Side effects?

[Bran]

So, I'm finishing up my 5th week on IM testosterone, and I'm even more glad to be doing it than I'd expected.  Seeing some changes already, which is awesome-- mostly my voice, which I'd expected to drop early and hard, but not quite this much. 

But I'm also getting some seriously annoying side effects, and I wanted to see if anybody else has had similar stuff.  My skin is a mess.  The acne and insane amounts of oil I'd expected, but I've also got a rash on my neck, cheeks, and hands, which I think is psoriasis.  I've had trouble with psoriasis before, but never this bad, and trying to treat the acne makes it worse.  Has anyone else gone through this, and have any tricks for getting it better?

The first couple weeks I got some bad stomach stuff, some annoying dizziness and ringing in my ears, and I definitely had a bit of a mood crash after 11 days or so.  So I switched to doing it weekly, and that part has gotten lots better.  I'm still getting headaches sometimes, and while my weight is holding even my appetite has been up enough to be actually distracting.  With that, and the skin stuff, and how fast things are changing, I'm wondering if I just need to get my levels checked (my doc had been planning to give me another month or so). 

What's other people's experience?  Are these common side effects, or a red flag that my levels are too high, or just my own thing?

[LordKAT]

Those are symptoms worth bringing up to your doctor now. It may not be related to your dose but to the oil in is suspended in. They aren't what I would call common side effects at all. What you are taking to be psoriasis may be hives, or not. The dizziness and ringing in your ears is definitely not a common symptom. It is worth calling your doctor about.

[Bran]

Those are symptoms worth bringing up to your doctor now. It may not be related to your dose but to the oil in is suspended in.

Thanks. I'd discounted that-- it's in sesame oil, which I use routinely in cooking, so figured it wasn't an allergy. Pretty sure it's not hives, though.  I've had those before, too, and they tend to be spots that come and go randomly all over my body, whereas this rash is a few specific areas that flare and improve in a very predictable order.  And, it's scaly, which hives usually aren't for me.  I'd honestly wondered if it was just over-drying of the skin at first, because it's worst in the areas where I'm trying to control the acne, and we're in the midst of a very harsh winter (wind chills of 40 below).  But it's much worse than any dry skin I've ever had, and way too patchy for that.

I'll message my doc, see what she has to say.   

[Sebryn]

My psoriasis also flaired pretty bad while my doctor and I were figuring dosages and intervals out. I do get dizzy and kind of...blah feeling when I forget my shot for a few days. Shame on me I know. It's a bit different for me however since I have had a hysterectomy and oophorectomy. I also get some ringing in my ears very rarely when I forget but that is more than likely from long term damage caused by a very poor reaction to another medication.

Contact the doctor and see if she'll check your levels. What I did was a daily T log if you will, on how I was feeling physically and emotionally. It helped my doctor and I nail down a good interval and helped me understand my cycle and how it effects my system. 

[sam1234]

First off, get your levels checked. Making up doses is a bad idea. Its dangerous to you and will effect your trust with your physcian.

I took depo testosterone in sesame seed oil for year with no problem. They, one day I started coughing immediately after injecting myself. I've been through an anaphylactic reaction before to penecillin, to that raised a red flag. I started using androderm and the problem was solved. Sometimes its not the hormone, but the delivery system causing the problem.

Acne is a fairly common reaction to starting a new hormone. It doesn't happen to all people, but you are basically going through a second puberty, and depending on how your body accepts the testosterone, it may be the cause.

Treat the acne like you would any other acne. Even if you didn't have any acne during your first puberty, you could still have it on your second. You just happen to be older.

The only way to know for sure is to get you levels, sit down with your Dr. and go over your levels and problems. Otherwise, its just a guess.

sam1234

[FTMax]

My skin was already pretty weird. Haven't gotten any acne to speak of though! I have had some headaches. Keep a list of when you're experiencing things and see if you can troubleshoot causes before you take it to a doctor. As an example, I didn't really get headaches before starting T, but I also tried to stop drinking soda around the same time so it's not terribly clear whether it's T related or caffeine related. I'm planning to mention it to my doctor, even though I've pretty much found that I only get them if I haven't had caffeine in a day.

[Bran]

First off, get your levels checked. Making up doses is a bad idea. Its dangerous to you and will effect your trust with your physcian.

I took depo testosterone in sesame seed oil for year with no problem. They, one day I started coughing immediately after injecting myself. I've been through an anaphylactic reaction before to penecillin, to that raised a red flag. I started using androderm and the problem was solved. Sometimes its not the hormone, but the delivery system causing the problem.

Acne is a fairly common reaction to starting a new hormone. It doesn't happen to all people, but you are basically going through a second puberty, and depending on how your body accepts the testosterone, it may be the cause.

Treat the acne like you would any other acne. Even if you didn't have any acne during your first puberty, you could still have it on your second. You just happen to be older.

The only way to know for sure is to get you levels, sit down with your Dr. and go over your levels and problems. Otherwise, its just a guess.

sam1234

I was just looking to hear other people's experience-- I know it's not a substitute for medical care. I'm familiar enough with anaphylaxis that I was certain it was nothing like that.  If it's an allergy, it's like a food sensitivity, not the life-threatening sort. And I'm not making up a dose, I'm taking the same cumulative dose at a different interval, which is a standard strategy for minimizing peak and trough effects. I wouldn't have made the change if I wasn't on good enough terms with my doc to know she'll be ok with it. I'm very fortunate in my medical care.

Like I said, the acne I had expected. I got acne at age 10, and have had it ever since.  The men in my family have very significant scarring. I started treating the acne seriously again a few weeks before I started T. The psoriasis was a surprise.  I've done my research, because I wanted to know what to expect.  The ringing in the ears, dizziness and GI upset are all actually well documented peak effects on testosterone. But all I could find on rashes was local reactions to the topical stuff. So I figured I'd ask here, since the accumulated real-world experience of this forum is higher than all but the most specialized medical folks. Figured I could at least find out if it had happened to someone else.

[sam1234]

No offense intended.

Dr.s don't always tell you all the side effects. Partly because it would take to long and partly because they are afraid to "put ideas in your head". Personally, I go to the PDR.

Two years ago, my T was twice the normal high for a guy my age and honestly, I didn't notice. Too low is another story. By any chance were you on aspirin when you were experiencing these symptoms?

Sam1234

[Bran]

No offense intended.

Dr.s don't always tell you all the side effects. Partly because it would take to long and partly because they are afraid to "put ideas in your head". Personally, I go to the PDR.

Two years ago, my T was twice the normal high for a guy my age and honestly, I didn't notice. Too low is another story. By any chance were you on aspirin when you were experiencing these symptoms?

Sam1234

No worries.  Reading my post, I'd have probably given the same advice to somebody other than me!  I'm obsessive about gathering information for myself, and I've got a science background, so I tend to look these sorts of questions up in the primary medical literature, just to get a sense of the possibilities.  My biggest question was whether it was most likely to be 1) an allergy to the carrier 2) my levels being off  3) just the way my body reacts to T, or 4) a random coincidence.  The lack of info on IM testosterone and rashes makes it very likely that my doc won't be able to answer the question, either-- even of my levels are off, it may or may not be connected.  And the rash is annoying enough that the thought of a long trial-and-error process to figure it out is less than thrilling.  And no, I wasn't on aspirin, and there were no other changes in my life or my meds to explain it.

My doctor is usually pretty good about talking about the major side effects-- she'd raised the issue of the acne when we started talking about T.  But I also know she hasn't worked with enough trans folks to have seen the rarer reactions.

[sam1234]

My allergy to T was with the carrier, and didn't show up until I'd been on it about 12 years. Everytime I injected my dose, I would start to cough. My Dr. couldn't say if it was just coincidence or the beginning of a major reaction. Once he switched me, I had no more problems.

sam1234