Switching to transdermal patches

[Tills]

Lots of really valuable comments and advice above: this forum at its best. Just to pick out a couple to respond to:

[...]

But instead, I get labs done, we make some sort of adjustment, I wait three months, get tested again, another adjustment and repeat ad nauseam. After 4 years of doing this, I'm still not quite where I should be.

This is sooooo true!!!

When I was on gels everything was pretty settled but these patches are proving far less so, not helped by all sorts of treatment-blocking problems by my health authority.

Perhaps the patches are more expensive.  They may fall off or be hard to get off too.

[...]

But I wonder if you are in water a lot, take showers and baths a lot, or get sweaty, perhaps that may cause issues with the patches staying on or the medicine itself leaking away.

I have no adhesion issues with Evorel. I put it on, place the palm of my hand on it for c. 45 seconds, and there it remains until day 3 removal. I find no need for any tape or any other sticking material. In fact, the biggest pain is the line around the edge after removal which is remarkably stubborn and causes a red patch when I rub it off. @Lori Dee you mentioned a while back using oil to get it off: which oil did you use for that if I may ask?

I have wondered about the bath / shower thing. If I have a deep bath and momentarily submerge the Evorel it does turn an opaque white colour.

However, I don't really think I can blame the problem with my levels on that. I just don't think Evorel 100 is delivering me sufficient estrogen, despite changing it every 3 days (as opposed to twice a week).

I'll up to Evorel 125 pending Nottingham's comments on the situation. They may agree to switch me onto Lenzetto which sounds pretty good.

I know too that my GRS hospital won't be happy with the low state of my estradiol reading. They require it to be a lot higher.

xx

[Tills]

Thats very good as I needed double to get correct levels which as you say is a faff to apply. This is with blockers! Its odd patches are this ineffective when you only seem to need a low intake of E.

C😻

One thing I wonder about, and which @Lori Dee referred to a while back, is about the way patches leech into the fatty tissue.

So I hike every day: at least 10kms. Prior to that I was a pretty serious marathon runner. My legs have no observable fat on them. They're very lean. I rotate the Evorel patches from right thigh to tummy to left thigh and back. The thighs look to me like they have zero fat. Might this be an issue I wonder??

Sigh.

It's quite annoying. And it's also tempting to go back to the gels. I have 3 months supply still and as it was entirely my request to switch from gels to patches there would be no real issue about doing my own thing, providing I liaise with my clinic about doing so.

[Tills]

By the way, @Dani nice to see you back on here and thank you for your very thoughtful post. You are absolutely right in what you said.

On the other hand, it's interesting for me to note that before I switched to patches my transgender clinic asked me if I was happy now to be discharged. After 12 years and a very steady estradiol level they saw no need to continue monitoring me. They were happy for me to carry on ticking over under my GP. I have another friend who transitioned years ago and she certainly has no transgender clinic overseeing her any more.

(My response to my clinic was that I wanted to go through the GRS and into a settled state after that before considering discharge.)

xx