Originally Posted by
Marquis
I've only started the protocol recently, so I can't speak from experience of the protocol per se, but for years before I was in the same boat, worrying that some permanent structural damage had been done - spider veins, fibrous texture, erections never totally solid and the glans never inflated, even when I'd dosed myself to the gills on PDE5 inhibitors, which I was becoming less and less responsive to. I thought that the years I'd gone without nocturnal erections must've caused some sort of permanent tissue damage or a venous leak (a term I've seen bandied around a lot, but never actually explained or demonstrated, and which seems to a theoretical vaguery). I didn't see how, even if I could fix my hormonal profile, my unit would ever return to normal.
Then, last summer, I had a spontaneous partial remission that lasted for around a week (probably the result of a lot more sun exposure and exercise than usual, coupled with a nearly-perfect diet). My erections were harder than I could ever remember them having been, with the glans fully inflated, which hadn't happened in years. Too bad I crashed myself a week later through an absolutely brutal weekend of binge-drinking. I haven't had any upswings to the same extent since, but all the same, it proved to me that the tissue wasn't irreparably damaged. Furthermore, a little reading around (not that I recommend it, as reading too many studies tends to get me thinking in the wrong patterns, and back to the toxic mentality of PH) reveals cases (non PFS-related) where erectile dysfunction caused by so-called "venous leakage" was resolved with androgen treatment or the correct dopaminergic stimulation. So I'd say unless you've actually suffered any extreme physical trauma to your member, it's unlikely that any irreparable damage has been done. Hang in there, man.