Testosterone’s Bad Rap ~ Todd Thomas

Demonized by many and proclaimed to bring back your youth by others. What is it that makes everyone associate the word testosterone with egotistical and anti-social behavior? Who has brainwashed us to believe that this hormone will make us treat our children like the red headed stepchild, or slap our significant other for complimenting our haircut? Studies on men and women have proved the exact opposite. Testosterone has actually increased fair bargaining behavior and sociability in both sexes when observed against a placebo. Men and women that “thought” they were consuming testosterone displayed anti-social and egotistical behaviors. Who cares though you don’t need testosterone anyway right? Isn’t testosterone for building muscle and getting jacked? Wrong, testosterone is responsible for many of the bodies daily responsibilities including but not limited to controlling blood sugar levels and cholesterol. Like our medical director Dr Matt always says, if you had diabetes you would take insulin right? Then if you had hypogonadism why wouldn't you take testosterone?

Testosterone, depicted as the primary influence of a swelling prostate and the eventual death by cancer of men over 50 has a new image. Poor information collected from a study in 1938 had us seemingly blind for 70 years, and doing such has had serious negative implications on men’s health. That’s right, Cardio Vascular Disease, Diabetes, and even Cancer (which is the leading cause of death in men and women between the ages of 40-79) is all related in one way or another to low testosterone levels. Chemically castrating men with end stage prostate cancer for decades, we now know that not only do healthy levels of testosterone help to prevent prostate cancer, it actually reduces your risk of aggressive disease by 50% (Click for Study). This muscle-building hormone is very important to more than just the bodybuilder trying to do well in his next competition, or the sports athlete trying to get an edge over their opponents. Testosterone is important to every single man (and woman) on the planet.

So what is the difference between the ever so tarnished reputation of steroids and testosterone? Well, there is absolutely no difference between the two because testosterone is a steroid. Your testicles manufacture it on an hourly basis during puberty and pharmaceutical companies (like Watson) stick it in a bottle as medication. The difference is the amount taken, not the male sex hormone that is responsible for almost every reason we call ourselves a man. When someone does a steroid cycle they are taking roughly 10x the dose a doctor would recommend or mega dosing. This is referred to as having supraphysiological levels of testosterone in the blood, an amount unattainable by a human being naturally. Years and years of clinical data have been recorded on men mega dosing all sorts of steroids, after all this is the same data we used to determine that testosterone was the black sheep of a man’s hormones, and anyone that considers it is on an early road to death via some kind of heart problem and or prostate cancer. I think it’s safe to say that if you take 10x the dose of any medication you could possibly expose yourself to many health dangers that would increase your risk of ending up in the cemetery early. This is where supplementation enters the scene, taking amounts that restore healthy physiological levels of testosterone, an amount human beings are more than capable of making naturally. When clinical trials were observed on doctor prescribed doses, it was amazing to see how optimal phsyiological levels of this hormone improved almost every facet of your health profile. Its really not that hard to imagine, and once all of the horrifying myths have been debunked you can see that it is no different than supplementing a vitamin. If you were low on vitamin B you would supplement vitamin B. Testosterone is no different, when you were 21 and at the height of your health you were pumping out more testosterone in your factory than any other point in your life. So why would optimal physiological levels of testosterone be bad for us? The short answer is, it’s not, it actually improves our health and look.

Most men have a problem admitting their testosterone may be low, it can be embarrassing and even de-masculinizing for a lot of men today. Many men ignore the symptoms and have been told to by doctors to accept these changes as normal aging. They see the decline in their physical and mental abilities, loss of sexual appetite, fewer erections and lower stamina and endurance as part of the aging process. I am not talking just about the ability to get it up, I am talking about the drive to be romantic with your partner, and the extra motivation to come home from a long day at work and cook her to dinner to ensure your going to close the deal without Viagra, and the subsequent sniffy nose and headaches that come with its use. I am talking about improving risk factors for all cause mortality, and improving your quality of life at the same time. The debunking of testosterone’s bad rap is long overdue.

What does optimizing ones testosterone entail? You will need to determine if your testosterone levels are low, and this should be done by completing a detailed medical history of your symptoms and confirming it with a blood sample. Make sure you get your free roaming testosterone checked along with your total testosterone. The amount that is free and unbound is the amount the puts in all of the work. The amount that is bound floats around your veins and does nothing until it is released from SHBG. It’s not widely known that the free testosterone value is more important than the total testosterone value, so make sure you’re very specific in what tests you would like to run. Once you have confirmed that supplementation has more checks on the pro side than the con, its time to get your life and health back on track. Most men who are deficient in testosterone will see a major change in BMI (body mass index) once they have optimized their testosterone and we now know waste circumference is the number one tell tale sign of your overall health risk. This is what decreases our risk factors for metabolic and cardiovascular diseases while simultaneously restoring our Alpha-Male status.

Testosterone’s new image consists of everything from making you more money to warding off diabetes but for those of us already on supplemental doses of testosterone, we know what it really does, it makes you look forward to that alarm clock in the morning and improves our overall quality of life in all of our day to day activities.

So if your ready to get your life back on track then just schedule an appointment at the bottom of any page on our website to get your free consultation!!

Join the conversation in the LiveFyre box below!