Interesting effect of Propecia

[Cr779]

So while I was in the process of weaning off Propecia I got some blood work done, just to make sure everything was ok. I also had blood work done before starting so I could make sure i din't have wonky hormones going in.

I was at the walk in clinic today about some pain in my pelvis and the doctor mentioned the results(my own doctor has yet to call me) My original blood work put me smack dab in the middle level of the healthy range of testosterone. The blood work I was on while quitting, at this point I was taking only 0.006 of a dosage, like barely even cutting part of the pill off. Anyway my testosterone at this point was actually below the healthy level of testosterone in men. I'm gonna go talk to my actual doctor about this in a week and get the actual results in numbers so I know.

I'm gonna get some blood work done in another month or so just to make sure everything has gone back to normal, the doctor said he was positive it would. But I just wanted to share this information. Clearly Propecia can have some nasty side effects and here's some proof it's not all psychological.

[Aames]

I'm not sure what you're saying. If anything, most people see an increase of testosterone while on Propecia due to less being converted to DHT. It's persistently low DHT levels that most people are concerned with, I believe.

[Dan26]

I'm not sure what you're saying. If anything, most people see an increase of testosterone while on Propecia due to less being converted to DHT. It's persistently low DHT levels that most people are concerned with, I believe.

The more important thing to take note of is free / bio-available T....Total T will rise and free T will generally decrease, and this is not a good thing

[Aames]

The more important thing to take note of is free / bio-available T....Total T will rise and free T will generally decrease, and this is not a good thing

Ah, I see. Thanks for clarifying.

[Cr779]

I'm not sure what you're saying. If anything, most people see an increase of testosterone while on Propecia due to less being converted to DHT. It's persistently low DHT levels that most people are concerned with, I believe.

I'm saying that before I took the drug I had perfectly normal levels of testosterone and after taking it and then in the processes of quitting my levels dropped to an unhealthy level. I'm saying that this is a bad thing and it is something caused by propecia. Since so many people claim the drug has no negative sides and that most are all in peoples heads. Due to my blood tests I can quite clearly say that testosterone dropping from healthy to unhealthy in a 21 year old man in the matter of 5 months is not in my head.

I mean it's been a month since i had those tests done and im now off the drug, other than this annoying pelvic pain I don't think I have any other sides and I hope my T levels have gone back up, which i will get tested for in a few weeks. But my point is, this drug does some weird unexplained shit and that shit can be negative.

[Cr779]

I should also point out I didn't have sides on the drug and quit because the idea of possibly getting them scared me. Then while quitting, my body did weird shit while adjusting to my hormones changing.

So this isn't a case of the 1-2% who get sides on the drug, since I was fine on it.

[BaldinLikeBaldwin]

it is true that free testosterone levels generally decrease on Fin so I assume that was the value your physician wasa looking at..

however to go from being in mid-range to falling out of the range doesnt sound good

when you go for tests next your values should be restored to 'normal'

[Ktownmatti]

It would be interesting to see what your T levels were before you started tapering off. If it was fine while on, it could just be your body trying to readjust itself. Im sure I would be just as concerned, but it is more likely then not your body will return to normal after a few months.

[GuyFromUK]

Thanks for posting this information.

You say you were in the process of tapering off when you had the 2nd test done. How frequently were you taking propecia at this stage? I.e. in the last 2 to 3 weeks before this test was taken how many times had you taken propecia?

The reason I ask this question is that in my opinion "tapering off" is almost impossible with propecia. Even if you take a very tiny dosage it obliterates you 5 alpha reductase which then takes up to 2 weeks to regenerate. This essentially means that even a very tiny dosage of propecia lowers your DHT levels for up to 2 weeks. So taking a very small dosage of propecia even several days apart is little different to taking a large dosage daily! It still has the same effect of lowering your DHT levels considerably for a couple of weeks.

If you had taken any propecia within 2 weeks before your 2nd test (even a tiny amount) then I would suggest that you were still effectively ON propecia and you were not "tapering off".

What I would assume from your test results is that whilst you were "on" propecia it lowered your testosterone levels considerably.

I would not panic at this stage. If I were you I would test your testosterone levels at least a month or two after you take your last dose of propecia. Hopefully then you will see your testosterone levels starting to rise back to normal.

I wish you the best of luck and please keep us informed of any further progress.

[Cr779]

Thanks for posting this information.

You say you were in the process of tapering off when you had the 2nd test done. How frequently were you taking propecia at this stage? I.e. in the last 2 to 3 weeks before this test was taken how many times had you taken propecia?

The reason I ask this question is that in my opinion "tapering off" is almost impossible with propecia. Even if you take a very tiny dosage it obliterates you 5 alpha reductase which then takes up to 2 weeks to regenerate. This essentially means that even a very tiny dosage of propecia lowers your DHT levels for up to 2 weeks. So taking a very small dosage of propecia even several days apart is little different to taking a large dosage daily! It still has the same effect of lowering your DHT levels considerably for a couple of weeks.

If you had taken any propecia within 2 weeks before your 2nd test (even a tiny amount) then I would suggest that you were still effectively ON propecia and you were not "tapering off".

What I would assume from your test results is that whilst you were "on" propecia it lowered your testosterone levels considerably.

I would not panic at this stage. If I were you I would test your testosterone levels at least a month or two after you take your last dose of propecia. Hopefully then you will see your testosterone levels starting to rise back to normal.

I wish you the best of luck and please keep us informed of any further progress.

At this point I was still technically on the drug. I was on (roughly) 0.006mg, like so small i barely chipped off any of the pill. I would take this tiny amount every other day and been on 0.006mg for about 2 weeks at this point, before that was 0.015mg. In fact those blood tests were taken the day before my last dosage. I did this because I remember someone posting a Propecia DHT inhibition curve that stated 0.25 inhibited 67% or as much as 1mg, 0.2 inhibited 60% and that 0.01 inhibited 10% so I was shooting for in between 0.2 and 0.1, which was my attempt at 0.015 and then i went down to 0.06 or closer to 0.1.

But yeah I'm not really panicking, though it was concerning. Id be panicking if I felt more negative sides. In fact my pelvic pain is considerably better today so hopefully it clears up over the next day or so, that would be great. Gonna talk about getting more blood tests when i see my doctor on Tuesday. At which point I will be a month and a half off the drug.

I've also been working out again and I don't feel tired or shitty after a work out and my lifts have stayed the same in weight. Pretty sure if I still had low T I would feel like shit and be weak? Someone correct me if I'm, wrong.