This is complicated. My total testosterone is low, but free is high. I also don’t have any muscle loss. I do feel tired and irritable at times.
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“Normal” is 300 to 1000.
There’s your answer. You are burnt out. You haven’t mastered balancing training load and rest.
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I’ve just started to dig into blood test results but for my age the norm tables my result is very close to the bottom of the range and 300 away from the mean.
I do agree that it’s a lack of energy balance and / or too much training that’s caused the issue.
Other blood values such as ferritin, b12 etc are also on the low end of the ranges.
I’ve had two weeks off training now with only a couple of very very easy spins and dot feel any better. So I’ll just keep resting I suppose.
Any advice welcome
My only advice is that ranges for blood values are just ranges based on population studies. Trying to get to the middle or top of the range usually isn’t a goal in medicine. If something is low or high, they look for the cause. In your case, it sounds like the cause is too much training load and lack of recovery. Consult your doc on iron and b12.
Look, if taking T was a magic bullet without any downsides like injections and the exogenous T shutting down your normal production I’d take it. I don’t race or hold any license. But I don’t forever want to have to inject myself going forward just to be able to train at an unsustainable level. There are other things you take/do to boost your free circulating T but you’d have to see an anti-aging doc for that kind of alternative treatment.
I think that too much training/ joy enough calories is the cause of these blood test values and not the other way round. I will get another test in a couple of months and will be interesting to see the values when fresh.
Absolutely no intention of any medication. But I think it’s worth thinking about supplementing on b12, paying attention to iron absorption and limiting blockers, moving forward to help prevent this feeling of fatigue.
Take a month off and re test
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Thank you. Normal ranges are exactly that: normal. At risk of getting myself in trouble…
This number only means something if it was a morning test (8am). Testosterone is released in a diurnal pattern and the reference ranges are developed for morning draws.
You sound underrecovered/undernourished. If your testosterone is truly low, that’s likely a sequela of the primary problem (low energy availability), not the driving cause of your symptoms.
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Lift weights…especially deadlifts and squats. Also, run short sprints: Effects of Dominance and Sprint Interval Exercise on Testosterone and Cortisol Levels in Strength-, Endurance-, and Non-Training Men - PMC. Eat 3 to 4 eggs per day and get plenty of protein.
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While I don’t know what “enclomiphene” is, regular clomiphene (clomid) requires a prescription in most countries and is banned in probably 99% of sports. If you don’t intend to compete in races, then it can be a great alternative to TRT.
I have Low T and spent a lot of years taking several different natural supplements. Then I found testoprime (stupid name) and it’s a couple pills that encompass most the things I was taking separately. It’s a bit spendy but if you buy a lot it’s steeply discounted. One of the main things it’s missing is boron.
A healthy lifestyle with good sleep, a healthy diet, no alcohol, and weightlifting, will be the biggest proponent of stronger T levels. Of course, some peoples are still low, but I’d bet that 90% of the people with Low T symptoms could largely be fixed by lifestyle changes. It may not raise their numbers a ton, but the actual symptoms will largely subside.
As a general comment (not relevant to a lot of people on this forum) - a lot of people just want to get on TRT because they are lazy with no discipline and think they’re going to be a cross between Schwarzenegger and John Holmes once they are on it.
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You should be doing what your doctors say, not trying to manage your hormones with supplements. And you can’t buy enclomiphene from Amazon, only from sketchy looking web sites. In the US it’s a drug prescribed to induce ovulation.
Also, what is low? A hard build cycle can push your testosterone level to the low end but it’s certainly self inflicted.
My understanding is that low T is usually not treated unless there are symptoms and lifestyle changes haven’t worked.
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All good points.
I’d take it a step further and say that not just your family doctor, but an endocrinologist. IMO, family doctors probably shouldn’t even be allowed to prescribe testosterone. Most are insanely uninformed to the extent that “oh, you have Low T, let’s prescribe you testosterone.” Many have no idea of the infertility it can cause (permanently in some cases), the fact that it can ruin the already low testosterone levels for life, for some people, if they decide to come off down the road. Not to mention the role it plays in raising estrogen and how to combat it. There are ways to maintain fertility and reduce estrogen, but some doctors are wildly oblivious.
Clomiphene (under a proper doctors care) can be a great choice as it stimulates the hormones that produce testosterone as opposed to just injecting testosterone and completely shutting down your bodies natural production. It’s generally not prescribed by many doctors as it’s not the intended use. I also recently heard Dr. Peter Attia mention he used to treat patients with Low T using clomiphene, but had discontinued its use due to some certain biomarker he was seeing in their bloodwork. Wasn’t 100% sure if it was clomiphene, but it was enough that at the time he had discontinued its use for that purpose.
Good question