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Testosterone and Lyme Symptoms (babs)

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Posted 9/17/2021 2:22 AM (GMT 0)
I had the unpleasant experience over the last few years (took me quite a while to figure out the cause) of finding an intersection of hormones and symptoms.

I found that increasing testosterone dose (or almost any hormone for that matter) increased my symptoms significantly (neck pain, brain fog, fatigue being the most immediate and worst) within hours of a dose (either injection or scrotal cream).

Ive been on testosterone along with various other anabolics over the past 9 years, doses ranging from HRT around 100-150mg/week to higher completion doses of 1500mg a week without any issues.

However since all these new Lyme issues I noticed that small changes would make symptoms a nightmare within HOURS of dosing. Cypionate would last 7-10 days before calming down, propionate 5 days or so, and cream or test base ~2 days. Even a low, low dose injection of 10mg would set off horrible symptoms within a couple hours

Has anyone had a similar experience? The only thing Ive been able to come up with is that testosterone and other sex hormones, for a reason I have yet to understand, increases the virulence of babesia. First Ive come across is online and was wondering if I was the only one
Posted 9/17/2021 6:15 AM (GMT 0)
Ah finally a thread about testosterone smile

I'll keep this short because I'm currently bed bound due to fatigue.
But I strongly suspect your red blood cells are too high.

As you might know, Babesia is an infection of red blood cells.

On HRT and also during "blasts" for competition purposes, many people routinely give blood donations to lower their red blood count. Because testosterone increases red blood cells, a lot actually.

I suspect you're giving Babesia the chance to have more red blood cells available to infect.

However don't give blood donations, as you can pass the Lyme and babs on to recipients of your blood. They don't actually even screen for Lyme when you give blood (yes, it's bad).

What you want to do is:

1. Check your red blood count with a blood test first, I believe it's called Hematocrit, but please double check.
2. Ask your doctor for a therapeutic phlebotomy, this is where they take blood and discard it for you.

Good luck, let me know if you have any more questions.
Posted 9/17/2021 6:22 AM (GMT 0)
One last thing, lowering your TRT dosage will also lower the increase in red blood cells. So you might want to look into that instead of constant phlebotomies.
Posted 9/17/2021 9:47 AM (GMT 0)
the hormone system is a very complex thing and its behaviours and reactions can change significantly over time. its a notable feature of the hormone system that things that are OK for a while can still be problematic in the long term.

long term use of testosterone and anabolics - especially at doses above those naturally occurring is generally associated with a pretty wide array of problems.

for instance - in particular, relevant to lyme etc, there are several studies showing lowered antibody responses correlated with men vs women and with higher testosterone in general.

eg . https://www.issm.info/sexual-health-qa/can-a-mans-testosterone-levels-affect-his-immune-system/

i am sure you have good reasons for using natural and synthetic testosterone / analogues - and clearly low testosterone has health impacts also - so i don't mean to preach or tell you what to do - but i just thought it worth highlighting there are potential health issues associated with higher doses / long term use - especially so if you are in a chronic infectious disease population.

Post Edited (Garzie) : 9/17/2021 3:53:14 AM (GMT-6)

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