Interesting. Yea, it can be a bit tricky to dose the red light. You can underdo it and get nothing, and overdo it pretty easily as well.
Might be interested to buy that joovv off ya if you really dont use it anymore haha
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I’m definitely still using it, so unfortunately it’s not for sale, lol. There were months where I didn’t use it, but then other times, like now, where I use it almost every day. You can probably find one on eBay for a discount compared to what I paid for a new one, though.
I guess it’s time for another update.
I’ve been exercising the last few weeks, moving somewhat closer to what my pre-lockdown levels of workout intensity were. Right now I’m averaging 6 workouts per week, but I need to be doing something every day. Working a muscle group, or sprints. I might look into those exercise resistance bands, but for now I have 4lbs, 7 lbs, and 15 lbs dumbbells.
I have leg day covered, using two big jugs of Poland Spring water with handles on them. They weigh about 22 lbs each or something like that, and when I’m holding one in each hand it’s a lot better than body weight squats. I’m able to feel sore the next day or two afterwards, so that’s a good sign. But I need to spread that further away from my sprinting days.
For chest, what I’m doing is supersets to compensate for not having heavy (for me) weights. Those 15 lbs dumbbells are very heavy when you just maxed out on push-ups 3 seconds ago. What I should do is then go to the 7 lbs, and then the 4 lbs ones. 5 sets of that, twice a day, would be solid. It should ideally be 15 sets of chest work, but I feel like my options for chest exercises are limited.
For shoulders, my home setup is actually not far off from what I had in the gym. I always used dumbbells and supersetted lateral, forward, and overhead raises. It’s pretty intense when you superset them, but they became my best muscle group. I also think, aesthetically, shoulders are the most important muscle group because they make you look wider up top and therefore you get more of that V-shape.
For back day, I’ve been doing bent over wide rows and reverse flys. I also have a pull-up bar for my doorframe, and I superset pull-ups into the rows and flys. The problem is that I can’t do that many pull-ups anymore, only 3 when I’m fresh. I felt like I was getting a good workout but again, I should probably be supersetting these with dumbbells. Maybe get 12 lbs dumbbells or 10 lbs.
On the red light front, I’m starting a routine where I use the Joovv one day, and the hair helmet thing the next. When I use the Joovv and the hair helmet the same day, the red light lasers actually start to give me a big headache for the last 5 minutes I’m using it.
I’m hoping that I didn’t lose all of my progress, hopefully it’ll come back. No MW except after pine pollen tincture days - and I think that’s a sign that I haven’t lost all my progress. Originally, even pine pollen tincture or a mega dose of the powder wouldn’t give me morning wood. My libido and sensitivity are still bad, though. I’m looking forward to when I have another upswing. I think that will come with more workouts.
My personal life has been hard lately, because my father is an incredible asshole and started mocking me for being what he considers a complete failure, etc. He was incredibly condescending and said that I was just now expressing interest in a career, but he said I’m too incompetent for any of my goals and that it’s his “duty as my father” to give me “cold hard reality.” The man has zero friends, is a horrible husband, neither of his sons talk to him except on holidays, and he’s been chronically depressed his whole life. So his advice is worth fuck all. He has zero clue about my field, and arrogantly thinks he knows more about it than I do. He thinks I know nothing, and that I’ve done nothing with my life, which is not true. He shows no respect for me whatsoever. It took a long time to break away from all the negativity I unconsciously picked up from him, and he’ll never drag me back down to his level.
I’m not going to listen to him, but it will 100% cause massive drama when he finds out about me moving and starting the business. It just adds a level of stress that I did not need. I wish I had two supportive parents instead of one supportive one, and one massively negative one. He’s treating me the way he did when I first crashed with PFS, near-death with panic attacks, and was living at home after losing my job. I really want nothing to do with him anymore. I don’t want to see him for my birthday, just my mom, or maybe my brother and his wife.
My job has become horrible, so I need to ramp up my preparations for my business and get my exit strategy rolling. I might also make a separate side business where I’ll refer personal injury cases to other lawyers. I’m good with digital ads, so maybe that could work out as a side thing.
1.) Ignore your father - people like that have no place in your life in general, let alone in your current situation. You can love and support your father without letting him hold a spot in your life that’s influential. I do it all the time with family members. It’s a cold hard reality as you said, but certain family influence is toxic. Doesn’t mean we don’t love and support them, but we don’t let them bring us down. Fight the good fight my friend.
2.) I wouldn’t recommend doing “something” everyday regarding training other than walking. If you’re not doing sprints or weightlifting, try an hour of normal pace walking. You’ll be amazed as to how you feel after without taxing the system. I walk about three miles at a normal pace daily whether I go to a CrossFit class, do sprints, or not. I rarely do sprints these days due to the injury risk - as I get plenty of HIIT in a WOD. Anyways, recovery is super important here - if you workout too much you’ll keep your body from having any reserves to “beat the PFS”.
1) Thanks for your kind words and encouragement. I agree that my father shouldn’t have an influential role in my life or decisions (anymore.)
What he was telling me was not really cold hard reality as he described it - it was pessimistic worst case thinking, combined with him not understanding my field at all.
I’ve struggled a lot and didn’t live up to my career expectations, and I also picked a field that is much more competitive and difficult than I’d expected. I had seen a therapist who taught me about REBT (Rational Emotional Behavioral Therapy) and it’s been helpful to me - I don’t tend to go deep down into negative thought spirals like I used to. “If only I did XYZ! Now it’s too late, therefore I’m doomed.” Or “I have XYZ attribute that can’t be changed. Therefore, I cannot do ABC which is absolutely required for me to be happy.” That type of thinking is my dad’s bread and butter and it’s what I’ve moved away from.
I’m just trying to chart a course to where I can support myself when I move to NYC, which I want to happen soon. I missed so many years of work for various reasons, including PFS - and my father piling on verbal abuse. I was an empty shell. I took whatever job I could, and hoped that my current job would allow me to transfer to NYC, but it doesn’t look like that will ever happen, so I have to find another way. That’s honestly almost a bigger concern for me than overcoming PFS right now, as ridiculous as that sounds. I could support myself for a year with my savings so I shouldn’t be so afraid, but I am.
2) This also makes sense.
Until pretty recently, I basically stopped working out altogether, when the gym shut down. That was over 3 months of not working out. (Somehow my arms only shrank from 14.15 to 14 inches. I was shocked I lost such little muscle mass.) For a good 2 months or so, I still had my normal ups and downs, and then the ups stopped - it felt as if the hormonal benefits of working out kept going for 2 months and then wore off. So I came up with some home workouts, but they’re generally not as good as what I did at the gym, where I have things like a bench press, incline press, and lots of machines. Right now I’m easing back into daily workouts and am doing 5 sets (with supersets) most days. It should really be 15 sets of 3 different exercises, and have a rest day every week.
The protocol calls for, I think, 4 lifting days and 2 (to 3) sprinting days, so that would be 6 to 7 days, if you count the sprinting as workouts. I think incorporating a rest day is a good idea, for my body, and also to give myself a break. Maybe I can work out 2 body groups per day or something so I can hit 15 sets - my goal is hormonal benefits and healing from PFS more so than putting on size, although it is nice to put on size.
Thanks for your helpful input, you always have good info.
Quick update: my morning wood has been back for the last few days. It seems like it doesn’t take that many days of exercise to boost my testosterone up to where I get my MW. On the other hand, it’s not at maximum strength when I wake up. Maybe 75%.
Based on that, it looks like my home workouts are showing signs of effectiveness.
Some days when I wake up, I have what I call “ghost wood.” It’s morning wood, but I don’t “feel” like I have an erection and wouldn’t notice it unless I checked with my hand. When I have downswings, I don’t have morning wood at all, unfortunately.
But when I’m having an upswing, I have 100% hardness that lasts for many minutes after I wake up. I can’t wait until it’s like that every day, and all my symptoms other symptoms are gone. Especially the lack of pleasure and libido.
I get that ghost wood stuff you're on about, I feel like as long as it's working and getting blood flow its not too much to be worried about.
You seem to be making good progress bro, you should be fine in no time.
I’ve been having consistent morning wood lately, and it’s a lot stronger than a week or two ago. It’s been fading somewhat quickly once I wake up, but I’ll take that over ghost wood any day.
My shoulders are looking a bit wider - I still can’t believe I kept almost all of my muscle after I stopped working out for so long.
My libido has been up significantly, but it’s not 100%. When it’s 100%, it’s distractingly strong. I’d say it’s maybe 35% or so. Sensation is improving, but it’s far from 100%.
I have UltraHard now, and maybe next week I’ll give it a go. I feel like next week I should be ready for it, and hopefully I’ll make some nice progress towards post-PFS status.
I think the quinoa that I have - despite being labeled as gluten free - actually does have gluten contamination. There’ve been a few times when I had it, including yesterday, and it seemed to derail me from an upswing. This morning I didn’t have any wood, so I think I’m going to throw out the rest of the quinoa. I also cleaned my rice cooker thoroughly before I used it to make some rice today.
I’ve been very lethargic lately, I just don’t have much energy. I’m not sure if this is related to PFS or not, but I have been feeling zombie-ish lately, and hazy. Not just today, but for weeks. It’s hard to make myself exercise, and I skipped that over the weekend. I don’t like feeling so lethargic and not getting much done - it’s really holding me back from achieving my goals.
Man, I feel ya. I feel like there are varying degrees of downswings. Some are mild, some are pretty sucky, and then some are really sucky. I just always keep in mind that things are consistently improving. Even though I'm not yet 100, I am FAR better than when I started the protocol, and I know I will get there. It's easy to question everything when not feeling great. We just gotta stay positive, and keep our eyes on the prize. I was in a terrible downswing a couple weeks ago, and I'm already feeling better. The downswings get shorter, and shorter, and the upswings keep getting longer until our bodies reach equilibrium and remain in a constant state normalcy. Just keep pluggin' away.
Update time. I had about 4 consecutive okayish days last week, followed by some bad days. Currently I’m feeling pretty bad, and it’s been quite awhile since I had real libido.
I seem to have almost permanent thirstiness, and I’m not sure what’s up with that. I doubt it’s diabetes because my diet is pretty good and I’m not fat at all. Might go and see the doctor about it, especially since it’ll get me out of work for a few hours.
Overall, I just feel pretty bad most days these last couple of weeks. Other days I feel better than I probably should, with lots of hope and optimism about my business plan.
Sometimes I feel like I’m cursed, and I wonder if things will be okay for me. If I wind up having a pretty unhappy life alone, I could deal with it as long as I don’t focus on the past or future, or what-if-I-hads. I like to imagine there are alternate universes and that there are other me-s out there living great lives. Or that maybe we get a do-over when we die, and you do a little better each time - although that’s totally irrational, and doesn’t make any sense.
I’m working out 7 days per week (if you count the sprinting as workouts) and it’s not overkill for me. And I’m taking my herbs as well, and my diet is gluten free, but occassionally I find things that are labeled as gluten free that apparently aren’t - or I’ll eat something from a restaurant that apparently was cross-contaminated. I’m starting to use the Joovv yet again, but I think the reason it didn’t help me that much before was that I was sticking to 5 minutes per day, and I wasn’t that consistent. I’m going to work up to 10 minutes and possibly eventually 15 minutes.
I’m just dragging myself through each day - I haven’t made enough progress on finishing my website to launch my law firm and I feel so old. I’ll be 37 soon and I know that that’s not that old, but I feel old. I should’ve gone to some sort of asexual meetups so that at least I would’ve had some companionship these last years. I’m not sure whether I’ll really turn the corner on this PFS thing before I’m 40, but we’ll see. I am the type of person who’d keep pulling the parachute cord when I’m fifteen feet from splatting, hoping it will somehow work, becuase you have to do something.
Last year, and I think maybe earlier this year, were periods of a week or more where I felt almost normal again, using the protocol, so I do know that it’s doing something. I’m just ready to get on to the next stage of my life where I’m back in NYC, have a decent website and ads that enable me to profitably get a stream of clients in my area. Workouts and red light every day, helping clients, all that. I may also see a teletherapist, although no therapist has ever believed me about PFS.
It sounds like you might have electrolyte issues. Potassium and/or sodium may be low. A hair analysis will tell you that. Could be due to low aldosterone which is common with PFS.
Have you started AndroHard or UltraHard or anything like it? Might want to back off exercising so much as well. Over training (you are compromised) will cause low aldosterone --> messed up electrolytes and low cortisol.
Do a 24 hour urinary cortisol test.
I could possibly be low on potassium, although I do get a decent amount from my diet, including lots of spinach. But the body needs a lot of potassium.
My doctor is very young, a year or two out of med school, and he always says no to whatever test I want to do.
A few months ago I used androhard for 3 or 4 days and felt nothing. So I haven’t been on that for quite awhile and I don’t think it’s causing any effects now. My workouts aren’t that crazy - only 15 sets across 3 different lifts for the same muscle group. 8 to 10 rep maxes. I’ve had the “always thirsty” phenomenon for a long time, even when I wasn’t working out at all during most of the pandemic.
Hopefully a doctor will let me do the urinary cortisol test, but I know he’s going to think I’m crazy. He’s very by the book, and I’m not sure where to get these tests. But I do think something’s possibly going on.
Get a new doctor. Mine lets me test whatever I want.
No you don’t. In my experience, nobody is going to believe it, I gave up on going to the doctor ages ago. You really just gotta stick to what is laid out and things will improve my man.
If you really insist on getting tests, you can get whatever test you want without a doctor, where I live at least. Not sure where you live. But I got some hormones and vitamin levels tested by myself through independent places, it cost me a couple hundred bucks.
I think you just need to try another doctor. Getting blood tests with a hormone panel, nutrient panel, PSA and other relevant tests is not controversial. In fact it is recommended for any man over 30 every couple of years. Depending on where you live, there may be a cost to you. But otherwise, these are pretty standard tests.
I have had them taken a number of times and have never told any doctor about PFS - except for one urologist who laughed me out of his office. I am not an anti-vaxxer or agains mainstream medicine at all, but there is no point trying to deal with this with through doctors until if / when it becomes a widely accepted condition. The good news is, it is not permanent, and there is a way through that you can keep following right here...
Chin up, bro.
Def
I feel like I’m improving again. I’ve been using my Joovv literally every day for a little over a week, and although I don’t have super consistent morning wood now, there’s pretty regular night wood when I wake up, and I’m feeling more libido. Sensation is still low, though. (But it’s increased slightly.) This is a long way from normal, but I love feeling better.
When I use the Joovv now, I’m doing it for 10 minutes instead of 5 minutes, and I think that makes a significant difference. I force myself to get out of bed and stand in front of it for the 10 minutes, looking at my phone, instead of laying in my bed looking at my phone. I used to be worried that it was giving me insomnia, but it isn’t. I lowered it below my chin level, so the panel covers everything from my neck to about my knees or so. The studies on red light and testosterone seemed to involve more than 10 minutes per day, so I’m not sure if I will maybe up it to 15 minutes at some point.
Obviously I’m also going to the gym, avoiding gluten, and I’m doing the herb rotation every day as well. It’s hard to say, but I do think the Joovv is helping significantly. It may take a few more weeks to really see the results, and then I should also be ready to use the UltraHard for a cycle.
I’m also getting in touch with a therapist, and I’m taking off next week from work. I will have 32 vacation days left after that, and I can get paid for 30 of them when I leave the job, so I want to make sure I don’t let it dip below 30. It’ll be a significant chunk of change. During the 9 days I’ll have off, I’m going to work on my business stuff, work out, and also take some time to visit places near my area that are open.
There’s also a woman who lives down the street from me who I’ve been texting and we’re supposedly going to go out when she’s back from visiting her folks.
I hit a downswing after eating at the Mexican restaurant near my apartment (I think there was gluten cross-contamination), but then over the last couple of days, I’ve been having a strong upswing. My libido suddenly got a lot higher, probably a solid 70% of pre-fin! For the first time in many years I’m actually getting blueballs. Morning wood is still inconsistent, although I’ve been getting terrible sleep lately. Sensitivity is still lousy.
I’ve upped the Joovv to 15 minutes these last few days, and I have to wonder whether that’s a major cause of my upswing, along with my workouts and everything else. I have to make sure to religiously avoid most restaurants - there have been many times where I ordered something that shouldn’t have gluten in it, but it apparently does. As much as it sucks, I think it makes sense to find a roster of foods that you know you can safely eat, and then stick to that. Because one gluten-containing meal can set me back for 4 or 5 days and completely derail an upswing.
I’m also going to buy some ginger tea, since there are some studies showing it may raise testosterone naturally. And whether it does or not, it has antioxidants that I think can only help me.
One other change that I made was switching from boxer-briefs to boxers. I’ve read studies on Pubmed showing that briefs don’t really lower your testosterone, but they do require your body to make more LH to achieve about the same level of testosterone. So to me, that means your body has to work harder for the same result. But I think that for PFS guys, you need every edge you can get, so I’m getting more boxers. I doubt this is a huge game-changing thing, but I also think that doing a whole bunch of smaller things can add up to a bigger result.
Within about two weeks I should be ready to try the UltraHard, so that’ll be exciting.
I just read your whole thread. It may be more apparent to me because I read it in one sitting, straight through, but if you go back and read, there is a consistent theme in your post. Upswings and downswings. Just the way it always plays itself out. I understand that it's easy to get frustrated once so much time has passed. Especially when you're starting to feel good and you get a taste of what that's like. But you don't need a new doctor...you don't need any doctor, IMO. You just need to constantly make sure you're doing what you're supposed to be doing and that you're not veering off course. If you are, fix it. As long as you're doing what is laid out for you, you'll get there....you will.
If you really have a hard on for bloods, then find a doc that will get them for you, but don't let them suck you into the medical model of treatment. That'll just add years to your sentence. Believe me.
I've seen this countless times. Guys get half way, or most times MORE then half way through, and they start to waiver. Become indecisive, start questioning whether or not they should switch it up. Thinking they should be farther along then they are, etc, etc. DON'T GIVE IN.
Trust me. Make sure your regimen is locked and loaded and you're squared up 100%. This is when you need to buckle up and get shit done.
KEEP GOING.
Thanks!
I have had lots of upswings and downswings, but I feel like I'm bouncing back from the downswings faster than I used to. And the upswings seem to be better than they used to be. I’m feeling stronger in the gym, and I’m going to start an UltraHard cycle, probably on Monday.
In the last few days I started to feel my general motivation coming back, which is very important.
The big areas where I need to improve are: sleeping more, and not fapping. It’s really weird having an improving libido, but not improving sensitivity. I’m sure it’ll get better, but it’s just weird how different symptoms improve at different rates.
I definitely won’t hop on the medical solutions bandwagon; I’m not really aware of anyone who was cured through that route. And I don’t want to go on TRT or any of those other things.
Thanks again for the motivation, and thank you for taking the time to read through all my posts!
That's because nobody has. It's just not something that can be cured using the "medical model" of treatment. This issue is too multifaceted to be cured with a bunch of meds
For the guys that put in 100%, you can be sure you'll get the same back from me. You're doing a great job. Great log. Certainly a good addition to the forum archives. You're helping alot of other guys by simply sharing.
Cooper mate youre starting to piss me off now so I'm gonna try help.
look at this website Total Male Optimization
Then sort the forum by replies and read all the top posts until you feel like you fully get what you're doing. Especially everything by a few users mainly IMO CD Jacknap maxout ricktheruler and damn these are the main ones that helped me at the start. Take notes and you should know what you're doing there's even a quick start guide on tmo.
The process is an outline but you pick the herbs you choose how long you fast etc... everyone's case is different and people here are happy to help but you need to make some decisions for yourself, for example you don't have to take every supplement but you need at least a 7 herb rotation with pine pollen, vitamin D and magnesium supplements to start IMO (I have more than this now but thats what I chose at the start all mine are listed on tmo) but I'm sure there are people who'd disagree with me. Have faith in the process, don't expect to just get it completely handed to you.
Also footnote you cant get R-andro anymore (except for out of date shite) that's why there's ultrahard at the top its a topical skin gel with the same active ingredients androsterone and epiandrosterone which are components of recovery. To cycle herbs you take 1 herb each day in your cycle so day one I take maca then I take tribulus etc... until getting back to the start of my cycle. This helps prevent tolerance.
Thanks. As The Whit Dragon said, you just pick herbs that are listed in Total Male Optimization, which is CD’s website. I picked most of them that were on the list, although I phased out eluthero because it gave me horrible insomnia every time I ever took it. If I took it at 8 AM before work, I would lay awake until 4 AM that night. You cycle them by making a list of the herbs and taking 1 per day, then you move it to the back of the pile.
I did a juice feast before the herbs and everything.
I won’t use R-andro because it’s not really available anymore; the company that made it stopped making it. There’s a new version, which isn’t very good. Guys are using a product called UltraHard now and that’s what I started using today.
I would just carefully look over what’s on CD’s website and follow that, and you should be good.
So, I’ve been using UltraHard since Monday, and so far I haven’t noticed any ultra-strong results, but I do feel at least some results. The first few days I did have a bit of an upswing, which then faded the day after I had a green smoothie and almost fell asleep. Maybe there was traces of gluten in my blender or something. I also felt incredibly sleepy after eating Mexican food from this place down the street, and it happened on two occassions that also derailed upswings, so I think that that might happen whenever I have gluten.
It seems like the upswings and downswings are getting shorter, with less “recovery time” in between upswings. But even during the upswings, I don’t feel 100% pre-fin or super close to it - the sensitivity quality still isn’t there. But I feel like these are still positives.
When I used the UltraHard the first day, and also today, I noticed that my balls had this odd “cool" sensation in them an hour or two after applying the UltraHard. I’d like to imagine that it’s something positive.
I was hoping that I’d start feeling a massive difference within a day or two of starting UltraHard; oily skin, raging libido, et cetera, but it hasn’t happened so far. It’s only been a few days, so maybe it’ll take longer to start feeling more results from it. Others have been describing much stronger results than what I’ve felt, but I guess everyone recovers at their own pace. I don’t think this 5-week cycle will cure everything, but hopefully I’ll make significant progress. Then it’ll be back to the herbal rotation, then probably another cycle of the prohormone.
The Ultrahard insomnia is not fun, but I’m getting through it. I’m having more down days than up days lately, and I think some of that has to do with my sleep. I’ve been averaging around 5 to 5.5 hours per night, and I tend to feel awful whenever I get less than 7 hours per night on a consistent basis. I feel horrible even though I got almost 8 hours last night.
I’m also not sure if I’m screwing up my diet. I have a lot of red lentil pasta and marinara sauce, and I’m not 100% sure if that’s okay to have. I also eat peanut butter (plain) for breakfast on most work days, because I wake up right before work and don’t have time to make anything. I’m not sure if the lentils and peanuts (which are legumes) are bad.
I’m ususally working out 4 days per week (5 is the goal, and it’s never less than 3 days), but I haven’t been loyal with the sprints. I guess even if I make myself do 4 sets of sprints instead of 6, that will be better than nothing. I read a study where something like this did boost the T of elderly men (1 session per 5 days) so this is definitely something that will help me.
Also read about how dehydration can raise cortisol, and that that ultimately leads to lower DHT. Need to drink more water; getting a nice glass pitcher filter thing soon. Normally I’m drinking seltzer waters throughout the day.
Also slowly easing into the cold showers. I think the hot water from normal showers can be mildly bad for the balls; I’m not sure if cold showers are truly better than “body temperature” showers but we’ll see. I just hate shivering and feeling cold, gasping for breath, instead of having a nice, hot relaxing shower, which is usually the nicest part of my day. So replacing that with something painful will be a chore, but I can do it.
I seem to have a lot of trouble with the whole nofap thing; I’m not sure how I’ll be able to get that fully under control and go for a month or two at a time. Earlier in this whole process it was super easy to go 10 days at a time because my libido was truly that low, so I guess it’s good that it’s at least higher than that, but still.
Also going to re-download the Headspace meditation app, even though it’s pretty pricey. I was reading some studies that show that meditating regularly lowers your cortisol and actually does boost testosterone a bit. So these are all things I need to do.
I just want to be recovered from all of this garbage already. Sucks when you have more downswings than upswings, and even during the upswings I usually don’t have sensitivity. But hopefully I can get everything fully on track.
Cold showers are a craft of their own. They're NO DOUBT better then room temperature water for all of the reasons listed on TMO, but do some of your own research to cement this into your mind. Yes, they suck at first, but once you start getting used to it, the invigoration and endorphins released by learning how to properly take a cold shower can't be matched any other way. A nice trick here is to do your breathing exercises right before going into the cold shower. Your body and mind will take to it much quicker this way and you won't be gasping and freaking out so much. One of the main points of the breathing exercises coupled with cold showers are to learn to control the adrenaline rush so that you get the benefits of it without suffering the downsides. This technique when learned and applied properly are truly life changing in their own right.
Concerning the insomnia from UH....you can either try backing down on the dose, or make sure you fully exhaust yourself during your workouts. This will eventual fade away and shouldn't be a problem once your system adjusts.
Some sprints are better then no sprints, keep that in mind. You don't even have to sprint to get in your HIIT portion of the weekly work out. Just go online and check out some of your other options concerning this aspect of working out. (High Intensity Interval Training)
For your water, your best option is to get one of these Definitely make sure you're staying hydrated.
For no fap, you need to learn and research "sexual transmutation" Use that energy for other aspects of your life. When you feel like spanking it, drop and do some push ups, or pull ups, or sprint. Use the energy for something that will benefit your life and propel you forward in your journey.
And to clarify, you're not going to feel 100% simply because your cycling. Not even close. it's just another tool in the box to get you to where you want to be. Don't get discouraged. Remember, it's a marathon, not a sprint.
Lastly, I'm not familiar with Headspace, rather I used Holosync. Before learning of Wim's method, I meditated with this program with great success.
You can get everything on track. Not hopefully....you WILL do it. Hopefully suggests that there are things out of your control that would have to get left to chance or luck to be completed. YOU are the only one stopping yourself.
I’m starting to think that the UltraHard might be suppressing me a bit. It’s been almost 4 weeks now, and over the last… week and change, I guess, I’ve had a downswing. (Weirdly, I had sexual dreams but no morning wood.) I’m thinking that once I hit the 4 week mark on Sunday, that that will be enough for this cycle. I’d switched to 4 pumps but maybe that was too much for me. Maybe next time I’ll only do 3 pumps per day.
It also seems like I tend to have downswings when I’m eating less calories.
Before I started finasteride in 2009, I was on sertraline (Zoloft) from 2001 - 2009, and that gave me some sexual sides, but nowhere near what finasteride did. Sometimes I wonder if I have post-SSRI syndrom as well, and if that means it would take longer to recover. Part of my problem with all of this is that doctors put me on these awful drugs so young that I didn’t have a true frame of reference for what “normal” was. I could have full orgasms on Zoloft; the only sexual side was that it took longer to come. But anyway, I’m never touching that type of stuff again. I’ve had to dump therapists who wanted to argue about me going back on SSRIs etc - I lose all trust for any therapist who tries to push those pills on me, especially after all I’ve been through with PFS.
I’ve been meditating, and I think that that’s been a positive for me. And doing cold showers, following the protocol’s guidelines for easing yourself into it over time with short periods at first. NoFap continues to be a struggle on days when I do have some libido. It always just seems to escalate from dating apps, even though the dating pool is so small up here and I need to put that energy into my new business so I can leave this lame city.
* One thing that bothers me is that the hair on the small of my back is still barely there - maybe 75% less hair than I used to have. Pre-fin, it was dense. I’d also estimate that my pubes are probably 33 to 50% less dense than pre-fin - still. I wish it would start to fill in again.
I’m not sure whether (gluten free) red lentil pasta is okay to eat, and I’m also not sure about rice. On the TMO website, it says to avoid grains, but under the carb backloading, it references eating gluten free pasta and rice for backloading, so I’m not sure about it. If I’m still messing up the diet then I need to fix that.
It’s been about another week. There are days when I have medium morning wood, and days when I don’t have it - today I didn’t have it.
There are also days where I have some libido and others when I don’t have any, but it was always like that during PFS. Although the no-libido periods were generally longer in the past.
It’s hard not to feel bad about the 12 or so wasted years and all the potential relationships that didn’t work out because of this. And my dad telling me I’m old now, washed up and all that.
I have been meditating every day which I think is positive. I don’t know that it will help in the PFS department, but I do feel calm. I will do the program but I don’t really feel that attached to the outcome today. It’s just part of my routine, although I’m not sure if I’m truly doing it right.
It sucks, but I missed out on the “good part” of life and will at best have to settle for what I can get, and just make peace with it. Lower my expectations and just try to do a better job with what I have. And minimize any interactions with my father - even the couple of minor ones each year make me unhappy.
I have been doing the HIIT on the 3 days per week where I don’t lift weights. Aka what I was supposed to have been doing. I don’t notice any real difference, though.
Also still not sure whether it is absolutely essential to do strict NoFap or not.
And I still have no idea if the gluten free red lentil pasta, brown rice, and legumes are okay to eat.
Didn't you make noticable improvements since following the TMO protocol? For how long have you been doing it? I didn't feel much improvement after the juice feast, thus I started a water fast right now.
I think it depends on how your digestion is at the moment and how you/your body responds after eating these foods. I recommend being very strict with your diet (no carb backloading) until your digestion is somewhat normal again and you can tolerate these foods. Personally, I would avoid all these artificial products like glutenfree pasta. Rice should be ok, aswell as potatoes.
But I am definitely not an expert, CD or other more experienced guys know more about this.
I have made noticeable improvements, although sometimes I forget about them, which is part of why I’m keeping this log. But overall I feel disappointed with my progress.
I started parts of the program in March 2019, just doing a 1 week juice feast, then the herbs, and weightlifting. I felt like I was making progress and even avoided the problem of never being able to ejaculate from sex, although I still didn’t have an orgasm.
Around October 2019 or so I got mono for a month and had to stop working out, and I also stopped the herbs for like 1 month.
I restarted the herbs and then I also cut gluten, and about 2 weeks later started getting morning wood every day and started getting more upswings. I think I was on a good path until March 2020 when my gym closed due to Covid and I didn’t have an effective home workout plan for 6 months. I still got morning wood every day for 3 or 4 months, but then the benefits of my lifting subsided after so many weeks without lifting at all.
I restarted the workouts in September. And then just recently I have been meditating every day, and also doing HIIT in my non-lifting days at the gym.
I have been eating a lot of red lentil pasta with marinara for dinners, and peanut butter regularly (not in the same meal, obviously,) as well as rice and beans or chickpeas. I know that beans and chickpeas aren’t considered paleo but I’m not sure if they would prolong PFS. I’m struggling to really understand the diet-related rules.
I could be willing to eat egg whites if I really needed to do that for protein and had to cut out my major sources of protein if CD says I need to.
I feel like I have excellent digestion, and I make 2 - 3 bowel movements per day with no stomach pains, indigestion, heartburn, or constipation, ever. But I am not sure if my diet is really okay.
What do you estimate how much progress did you make since starting the protocol? Why are you disappointed?
Your story is full of ups and downs in your symptoms. Maybe the mono and the pandemic have hindered your healing process because your main downswings seemed to happen after stopping working out, right? Who knows how you felt if covid didn't happen and you could have kept going.
How is your morning wood now after working out for 2 months? Is it back?
Thanks for your reply. For me, I think the best way to describe it is symptom-by-symptom rather than an overall percentage. When I feel like I’m close to recovered, at that point I’ll have a better sense of what percentage I am, but I have no idea if it’s 25%, 50%, 60%… I just don’t know. It’s definitely not 75% because I don’t feel like I’m that close to recovered.
I feel like I still have some mental sides; fogginess sometimes, but I’m not sure if that’s from PFS or my general poor sleep habits.
I’ve been getting some morning wood recently, but it’s never rock-hard. And then there are also days when I don’t get morning wood at all, like when I woke up today. However, yesterday I screwed up and ate some gluten-free sugary cereal that I’d forgotten to throw out, and I think that’s what did it. I’m getting rid of the other box and I’m not buying any more. When I’m fully recovered in this area, I’ll have rock-hard morning wood 95-99% of mornings.
Libido-wise, things are definitely better than they had been, but I have only had a few brief periods of maybe up to a week where I had pre-fin levels of libido. The last time that happened was early during Covid, even though I’d stopped working out. Having more consistent libido is something that I really miss, and I feel like it would give me so much more drive in life. Hugely important.
And then the biggest problem for me is having non-orgasmic ejaculations - that’s been the area where I really haven’t seen consistent progress. Although, a few days ago I did actually feel some pleasure. Just enough to remind me of what it’s supposed to feel like. I’m taking it as a good sign but I want it to become consistent. My progress in this area seems to hover around 0% to 25%, usually 0%.
I’d say I’m disappointed because I still don’t 100% know if I’m doing everything right; if there are some foods I’m eating that I should not be eating that are holding me back. The Joovv red light helps but it’s not the epic game-changer I’d hoped it would be. And I haven’t felt long stretches of consistent upswings in awhile. I feel like there must be some mistake I’ve been making that’s holding me back; I’m not sure if it’s legumes and gluten free red lentil pasta.
Okay, so I think the red lentil pasta has been messing me up badly. It’s from Barilla, and they make it on a dedicated gluten free line, so I trusted it.
But gluten free line means it’s not a gluten free facility, which means there are wheat pasta machines in the same big room, and as millions of noodles land, glutenous dust fills the air and some gets on the red lentil noodles. It’s small enough that it still counts as gluten free, legally, but I know from experience that I am more sensitive to gluten than that. It can be up to 20 parts per million gluten and still use the gluten free label, but unfortunately that’s not good enough for my system.
Plenty of “gluten free” things destroy my libido and morning wood for several days. One example is that “gluten free” chex cereal from a week or two ago.
I have been buying my groceries mostly at Walmart through their app for over a year, and I scrolled through my purchase history. Right around when I started eating the red lentil pasta 5 - 6 days per week was when I had a major decline during lockdown, the one that partially reversed itself when I resumed working out.
Previously I would eat it once or twice per week, but if it causes problems then I want to eliminate it from my diet altogether, not just restrict it to one or two days per week.
So let’s see if, in a week or two, I start getting better morning wood and a nice upswing after removing this from my diet. I have a feeling that this could be a turning point for me where I can accelerate my healing progress.
I started getting better morning wood the last couple of days, where I know that I have morning wood without having to physically check. But it goes soft very quickly after I wake up. So I think cutting the “gluten free” pasta out of my diet has been a good thing.
Libido is zero, ejaculatory anhedonia is at its maximum, and I don’t feel very energetic. Probably feel a bit foggy as well. My upswings tend to happen somewhat rarely, unfortunately, and I don’t feel like I have tons of forward momentum.
Last night, I had a bizarre dream where CD was there giving me advice outside of my parents house for some reason, and then he drove away. So I’m probably thinking about all this stuff too much, if it’s showing up in my dreams. But I don’t want to “set it and forget it” if there are elements of my game that aren’t up to par.
I probably need to overhaul my diet in a major way. It’s frustrating because I’d like to be able to have a life in the tail end of my youth and I just want to get past all of this stuff.