almost 10 years, I woke up EXHAUSTED, before I went on TRT. Thats a fun way to go through life.

4. Improvement is huge. Besides vastly improved libido, erections, night/morning erections… My attitude, outlook, confidence, sociability - all night / day improvement. I sleep way better. Wake up a few times a night. Maybe pee twice a night. But I work late and eat before bed. So night and day on the urinary urgency/ baby bladder.

5. What are your symptoms re muscle and joint symptoms?

First, get on TRT. 100mg a week. Find a Doctor to treat you, and just get on it. Stick with it for one full year. No execuses. Exact same amount. Exact same day (weekly shot). Exact same time of day (for shot). No anti-estrogen pills. Estrogen is joint protective. With TRT, both you testosterone and estrogen levels will increase. So the added estrogen should help with the joint pain.

I never experienced any muscle or joint pain / weakness symptoms. So I can’t speak to that.

The general malaise of PFS is a draining experience. If I stopped TRT and went back to low T, much of those same feelings would return. Chronic exhaustion. Shit sleep. No energy. No stamina. etc.

Where should you start? Forget the gym. Work out at home. Everyday, do 10 bodyweight squats to the ground + 10 burpees. Thats it. After a couple weeks, bump that up to 20 bodyweight squats a day + 20 burpees a day. This wont take anymore then 10 mins a day, if that. Bodyweight calesthenics are more then enough to kick the body/muscles back into “work/build” mode.

You need to get your body moving again. Gym is not necessary.

Find a Doc and get a script for TRT. It will change your life.

[tumbleweeds]

I want to emphasize, that in my experience, there’s a very thin “WINDOW” where TRT works for me (psycholgically / erections)

Any type of varability in shot timing and dosage, throws my entire body off and I lose all the libido and erectile benefits. TRT takes over a year to build up in the body. Hoping on and off, changing protocols, adding anti estrogens, being sloppy with admin (timing, dosage and day), and simply not taking the testosterone for a long enough duration (over a year), gave me terrible results.

I suspect this is why so many guys on the forum wrote off TRT as “ineffective”. They hop on / off. They try it for a couple months. Complain “it doesn’t work”. Then stop. They try various dosages, and don’t stick to one amount. Which throws the body right off. TRT does not work like that. TRT is all about CONSISTENCY. In dosage and timing and DURATION OF TREATMENT.

So get on it… Or try HCG. That should work as well.

I’m about 40% to 50% of what I used to be, pre-PFS.

But thats good enough to have sex and confidently date.

[mstone]

Sounds more like MCS than PFS.

[TommyT]

Hey,
Glad to see a good story. I’m 34 and almost a year into this. I’ll consider TRT or HCG eventually. Did you ever experience shrinkage? My flaccid dick is about 1/3 smaller than it should be.

I have a lot of fluctiation going on based on my diet. Seems that calibrating estrogen plays a role.

[Dysfunkion]

Yeah I haven’t taken anything direct hormones (besides D3 technically a hormone) but there is something to this you found, if I got out of sync with anything that I was doing to recover everything would get screwed. Same times, same day patterning, same dosages, and stable conditions before adding something else. Shocks to the system would go in either direction even very far out past a year but at some points I needed those shocks to get some process it feels like started that my body just after initiated just started doing on it’s own again. The first thing for me that drastically cut down the genital numbness was a capsule of osha root which contains oxytocin. Very early on from tongkat I had a sexual functioning but worse everything else window where my body fully reacted to sexual stimuli I was attracted to but I felt literally nothing emotionally or otherwise (which was extremely weird in itself as I need emotional stimuli to get really aroused, this was just uncomfortable). During that window I felt almost comically masculine in a very bad way that wasn’t like myself I couldn’t work with, my gender dysphoria completely sky rocketed with which probably implied it caused some extreme spike in testosterone that over activated something and then I tanked again. It was quite bizarre and I don’t want feel what I felt then ever again.

Then came much later the D3 wars after some point where I was starting to get condition fluctuations from foods where doses of it were causing what seemed like completely random effects every time. One dose almost crashed me to baseline. Another gave me a classic POIS like episode. Another turned everything on but made me feel I like I was on 50 stinluants at once. Another time I got unusally calm and emotional which functioning sexual functions but reduced sensation. It left me scratching my head. I was only able to integrate it after rebounding off of calcifediol and adding in vegan D3 which I responded best to at 2500 iu. I after doing this felt more lethargic for a while but after months of keeping on it eventually this became more energy and without side effects per dose. Only after this was I able to proceed with recovery.

Later I had some up’s and downs with much later a big scare after eating food with curcumin in it. This like both the worst regressions and best improvements was a shock like effect. I haven’t consumed anything that agonized 5ht1A and through the whole experience based on my PSSD like presentation to my situation I worked to minimize anything hitting that receptor. Later I read someone else’s right up that mentioned that (I unfortunately forgot what it was) that estrogen receptor A might have tanked in signalling through some 5ht1A shock mechanism some people are vulnerable to. Before and after getting out of the curcumin hole I was largely recovered but still not there yet. Something was off but I didn’t know what.

So that when I remembered on another forum people that had positive results with hops. Not having any estrogen and not being able to get on HRT currently due to my personal situation I decided to go for it because I feel like I’ve tried everything else in the world at this point. I brewed some tea and it was a huge success, I finall rebounded right out of it but in an unstable fashion where my POIS returned and my sex drive got annoying high up front. A larger dose with higher alpha acid content would only potentiate this. After I added Yucca root this stablized a bit and I felt more normal but still a bit ridiculous. Now after integrating myrrh after the second dose this makes me feel completely normal again with everything online. I still need to see what hops do on top of this stack and if the 4 percent alpha acid strain is closest to the effects of the brand I’m currently using (because they didn’t say what the content is so now I have to feel my way around based on educated guesses) but I believe I’m out of here. Though I’m if I stop this support network of supplements and herbals that support my fragile nervous system, hormones, and immune system I’ll crash back down again even if I am eventually able to get on closely monitored HRT. This was always the case anyways since I became chronically ill and needed to start supplementing things over 10 years ago at this point so that’s really nothing new anyways.