Just got blood work back

[bass]

you know this all sounds really good and i for one love to not do IM injection if there is a better way like SC! something in that study seems to make sense to me as to why my clinic is against SC injection! according to the study you can obtain steady and higher levels of test, and lower levels of E2, which means use smaller dose and save money. well, the clinics are in this business to make a killing, so maybe they are against SC injection because its a money breaker for them! i am tempted to try SC injection next time around since i am on 160 mgs a week, i think it won't be so bad. BTW, do you use the insulin syringe/needle to inject T in SC, or do you have to have a larger needle?

[bigboy67]

Wouldn't it be difficult pushing the thick Test oil through a 29g needle?

[Dpyle]

Yeah bass. My doc said the SC injections are done with with a slin pin.

[GotNoBlueMilk]

I pull with a 27 g needle and pin with the same needle. Takes about 45-60 seconds to pull 0.25 cc of Test Cyp. The secret is to pull the plunger waaaay back, not just to the 0.25 cc mark. So if you are going to break up 160 mg into two shots, pull that plunger way back until you have over about 0.45 cc in the syringe, then press the plunger until you get to the 0.40 cc mark.

Pinning with a 27 g needle is easy. It's easy to force the oil through when pinning, just slow pulling. I never tried this with a slin pin, mainly because the slin pins I have are 31 g needles. That would be a rather slow pull. Plus my slin pins are 0.5 cc so I couldn't get enough suction in the syringe when pulling. I usually pull the plunger back to the 0.8 or 0.9 mark to pull.

[Dpyle]

Second injection was today. Doc only dropped the dose to 150mg. I was expecting 100, but I'll go with what he says. I have already noticed a difference in the quality of sleep I'm getting and feeling a little better upon waking. It may be all in my head but either way it works for me.

[bigboy67]

Second injection was today. Doc only dropped the dose to 150mg. I was expecting 100, but I'll go with what he says. I have already noticed a difference in the quality of sleep I'm getting and feeling a little better upon waking. It may be all in my head but either way it works for me.

why did he drop your dose at all?

[Dpyle]

First injection was 200mg to frontload. As suggested by dr. Crisler this is to stabilize the levels sooner. The doc at my clinic seems to take a lot of his protocol from the suggestions of dr. Crisler. However dr. Crisler suggests that the following injections be dosed at 100 to avoid "spoiling" the patient.

[HRTstudent]

what does the Dr mean by spoiling?

[steroid.com 1]

[QUOTE=hrt;5788024]what does the Dr mean by spoiling?[/QUOTE]

Patient thinking too much of a good thing is good...it's not.

[Dpyle]

Back to bump an old thread! Got some bad news and some great news. After reading the hcg thread the other day I inquired about hcg at my clinic on Monday they told me they didn't use it with trt there. I had previously talked with the NP that's been working with my protocol since my consultation, She had quoted me a price and everything but I decided to hold off at the time, so I found this weird.
I call back today because it's her scheduled day at the clinic and she was at their other location. So I call the other place to talk to her and she informs me that she is being phased out of that location. The other clinic adds about 20 min to my current half hour drive. At this point I had given up on having hcg in my protocol.

Great news came when she said if I could move to the new location I would only have to come in every 3-4 months for lab work. So my appt is next Wednesday and she said I would get scripts for at home injections for everything I need and this one accepts insurance. No more paying 30 bucks per week for my 150mgs test c.

[zaggahamma]

thanks for the update

[Dpyle]

Yeah. I'm interested to see if walgreens test differs from the test my clinic was getting from a local compounding pharmacy

[Dpyle]

On the upside my insomnia is completely gone. I'm sleeping better now than I can ever remember. Energy levels and libido are doing great.

[doc w]

Yeah. I'm interested to see if walgreens test differs from the test my clinic was getting from a local compounding pharmacy

I use Walgreens test cup watson brand. My levels ate great on it

[Dpyle]

I only wonder because I think their compounding pharmacy may be under dosing. At 8 weeks in total T was 905 and e2 was 32 6 days after injection. 6 month lab work total T at 340 and e2 was 24 10 days after injection. Now I knew it wasn't gonna be as high because of the few extra days but didn't think it would drop that far.

[doc w]

Sounds a little fishy. Ecdysone might be able to answer that better. He seems to know a the pharmacokinetics fairly well.

[Dpyle]

Other possible option is that I wasn't in complete shutdown at week 8 causing my labs to come back higher or I may be metabolizing the test a bit faster causing the low results for the labs drawn 10 days after injection.

[ecdysone]

Might be the timing, hard to know for certain. Typically most guys have a 5-8 day half life for test-cyp oils, so just doing the math you would have expected something on the order of >500+, but labs are sometimes ±20%, so mid 400's would be possible, especially if you excrete the drug faster than expected.

But I wouldn't be happy about 905 --> 340 no matter the timing. Definitely needs some more investigation or new labwork.

[Dpyle]

Yeah I've been feeling that drop pretty hard the day before and day of my injection. I'm sure new labs will be drawn at my visit Wednesday since they are starting me a new patient record. Apparently they are about to break off from the other clinic they are associated with currently.

[lovbyts]

Good to hear you found a doc/clinic to work with you and you found someone to do the HCG .
So with your drop were you on the Walgreens pharmacy test or the compounding pharmacy?

[PetrX]

Your diet, how much you excersise, stress, and sleep play a huge role on testosterone

[Brohim]

Why not try to diet hard and up the exercise for a few month's and make sure you get quality sleep? You seemed to take one blood test and then jumped on hrt at 26. Test flucuates widely as well so one test would not be enough. Depends on time of day you take it as well. If a person is overweight that could lead to higher e2 which in turn could hinder libido.

[Dpyle]

Good to hear you found a doc/clinic to work with you and you found someone to do the HCG .
So with your drop were you on the Walgreens pharmacy test or the compounding pharmacy?

The drop came with the test from the compounding pharmacy.

[Dpyle]

Why not try to diet hard and up the exercise for a few month's and make sure you get quality sleep? You seemed to take one blood test and then jumped on hrt at 26. Test flucuates widely as well so one test would not be enough. Depends on time of day you take it as well. If a person is overweight that could lead to higher e2 which in turn could hinder libido.

Before I went Dow. The trt route I saw my PCP and a urologist. Neither of which could offer me an explanation of what was going on nor did they seem interested. I was offered some Viagra samples and sent out the door. At the time all this started I was in the gym 4 days a week, diet wasn't the cleanest but much better than the average individual my age, and sleep was a rare thing as I've battled insomnia since high school. Going to the clinic was done to start eliminating options. If the trt hadn't worked I would have run a pct and gone on( asked about that in an earlier post if you didn't notice). Fast forward 6 months later and insomnia is gone, energy, motivation, and libido are all back. I'm just dropping of the few days before each injection thus my inquiries into HCG .

[lovbyts]

The drop came with the test from the compounding pharmacy.

In that case it defiantly could be suspect. The clinic may be making a buck or two using weak gear. It's not common but not unheard of either. I would just go with the blood work results and have your doc bump up your dose to get it where it should be.

[Dpyle]

In that case it defiantly could be suspect. The clinic may be making a buck or two using weak gear. It's not common but not unheard of either. I would just go with the blood work results and have your doc bump up your dose to get it where it should be.

Shouldn't be a need to bump the dose. Like I said I'm moving to a new clinic with the NP that's been working with my protocol so far. The new clinic accepts insurance so I'll get a script to fill at walgreens or the pharmacy of my choosing. Should be good to go after that. And I know they are making money at the current clinic. My current 150mg/week costs 30 per injection.

[zaggahamma]

I think if the script is for compounded meds it will be hard/not able to fill at walgreens, etc.

[killergoalie]

Just reading some of the past posts in this thread, and I was just curious...is there a "special" form of testosterone (testosterone-cypionate to be exact) that is used specifically for Sub-Q injections? Could a person not use "regular" testosterone-cypionate that is designated on the label "for Intra Muscular use only" for Sub-Q injections?

I know in one of the posts it mentioned something about testosterone mixed with grape seed oil has a higher absorption rate than test mixed with linseed, or cottonseed oil, so does that mean that those forms of test-cyp are no good to inject sub-Q? What if test-cyp mixed with cottonseed oil for example is the ONLY type that is available? Does that mean you HAVE to inject it IM?

[zaggahamma]

Just reading some of the past posts in this thread, and I was just curious...is there a "special" form of testosterone (testosterone-cypionate to be exact) that is used specifically for Sub-Q injections? Could a person not use "regular" testosterone-cypionate that is designated on the label "for Intra Muscular use only" for Sub-Q injections?

I know in one of the posts it mentioned something about testosterone mixed with grape seed oil has a higher absorption rate than test mixed with linseed, or cottonseed oil, so does that mean that those forms of test-cyp are no good to inject sub-Q? What if test-cyp mixed with cottonseed oil for example is the ONLY type that is available? Does that mean you HAVE to inject it IM?

i think some have used different oils
but thought most used the ones we inject im

[Dpyle]

I think if the script is for compounded meds it will be hard/not able to fill at walgreens, etc.

No the script will not be for the compounding pharmacy. The clinic she is moving to is about to change names and disassociate themselves with the current clinic I'm going to. That's why she suggested I move to the new clinic, even though it's an extra 20 min drive.

[killergoalie]

Thanks jpkman! That's what I thought. I even told my Endo that I was going to inject SubQ, and he knows I'm using a test-cyp that's designated for IM use only, and he never said anything. So yeah, I guess it's okay to use.

BTW, absolutely no neg effects so far from my first SubQ injection yesterday! Plus it was totally pain free! WooHoo!! *knocks on wood

[lovbyts]

No the script will not be for the compounding pharmacy. The clinic she is moving to is about to change names and disassociate themselves with the current clinic I'm going to. That's why she suggested I move to the new clinic, even though it's an extra 20 min drive.

I did basically the same thing. I started with a longevity clinic but got tired of all the BS and them pushing their brand of vitamins and me having to pay for blood work, visits and driving over 1hr each way monthly. After seeing them for almost a year I switched to an Endo and with all my blood work results on hand he just wrote me a prescription for 6mo worth of refills and said get blood work (covered by ins) after 6 months. I'm at 1x a year now.

[PetrX]

I talked to a few drs and endos at work and they were all against subq injections and warming up vials before injecting... they were pressed for time but they all agreed that testosterone is made to be injected I'M for a reason. Injecting test subq will eventually lead to cycst, infections, bad reactions, and how it absorbs.. about warming the vials, that can cause a chemical change with the test. I guess I will have to be injecting I'M =/ haha but one of the drs did say something about some testosterones made to be injected via subq so I'm going to try and find out which kind it was.

[lovbyts]

Sorry but I call BS on that, warming up a vial to 80/90 deg wont change anything in an oil base when in fact it's brought almost to a boil when made. IM vs SQ I have also talked to doctors about this and they said it should be no problem and test will absorb even if you wanted to inject it into your fingers. OUCH!!! A lot of people have been doing SQ injections for quit a while and I have never heard of anyone having a problem and so far blood test support the more even levels and less chance of E2 sides.

[Dpyle]

Don't know how to post the link through the phone app but Bass has a thread detailing his blood work results and experience with sub-q injections.

[zaggahamma]

never had to warm up my vial(s) of test and i've been injecting weekly for 6 years

[Dpyle]

Update: got script for test and was bumped to 1 ml per week till next blood work is drawn. Script was for 10ml vial with 2 refills. Walgreens gave me 4 1ml vials with 2 refills saying this is all my insurance would cover. How ever total cost on on month of test was 1/3 the cost of a single injection at the clinic. But doc also said that this had happened to other patients. And said to call her back if it did.

[Dpyle]

Ok scratch that. Just talked to the doc and she said the other patients were having a problem with the pharmacies only wanting to give 1ml vial at a time making them have to come in every week to pick up a vial. So I'm good with getting 4 at a time.

[bass]

same here, my script was fro two 10ml vials but they can only give me one vial every month.

[Dpyle]

For the price I'm happy with my 4ml per month but that 10ml per month would have been nice to stock pile if I ever ran into a spot with no doc for a while.