About a week ago I had my first blood draw since starting the therapy. My dosage will decrease a bit since the level of testosterone in my blood is about as high above the optimal goal and it was below to begin with. In other words, using the middle of the optimal range as the goal, I started out a little over fifty percent of that. Now I'm at about 150% of the goal. I'm not just much higher, if it were to go significantly higher I would be out of balance.
So what does this relate to? I did a little online research and found a couple of scales to relate to. One had a scale based on where a person is in puberty based on body hair or other characteristics that change as one goes through that. The other scale was based the age those levels generally occur. I liked the age scale as it is easier to relate to even though each person reaches different levels and characteristics at somewhat different ages. I'm at the upper end of testosterone levels of someone about 16 to 20 years old.
I'm not really interested in going through that stage of life again. As part of the appointment to get the blood draw I answered a few questions about what has improved. I answered there have been improvements in erections, in sleep, in just generally feeling better. I said there has been little change in ability to lose body fat or increase muscle. I was expecting those to take time so I didn't think it was something wrong to not put an improvement there. I would prefer to make slow but lasting changes in those aspects of my body. I was really getting discouraged with lack of change there and now I'm seeing some slow changes, that are what I was hoping for.
Since this started I've lost about four percent of the measurement around my waist. About three years ago I got serious about keeping my body in shape. I managed to lose some weight but my chest started looking like an old man and my biceps looked like a 10 year old boy. I read my workout plan again and realized I was skipping some exercises that would help my chest. I was starting to see some good results when I got an infection right at the end of the school year.
After a week in bed I went to a doctor to get some antibiotics and stronger than over the counter cough medicine so I could get some sleep. Another week in bed brought it to a total of two weeks right down, and it took several more weeks to get back to strength. For some reason my biceps hadn't gotten really small again but the gains in muscle on my chest had gone and my weight was back up, though still twenty pounds less than when I started trying to take care of myself. Being careful to eat well was kind of hit or miss from then until a few months before I started TRT. One of the activities my wife and I enjoy is travel. Since I've started this we have flown to Rapid City for a few days to see Mount Rushmore and Badlands National Park. Today I'm still on Mountain Time so up here early writing this waiting for my wife and my daughter and family to wake up. We have driven to Southern California to visit for a few days. It is a challenge to eat well while traveling but I'm slowly learning how.
So how are my other measurements doing? My weight had been hovering around that twenty pounds lower than my peak. I reported about a one percent gain with waist measurement going down so I thought muscle mass was increasing. Then two weeks later I was back down. This report is about one percent down from the point it has been hovering around. I'm hoping, even with the mess up in diet by driving all those hours, to continue to drop. I guess the next report will tell. My unflexed bicep is still at the average. I'm a couple of inches shorter than average so that looks good. I'm hoping there will be little change there as I don't want to look like a body builder. I won't complain if my body adds a little muscle there but my goal is more of maintain that while my waist goes down. My chest is one percent smaller, which I was hoping would go the other way. The shape doesn't look like an old man, like three years ago, so hopefully the firmness I feel there is muscle mass. That is where I'm hoping to see the biggest change in muscle.
I still have two doses at the 200 mg level left, then I'm to drop to 185. That is still over 90% of that maximum dose. I hope it helps drop me to that more optimal range as I fear too long at this higher level could bring on some of the unwanted side effects. Giving myself an injection here in my daughter's apartment was a different experience. It did seem to go smoothly though. Having already done it eight times it is starting to feel much less a new, somewhat scary thing, and becoming just a part of my life.
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