I thought it was just that I was depressed after the passing of my wife. Then I thought that I just had a flu bug or something. Then I started noticing that overall my energy was bottoming out. Then I began to worry that I perhaps had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Now I know differently.
Until I received a consultation from a pharmacist consultant, I had no idea that what I was experiencing was a testosterone level that was at an all time low. I had no energy for myself, no matter what I tried. Top that off with a migraine every other day and it began to make me feel like a 22 calibre bullet to the left temporal lobe would be a viable option.
A friend of mine told me about a local pharmacist consultant who she had gone to see and who had helped her a great deal. I don’t usually do the medical route, but thought “What could it possibly hurt?” Two years prior I had been diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. I was trying to manage this with diet and with exercise, but I could only do 5 minutes of exercise and then I was wasted for the rest of the day. Life was not feeling all that great. And to make matters worse I was actually gaining weight instead of losing weight.
The pharmacist consultant looked at my answers on the intake form questions…asked a few questions…and then looked at me and said, “Well, first the good news…this is totally fixable. Next the not good news…you are in full blown Andropause!” She explained to me that historically, until the last 150 years or so, men have on average lived only up to age 45. Now we are living much longer. But because we would only live that long our genetics are such that our bodies only produce enough testosterone for those many years, and then it dramatically drops down…yet we still now have about another 45 or so years of life. This leads to all sorts of health issues for men. Now, apparently many men will resist going onto hormone therapy. They see it as “unmanly”. But I am not that type of man. I am the “let’s get this stuff dealt with” type of man. Very straight forward and no nonsense.
Once I made a doctor’s appointment and got onto hormone therapy my energy started coming back up…slowly at first and then within 3 weeks I was doing one HOUR workouts three times a week! I started losing weight and my diabetic numbers began to drop significantly. I also began the paleo diet, which cuts out almost all carbs and thus I am not over supplying my body with sugars. And although they cannot figure out why, I have not had a migraine since the testosterone treatments began. I think that this is something that requires more medical research.
Yes, I will be on hormone therapy for the rest of my life. But I view this as a preferential thing to having to lose body parts because of Type 2 Diabetes. And I am enjoying the new found energy, the fact that I am building muscle mass and my body is becoming much more sculpted, and the fact that I now have to go shopping for new pants for the RIGHT reasons.
People often think that testosterone therapy causes heart attacks in men. Well, if it is the synthetic stuff then yes. This stuff is based upon the Yam and is more of a biological testosterone than it is a chemical one. So the side effects are much less of an issue and it does not cause heart attacks.
This is not something to do in order to win a body building competition. If you are under 45 you should not be using this product. Also, I should mention that there is a black market for this stuff, so it is a controlled substance. Apparently it also increases libido. But some are using it as a casual enhancer instead of as a hormone therapy. And to make matters worse, they are using it in conjunction with sexually stimulating drugs. THAT will definitely cause heart failure. So please do not ever go there.
In the meantime, I am enjoying much better health.