Taking Testosterone Illegally Helped Manage Depression (Article)
Pretty good read here if anyone is interested
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/x...-my-depression
Quote:
At 19, I was diagnosed with major depression. I spent the next 14 years searching for the holy grail of antidepressants. In that time, I've been on more than two dozen psychiatric medications. I've tried all the well-known SSRIs (selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors), like Prozac and Zoloft, as well as NDRIs (norepinephrine–dopamine reuptake inhibitors) like Wellbutrin. I've been on antipsychotics and atypical antipsychotics like Abilify, a drug I was on for only two weeks because it made me so tired that I slept through my alarm every morning.
I've been on mood stabilizers, anti-anxiety drugs like Xanax and Ativan, ADHD meds like Adderall, and more than a few treatments not approved for depression by the FDA. Every single drug I took ended up not working, only working for a short time, or producing unbearable side effects, like when the antidepressant Remeron made me puke for three days straight.
I'm 33 today, and my mental health deteriorated earlier this year in ways it never had before. Despite the three drugs I had been on (Paxil, Wellbutrin, and Lamictal), I became so depressed that staying awake for more than ten hours became nearly impossible. I lost interest in sex. (I'm in an open triad relationship, and my boyfriend Jeff, who writes for VICE, can confirm this had never been a problem before.) I started wishing that I was dead. Work became a nightmare. It was the most intense period of depression I'd experienced in my life.
It was around this time that I decided to take matters into my own hands and start illegally purchasing and injecting myself with testosterone.
I was 25 when a doctor first suggested I get tested for low testosterone, explaining that men with "low T" mimic depression symptoms: lethargy, low mood, general loss of interest, and low sex drive. My test results revealed that my testosterone level was 225 ng/dl. Low testosterone is medically defined as occurring in men who test below 200 ng/dl. Although I was borderline, because I didn't fall into the official low T range, my doctor wasn't comfortable prescribing me testosterone.
This February, after being let down by yet another cocktail of medications, I started thinking about testosterone again. Over the past decade, low T has become an extremely controversial diagnosis. Drug manufacturers stand to make a fortune from drugs that can treat it, but modern studies have had mixed results when it comes to its efficacy for treating depression, my problem. A study of testosterone's effects in men over the age of 65 found that "testosterone was associated with small but significant benefits with respect to mood and depressive symptoms"—but that's for older guys, not 33-year-olds like me.
Taking Testosterone Illegally Helped Manage Depression (Article)
Did anyone see the triad relationship?
