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I might die... /s (blood test results) (thelemmy.club)
submitted 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) by to c/mtf@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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Ummm, so my latest blood test came back and those are the results...

I'm on 5mg of valerate every 3 days, 25mg of cypro daily and 400mg progesterone rectally daily.
My E at trough used to be around 360 pg/ml, but I guess it creeped up.

The full results

The most important values are (table for readability):

Hormone US units EU units
Estradiol 868.7 pg/ml 3189 pmol/L
Testosterone 12.7 ng/dL 0.44 nmol/L
Progesterone 19.8 ng/ml 62.09 nmol/L
Prolactin n/a 2181 mIU/L
SHBG n/a 98.3 nmol/L
LH & FSH None None

Now...there are a couple of things happening here:

  • My E is astronomically high. This is bad for a couple of reasons. I'll increase my shot interval to every 4 days right away. This is way too fucking much.
  • My SHBG is...surprisingly normal? I was expecting it to be through the roof with such high E levels. Weird.
  • My progesterone levels dropped...a lot. They were around 176 ng/ml (560 nmol/L) last time and this is almost a tenth of that...why? I'm still taking the same dose. This is very strange.
  • My prolactin is very high...this is a bad thing. Cyproterone raises prolactin, kratom (which I also take) raises prolactin, however...this could very well indicate a prolactinoma, a benign brain tumor in my pituitary gland. It produces prolactin on its own, so it can cause this.

Honestly? I can fix my E levels. Valerate sucks ass, but changing the frequency to 4 days will help a lot, I think. But the prolactin honestly worries me...this could certainly be a tumor. And I could blame only myself...I could have easily done monotherapy, but I wanted the guarantee of zero T, from the cypro. But it may actually be causing problems now...

Idk. This isn't the end of the world, definitely. My high E levels might be why my boobs are so small, but probably not. I'm worried about the prolactin, but I'll probably live.
I'd love to hear some opinions from you all. I'll be glad for anything! Thanks for being here for me, with me. I love you all so much 🩷

Edit: The weird thing is, my boobs still definitely hurt in a sore kinda way. Or at least one does (left, as always). I think they're still growing. Despite my absurd E levels, could they still be growing? Please be patient with me, I'm kinda slow 😭

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[–] 4 points 5 days ago*

Yeah, the breast cancer risk associated with estrogen HRT is from the old studies of postmenopausal women over 60, and generally when they used to use Estrone which is the most common type of estrogen in postmenopausal women, before they found Estradiol when they started studying premenopausal women at all. Unfortunately, medical science for women is lacking and has always been poorly funded. That is unlikely to change in our lifetimes. Drug companies and government funding they control are concentrated on synthetic drugs that can drive high enough prices. And lingering patriarchal mentality in medicine means only men's quality of life issues usually get researched and even then only if they can newly charge a ridiculous price for an existing medication like they did with Viagra.

So far there have been no comprehensive, controlled studies of the effect of HRT on pre- or peri-menopausal women, much less trans women. However, most reviews suggest that it's generally safe even at high levels. Women commonly experience much higher levels of Estradiol than yours during pregnancy for example, sometimes as much as exceeding 30,000 pg/mL in their third trimester according to some studies, though most say 1,000-6,000 through all but the first month or so is most common. There is also almost no research on pubescent girls and that's what we really need to understand, but generally the normal levels for an adult premenopausal cis-woman are 30-400 pg/ml depending on phase of their cycle.

There is even less research for progestin or estriol so I won't go onto those, but limited data is out there.

But check with your doctor to be sure, just I think jumping to conclusions is just going to affect your mental health negatively. It's statistically likely not that bad.

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