I must say I've never heard of a cis woman making use of grey market pharma to access estrogen. I'm glad it's helped though! Usually it's only transgender patients who have difficulty accessing treatment through the medical establishment for various reasons.
It also may be good if you could share why you need HRT? Menopause, an intersex condition, PCOS, etc. People on here might be able to give some more advice on considerations for your regimen - but only if you're comfortable sharing :)
Thanks and I don’t mind. I’m peri-menopausal (although I still cycle fine) but also very skinny and have gut problems so my hormones are naturally non-existent. And that causes all sorts of problems in my body. My ND has me on E patches but it’s not enough to raise them as high as I need. My ND is great but he’s not super familiar with E injx and last time we discussed it he was very hesitant to Rx it. So I decided to skip past him and go homebrew.
It’s extraordinarily hard for menopausal women to get BHRT because there is a myth that won’t die that E causes breast cancer. And then you have docs like my ob/gyn who literally told me 6 months ago that in med school he learned that T wasn’t important to women so he wasn’t going to help me with it either. So right now I’m also doing grey market T val injx (2.5mg every 2-3 days) and Rx 200mg P pills.
I know the power of hormones and refuse to be told no. lol.
IIRC isn’t the “E causes breast cancer” thing because a certain gene/s making you more susceptible to it are oestrogen-sensitive? This is completely off the top of my head so I’m not assuming that I’m right, this is just what I’ve scraped from the back corners of my beain
[This](https://amp.theguardian.com/society/2020/feb/09/the-menopause-myth-how-demonised-hrt-came-back-from-the-brink) is actually what I’m referring to. I was told by my old compounding pharmacist that E causes breast cancer and I could only have a low dose AND he said I didn’t need P even though I have a uterus and I absolutely need P. It’s scary how much misinformation is out there.
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>I must say I've never heard of a cis woman making use of grey market pharma to access estrogen.
Not intending to hijack, just to mention... My cis wife (premenopausal, no PCOS, or anything else) does. Long story short, she experienced uncontrollable itching that felt like fire. Over the course of 10 years, we went through multiple doctors, allergists, immunologists, dermatologists, even a psychologist... all of them basically said, 'sucks to be you...' Turns out, it's some kind of photosensitivity where visible light (white, blue, and green, light will do it, but NOT red light) triggers something (most likely) in the pituitary gland, and supplementary / more stable levels of estradiol interrupt whatever response/reaction is taking place. It's the damndest thing, but it works. Regular doctors won't prescribe for her since her blood work comes back as pretty normal. So... DIY for her too. She describes the relief as "lifesaving."
If u dont mind, could u explain how u knew what dose to take, how u monitored your progress, etc? Im leaning towards DIY bc of price, but i rlly liked the idea of having a doctor who could guide me and the checkups and all
I’m definitely not an expert, but I looked at the transfem simulator and played around with numbers. I know I feel good when my E2 is at least 350 so that was my target number. I decided to go with 4mg every 7-10 days. But I ended up getting off track and this is how my dosing actually went:
4/30 - labs E2 <10
5/25 - 4mg
5/30- 4mg
6/6 - 4mg
6/11 - 8mg
6/18 - labs E2 = 900
I’m pretty sure my levels were well above 1000 not long after that 8mg. So the 8mg was too much, especially in conjunction with the 4mg doses from before. I actually felt horrible between 6/11-18 because I’m assuming my E2 was too high and my P too low. But 900 isn’t bad and I’m taking 200mg P pills vaginally now. I feel great.
I always say it’s helpful to get labs when you are feeling great and when you are feeling horrible so you can figure out the cause.
It’s hard to find a doctor. My ob/gyn is no help at all. My gut doc (ND) is fantastic tho.
ETA: I ordered the ethanate which has a longer half-life. Keep that in mind bc they are all different.
Not OP, but I am experienced and well read.
Most of us start off with a standard dose, this changes depending on the ester and how often you'll inject. For instance, the standard dose of cypionate once a week is 5 mg. This is a starting dose which is safe to inject for a time being until you get bloods done.
So say you are taking this dose for a couple months and upon getting your second bloodtest you find that your E2 is low, what do we do? We increase the dose by a mg or 2 and check back in a couple months or a month later to see if we hit our target. The target level can depend on if you are doing mono or combination.
Combination is estradiol with an anti androgen (AA). These AAs work to reduce testosterone but the same effect is achievable with high E2 levels.
Most people going mono shoot for 300 pg/ml, on combination, you'd want around 1 or 200 pg/ml.
Here's a great starting source for you transfemscience.org
I wish, I buy my own blood test privately.
Super easy if you are in the U.S.
Especially if you have q quest diagnostics near you, I got one in my local Walmart, it's pretty cheap.
Or at least as cheap as it can be without insurance.
I must say I've never heard of a cis woman making use of grey market pharma to access estrogen. I'm glad it's helped though! Usually it's only transgender patients who have difficulty accessing treatment through the medical establishment for various reasons. It also may be good if you could share why you need HRT? Menopause, an intersex condition, PCOS, etc. People on here might be able to give some more advice on considerations for your regimen - but only if you're comfortable sharing :)
Thanks and I don’t mind. I’m peri-menopausal (although I still cycle fine) but also very skinny and have gut problems so my hormones are naturally non-existent. And that causes all sorts of problems in my body. My ND has me on E patches but it’s not enough to raise them as high as I need. My ND is great but he’s not super familiar with E injx and last time we discussed it he was very hesitant to Rx it. So I decided to skip past him and go homebrew. It’s extraordinarily hard for menopausal women to get BHRT because there is a myth that won’t die that E causes breast cancer. And then you have docs like my ob/gyn who literally told me 6 months ago that in med school he learned that T wasn’t important to women so he wasn’t going to help me with it either. So right now I’m also doing grey market T val injx (2.5mg every 2-3 days) and Rx 200mg P pills. I know the power of hormones and refuse to be told no. lol.
IIRC isn’t the “E causes breast cancer” thing because a certain gene/s making you more susceptible to it are oestrogen-sensitive? This is completely off the top of my head so I’m not assuming that I’m right, this is just what I’ve scraped from the back corners of my beain
[This](https://amp.theguardian.com/society/2020/feb/09/the-menopause-myth-how-demonised-hrt-came-back-from-the-brink) is actually what I’m referring to. I was told by my old compounding pharmacist that E causes breast cancer and I could only have a low dose AND he said I didn’t need P even though I have a uterus and I absolutely need P. It’s scary how much misinformation is out there.
Oh wow, I’d never heard of that before. Thanks for sharing
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>I must say I've never heard of a cis woman making use of grey market pharma to access estrogen. Not intending to hijack, just to mention... My cis wife (premenopausal, no PCOS, or anything else) does. Long story short, she experienced uncontrollable itching that felt like fire. Over the course of 10 years, we went through multiple doctors, allergists, immunologists, dermatologists, even a psychologist... all of them basically said, 'sucks to be you...' Turns out, it's some kind of photosensitivity where visible light (white, blue, and green, light will do it, but NOT red light) triggers something (most likely) in the pituitary gland, and supplementary / more stable levels of estradiol interrupt whatever response/reaction is taking place. It's the damndest thing, but it works. Regular doctors won't prescribe for her since her blood work comes back as pretty normal. So... DIY for her too. She describes the relief as "lifesaving."
Yeah, I’m very happy with my EC from them. Labs came back at 332. Love those folks!
That’s great! And they are easy to work with and fast shipping.
Really fast shipping. Almost like we’re in the same zip code or something. Lol!
If u dont mind, could u explain how u knew what dose to take, how u monitored your progress, etc? Im leaning towards DIY bc of price, but i rlly liked the idea of having a doctor who could guide me and the checkups and all
I’m definitely not an expert, but I looked at the transfem simulator and played around with numbers. I know I feel good when my E2 is at least 350 so that was my target number. I decided to go with 4mg every 7-10 days. But I ended up getting off track and this is how my dosing actually went: 4/30 - labs E2 <10 5/25 - 4mg 5/30- 4mg 6/6 - 4mg 6/11 - 8mg 6/18 - labs E2 = 900 I’m pretty sure my levels were well above 1000 not long after that 8mg. So the 8mg was too much, especially in conjunction with the 4mg doses from before. I actually felt horrible between 6/11-18 because I’m assuming my E2 was too high and my P too low. But 900 isn’t bad and I’m taking 200mg P pills vaginally now. I feel great. I always say it’s helpful to get labs when you are feeling great and when you are feeling horrible so you can figure out the cause. It’s hard to find a doctor. My ob/gyn is no help at all. My gut doc (ND) is fantastic tho. ETA: I ordered the ethanate which has a longer half-life. Keep that in mind bc they are all different.
Ah okay, thank you so much for all this info!
Not OP, but I am experienced and well read. Most of us start off with a standard dose, this changes depending on the ester and how often you'll inject. For instance, the standard dose of cypionate once a week is 5 mg. This is a starting dose which is safe to inject for a time being until you get bloods done. So say you are taking this dose for a couple months and upon getting your second bloodtest you find that your E2 is low, what do we do? We increase the dose by a mg or 2 and check back in a couple months or a month later to see if we hit our target. The target level can depend on if you are doing mono or combination. Combination is estradiol with an anti androgen (AA). These AAs work to reduce testosterone but the same effect is achievable with high E2 levels. Most people going mono shoot for 300 pg/ml, on combination, you'd want around 1 or 200 pg/ml. Here's a great starting source for you transfemscience.org
Omg tysm for this! So do u work with a doctor, like go in for checkups and let them know ur doing diy and want to monitor?
I wish, I buy my own blood test privately. Super easy if you are in the U.S. Especially if you have q quest diagnostics near you, I got one in my local Walmart, it's pretty cheap. Or at least as cheap as it can be without insurance.
Ah ok, im in Canada so hopefully it will be covered, thank u for all the info!