The FastDay Forum

An unusual medical question here.

I was lucky ears ago to have a German doctor look at my blood results for my excessive tiredness and depression who decided to do a Testosterone blood test. This is something that is not normally even thought of by U.K doctors for women, crikey they hardly ever think of it for men.

I was found to be very low in testosterone (look up 'low testosterone in women' on google and you will find it covers a lot of ground. I now have a 6 to 8 monthly, slow release, testosterone implant. Its a 10th the size of an equivalent one for men, but it boosts my level up to and maybe above a normal range.

What does happen is that my own production of testosterone falls in the meantime to non-existent as my body's feedback kicks in and says I don't need anymore testosterone, so shut down own production. It does cause terrible slumps when the implant runs out, till my own production minimally kicks in, but 6 out of 8 months I'm chipper and chirpy.

Now how is this going to affect my weight loss and my muscle growth. Will it have a knock on effect on my cortisol levels or my adrenal levels. Am I going to start putting on serious muscles (no sign of it so far) or am I still going to struggle with muscle mass build up even if I am doing 4 lots of strength exercises each week. If there is a cortisol knock on effect, will it effect my insulin levels or resistance?

I have also found out I am peri-menopausal (detected early because of the regular blood tests) which messes things up again, though once I'm fully post menopause I won't need the testosterone implant.

If anyone can figure out whats going on or likely to happen it would help me. I am starting to wonder if my plateau will be with me until my testosterone level drops again for some reason.

I think you need a medical professional to answer this one @Julieathome perhaps you should ask your doctor.

[carorees]

Without having looked anything up, my guess is that weightloss is more likely to slow when your testosterone level is low than high. After all, men usually lose weight faster than women...though I don't know if this is simply down to their higher relative muscle mass. I'll see what I can find out.

The general thought in weight lifting literature is that women don't bulk as they don't have enough testosterone at the best of times.

The girls are my gym are lifting seriously heavy and whilst they are all getting more compact, it's nothing like the lads' muscles.

I'm not sure if that helps but that's the general thought.

I have tried asking my specialist, but even he is pretty much at a loss. he is more used to dealing with PCOS than testosterone problems. He just knows that in testosterone low women, testosterone supplementation sorts out A,B & C. The intricate detailing what its likely to do to dieting muscle tone or whether weight loss will be improved or slowed down is not something he knows.
I will contact his secretary and ask her to ask him to hunt up the details before my next appointment.
All I can go on at the moment is assumptions. Such as assuming that once I'm through the menopause I shouldn't need any supplementation because my estrogen and progesterone production will be nil or close to it, so the production of testosterone from my adrenal glands will then be in balance with whats left. The balance being whats important not the overall levels.

I will look into the literature again and see if anything new has come up.

Just a couple of quick questions, do you have a problem with your thyroid low/high? Are you peri or menopausal? Did your Doctor also test your DHEAs? Cortisol? How are your female hormones e.g. Oestrogen, progesterone?

A lot of physicians don't look at hormones wholistically but in my experience they are pretty much all linked/ one affects the other e.g. If oestrogen is too high, free thyroid is often too low because too much oestrogen raises thyroid binding globulin which in turn binds your free thyroid hormone.

So your question is hard to answer.

Testosterone in small doses theoretically should help women lose weight but not put on a huge amount of muscle as women naturally should have small amounts of testosterone. I don't have time right now (we are having nine people over for dinner tonight) to dig through my books but when I get a chance I'll look up the relationship between test, cortisol etc in women.

Please note this post is not to be taken as medical advise, under no circumstances are you to change your medications dependant on this post. You must always see your physician for medical treatment.