LOW Testosterone Male and Stress Fractures--Help?

Your low testosterone is probably mostly a genetic problem, and you CAN get prescriptions for synthetic testosterone, but you can also raise testosterone naturally. Start taking zinc and magnesium. Start eating more mono-unsaturated fat. In one study I read, the researcher found men with diets with less than 10% of calories from fat sometimes had testosterone levels lower than healthy "pre-adolescents." This means they were less manly than 10 year-old boys. The study basically said as mono-unsaturated fat intake increased, so did testosterone levels. It recommended that men's diet contain at least 25% of calories from fat.

Don't go crazy, but adding more peanut butter and olive oil to your diet should help. Be careful too as it's pretty easy to gain weight when you start adding calorie-dense foods to your diet.

Good luck.

Correct,

Low testos can be caused by lot body fat, low fat intake (fat is used to make testos), and extremely strenuous training, as well as adrenal overload syndrowm (i think that is the name)

Androgel would be prescribed by any endoctronoligst (sp) if you wanted..

Most distance athletes have low testosterone - in the neighborhood of 60% of average.

Some people, knowing that testosterone of distance athletes is low, will get a prescription from a doctor to bring them into the normal range - again, which is well above average for distance athletes.

The creams and patches are good and are testosterone - unless someone had a very high testosterone level ... well above "high normal" an athlete would not raise a red flag. Yes, it may be "synthetic" testosterone, but it would require a very expensive test (mass spectrometer) to tell the difference. These tests don't get run except for anywhere other than championship (Olympics, WCs, PanAm Games, Euro Champs, etc.) and again, only if the testosterone level is well above normal. This happens all the time with people who don't have a problem but want an advantage. Sorry guys - those are just the facts.

Guppy wrote:

Start taking zinc and magnesium.

Your entire post was very interesting and informative. I was just curious what the relationship between zinc and magnesium and testosterone is?

I don't think you are running enough to have the low T level for volume reasons alone. Figure it would be lower, especially above 60-70 miles/week.

My guess would be your sleep quality is poor, which can down regulate T and growth hormone and probably your prolactin.

Are you having trouble falling asleep? Circadian disruptions? Feeling warmer at night but a bit colder than usual during the day? Some sort of hypometabolic state might be next or already in place. All of this is correctable.

The other important clue is the fractures. Basically your body will not lay down bone or muscle without sufficient resources to sustain it. Make sure your blood sugar level is stable. Work on improving your diet, and try to get sufficient vitamin D and magnesium. Magnesium is stored in bone. My guess is your body needs that magnesium somewhere else that is a higher priority.

I can go into a bit more detail if you email me but a good GP would be able to read this note and get the clue.

dsrunner@juno.com

Maybe it's those damn plastics again. Do you eat alot of food in plastics or heat food up in plastic? There's an element that leaches from plastics and some people believe this lowers your testesterone. Google it up for yourself. It wont hurt to distance yourself from plastics and see if it helps. There was a thread on this recently. It could be bs or maybe not. The plastic companies say it's safe ;o)

low testosterone? Are you cranking it too much?

Thanks for the info guys. I will heed the dietary suggestions in addition to any OTC or presciption testosterone. I'm not fat, and I do eat a fair amount of fat that helps build testosterone. My training has been limited so I have not been able to do the volume I did for several years before I got into the stress fracture rut. Also, my sleep and hypometabolic state seem to be fine, but I will try to get more magnesium and vit. D in my diet.

Basically, I'd like to get my levels back above the 250 lower limit, so that would mean I'd have to double my current levels. We could never find out the reasons behind the stress fractures until this test came back, and hopefully fixing this will allow sustained training and health again because its been really long since my last competition. Thanks for all the advice, and feel free to share any more tips--I don't know enough about this stuff, but my Dr. will hopefully help me fix this and I'll try to do the little things as well.

aww, low testosterone male?

you know most women have higher testosterone levels than you. you don't technically qualify as a person.

you want to get your levels up?

beef and oysters for a week. followed by copious amounts of chili, hotsauce, cheeseburgers.

lift some weights, look at pron, massage yourself (discretely) and stay away from girly health products. In fact don't shower or bathe for a week. You're suffering from gay syndrome and the only way out is to become a wild man, and finally back to a man.

its ok sissy pants, having the masculinity of a 13 year old girl is not that bad.

stay away from soy and plastics forever though, that means forever. sorry.

get your facts straight. or lose the anonymous alias.

Okay, I'll try to help. I'm tired, ill and disorganized, so bear with me as I ramble.

1) You should make an appointment with a GOOD endocrinologist or urologist in your area who is up-to-date on the current research and experienced at treating hyogonadal men. If you need help finding one in your area, let me know and I'll try to find some candidates.

2) You will want to have your testosterone levels tested at least twice more before you consider starting any Rx treatments. Testosterone levels are extremely variable and easily suppressed by certain stressors; it's possible for a normal, healthy male to get sick, drink to excess, become sleep deprived, etc. and consequently test lower for testosterone than the average adult female. This is why repeat tests are crucial.

3) Yes, healthy testosterone levels are very important for bone density. Perhaps you experienced stress fractures as a result of poor bone density which in turn was caused by low testosterone levels, OR perhaps both of these things were caused by something else, OR maybe, again, your low testosterone levels are transient.

4) Yes, there are OTC products such as

which help boost testosterone. IMHO, they'd only be useful treating hypogonadal men in borderline cases--in more severe cases, drugs like Clomid, or A-dex or TRT would be much better choices.

5) Optimally, someone your age should have testosterone levels well over 4-500.

6)If you are seriously hypogonadal, treat the condition first and worry about competing later. Yes, you may need to stop competing in drug-tested competitions. So be it. Your health is more important, and besides, you won't be competitive if you're seriously hypogonadal.

7)Why could a 20-something male be hypogonadal? All sorts of reasons--genetic, illnesses, injuries, stress, nasty environmental or industrial toxins, radiation, etc.

8)There are also OTC substances which may help re: stress fractures. I'm a huge fan of standardized extracts of Cissus Quadrangularis such as