If you’re twenty years old and reading this article, use it for research, but come back in five years for actual application... Your testosterone levels are already sky-high and moderate testosterone supplementation won’t benefit you much... Rather, it may tell your brain to slow it’s already very effective testosterone production... If you are a competitive bodybuilder reading this, use this knowledge later when you step back from your high-testosterone stack and seek something to moderately improve your suddenly-crashed T-levels... If you’re 30 or older, testosterone supplementation might be a solution for you... Many women in the post-menopausal phase fine testosterone supplementation to be useful as well for keeping body hormone levels in check... Testosterone is naturally produced in the body by the testes. How much testosterone is produced by them is controlled by the pituitary glad of the endocrine system... As we age, our pituitary gland tells our testes to produce less and less testosterone... This is why men tend to lose sexual function, muscle mass, and energy as they age... If you’ve ever seen a highly energetic older man with good muscle mass, it’s likely he either has naturally high testosterone levels, or is using supplemental testosterone... The differences in older men who use it versus those who don’t use it are astounding... Moderate testosterone supplementation has many great side effects... Aside from the commonly known effects such as added muscle mass and increased sexual prowess, testosterone supplementation can stave off the onset of Alzheimer’s disease... There are negative side effects are well... If the body is pre-destined to develop some kinds of cancers or suffer from male pattern baldness, testosterone supplementation might accelerate it... Additionally, testosterone use may increase the size of the prostate, which begins growing in men around age 40 naturally... There is often a negative stigma which accompanies the use of testosterone as “cheating” or “steroids”... The truth is that it occurs naturally in our bodies... The only “cheating” that is going on is simply changing our testosterone levels at age 60 to that of your grandchildren... A 20-year old isn’t cheating by having testosterone levels at a high level, so why would his grandfather be cheating at anything by using a simple medicine to help raise his own levels? Remember that testosterone supplementation for adults is something entirely different from injecting large amounts of testosterone into the body for vanity or muscle-building purposes... Testosterone supplementation is used to improve health and vitality... The added muscle mass and lowered body fat is only a bonus! __________________
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-TRAINING IS THE ENGINE... -PROTEIN IS THE GASOLINE... -AND JUICE IS THE NITROUS OXIDE... Pain is temporary, glory is forever,
Clinical research still hasn’t determined a hard threshold level for when symptoms of low T begin appearing. Some recent research suggests that symptoms of low T might begin appearing in men when their total testosterone level dips below 320 ng/dl. According to anecdotal evidence from the owner of Peak Testosterone, many men start noticing low T symptoms when their total testosterone dips into the 400s. Of course, it’s anecdotal, so take it for what it’s worth, but it’s probably a good idea to stay above 500 ng/dl if you don’t want to experience symptoms of low T.
The biggest one I find is loss of morning erections.
According to Jonathan Wright, M.D., author of the book Maximize Your Vitality & Potency, the following effects have been reported in response to low testosterone levels:
Loss of ability to concentrate
Moodiness/emotionality
Touchiness/irritability
Great timidity
Feeling weak
Inner unrest
Loss of ability to concentrate
Memory failure
Reduced intellectual agility
Passive attitudes
General tiredness
Reduced interest in surroundings
Hypochondria
The above feelings can all be clinical symptoms of depression, and testosterone replacement therapy has been shown to alleviate these conditions. Testosterone thus has exciting therapeutic potential in the treatment of depression in men.
Testosterone and Aging
We know that many of the degenerative diseases of aging in men such as Type II diabetes, osteoporosis, and cardiovascular disease are related to a testosterone deficiency. We also know that common characteristics of middle-age and older age such as depression, abdominal fat deposition, muscle atrophy, low energy, and cognitive decline are also associated with less than optimal levels of free testosterone.
A consistent pattern that deals with fundamental aging shows that low testosterone causes excess production of a dangerous hormone called cortisol. Some anti-aging experts call cortisol a "death hormone" because of the multiple degenerative effects it produces such as immune dysfunction, brain cell injury, arterial wall damage, etc.
A group of scientists conducted two double-blind studies where they administered supplemental testosterone to groups of aging men and observed the typical responses of lower levels of cholesterol, glucose and triglycerides, reductions in blood pressure, and decreased abdominal fat mass. These scientists then showed that excess cortisol suppressed testosterone and growth hormone production and that the administration of testosterone acted as a "shield" against the over-production of cortisol in the adrenal gland.
It is important to point out that testosterone is an anabolic (or protein building) hormone while cortisol is a catabolic hormone that breaks down proteins in the body. Normal aging consists of a progressive decrease in free testosterone with a marked increase in cortisol. As men age past 40, cortisol begins to dominate, and the catabolic effects associated with growing older begin to dominate.
These findings have significant implications in the battle to maintain youthful hormone balance for the purpose of staving off normal aging and its associated degenerative diseases.
