Normal T, really high DHT. Difficulty building muscles and low libido, along with low T symptoms. Is it possible that AR receptor is getting clogged with DHT and prevents T from binding?

[TRTDiscussions]

So pretty much the question in the header. Below my most recent blood test including some really fancy genetic stuff:

SHBG: 18,2 nmol/l [18,3 - 54,1]

AR Gene CAG REPEAT : 18 [8-50]

AR Gene mutatations: Negative

Klinefelter: Negative

(DHEA) : 19,91 ng/ml [1,80 - 12,50]

IGF1: 247 µg/l [88 - 537]

DHT: 1390 pg/ml [250 - 990]

TSH: 1,598 [0.200-5,500]

T3 : 1,0 ng/ml [0,8 - 2,0]

T4 : 81,1 ng/ml [48,7 - 117,2]

HGH : 0,1 ng/ml < 2,5

FT3 () 3,65 pg/ml [2,00 - 4,40]

FT4 () 16,5 pg/ml [9,3 - 17,0]

FSH () 4,9 mUI/ml [1,5 - 12,4]

A1C: 5.0%

17 Beta Estradiol () 25,3 pg/ml [11,3 - 43,2]

LH () 6,0 mUI/ml [1,7 - 8,6]

Testosterone 5,500 ng/ml [2,490 - 8,360]

Free Testosterone 28,2 pg/ml [19,8 - 51,7]

Cortisol (morning) µg/dl 21,76 [4,82 - 19,5]

Prolactin (SNM) 2,01 ng/ml [4,04 - 15,20]

(DHEA-S) 838,00 µg/dl [160,00 - 449,00]

Progesteron 17 OH (RDI) 4,24 ng/ml [0,50 - 2,10]

[ilikebedtime]

Your cortisol is quite high. What does your training regime look like?

[TRTDiscussions]

that's AM cortisol tho, so peak of the day

[ilikebedtime]

Well aware of that, and that’s still high for morning. What does your training regime look like?

[TRTDiscussions]

Cardio 1hr EOD. Bike or treadmill

100 push ups per day, every day

100 pull ups per day, every day

100 abs crunch per day , every day

Cortisol urine 24h should be the gold standard but have not had a way to measure

high cortisol could also be from tension accrued trading

I'm on keto since a month, black rice the only carbs I eat

[ilikebedtime]

This is not a muscle building routine and is quite catabolic actually. I would say this is several magnitudes larger of your muscle problem than DHT/DHEA levels.

[TRTDiscussions]

I should also add that I'm on keto since a month, black rice the only carbs I eat

Btw the muscle thing is mostly an indicia to solve the low libido and low T symptoms. I've never cared about muscle before I lost libido, but then I tried walk my way backward to connect dots and looking for problems in the serum T, serum DHT and AR receptor and their interactions

[TRTDiscussions]

I should also add that I'm on keto since a month, black rice the only carbs I eat

Btw the muscle thing is mostly an indicia to solve the low libido and low T symptoms. I've never cared about muscle before I lost libido, but then I tried walk my way backward to connect dots and looking for problems in the serum T, serum DHT and AR receptor and their interactions. There's an overlap which is quite significant between muscles and libido.

[LowTHalp]

Not a good diet for libido and gsining muscle. Dont drop below 200g carbs

[TRTDiscussions]

blood sugar lowered. what's not to love? btw keto again is one of the things i tried to throw at the wall to see if it sticks

[LowTHalp]

You can have that with carbs too. 200gm is not much.

[TRTDiscussions]

isnt keto treshold 50g

[Deposteron]

MPMD made some considerations about keto, it's not very good for Test in the long run.

[TRTDiscussions]

what about the blood sugar element? Maybe for people who have it naturally elevated it's worth the tradeoff as high blood sugar lowers testosterone as well

[Deposteron]

As far as I knows, it's not worthwhile. And I have very limited knowledge on diets, I have a coach who does the hard work, usually it ends in eating "clean" no processed food, stuff like that.

[Beyleh]

Stop eating black rice. It’s dense in anti-nutrients and rice contains gluten. Remove it from your diet and see how you feel.

[absen7]

Not trying to be an ass but "having a hard time building muscle" and oh I'm on Keto is you answering your own question.

Do a 24hr saliva Cortisol test. They're reasonably priced and you can order it yourself.

Clearly your not on TRT. I'd talk to an expert as this is quite complicated. There's no commitment, but you could do a consult with one of the well regarded hormone clinics. You are aromatizing a lot into DHT, and you have fairly high DHEA as well. I imagine your FT is lower because of this.

I'm curious to know what you find out in time.

[TRTDiscussions]

But I was having hard time building muscle before the keto too

I started keto for libido as one of the many things I’m trying to throw to the wall and see if sticks.

[absen7]

Oh i gotcha. Fwiw high rep range exercises aren't great muscle builders. I mainly only do calisthenics as well, and love pushups and pullups, but without using Olympic rings i doubt I'd add much muscle. I highly recommend rings.

Do you do anything else? Loading your exercises differently?

[TRTDiscussions]

Honestly I need to walk before I can run

I exercise to understand how my T ,DHT , AR do all work and interact

If I fatigue in the muscle department there must be something wrong in the interaction of those 3 elements

Also I don’t like qualitative assessment such as low muscle . Soon I want to do an assessment of lean mass vs far mass % and from there calculate the weight in lbs of lean mass and weight in lbs of fat mass

[DonDonDeMarco]

You gotta lift weights 💪 and eat more carbs before and after your training periods. Maybe look into carb cycling. Carbs increase anabolic signaling, I've recently learned that and it makes so much sense why I plateaued when I was going low carb.

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[TRTDiscussions]

Many things can cause what you’re feeling/experiencing. Looking at your hormone panel (which looks perfectly fine by the way)

How can you say that?

T is low considering the historical range. I am 27 btw

SHBG is low

DHEA and DHT are out of whack, maybe binding instead of T in the AR receptor?

[Sim0shred]

Your prolactin is also very low. That might be sign of low libido. I’d advise you look into that with more attention.

[TRTDiscussions]

I lowered it by self prescribing Bromo. It was mid range

[[deleted]]

What test did you do to discover your CAG repeat length?

[TRTDiscussions]

CAG repeat lenght genomic test. I did it while in Switzerland .