This can be the Battle of our lives: Fear not for we can conquer this.

[Holistic]

Greetings all, first of all I want to thank the effort put by CD and others in the community for this space, and please excuse me before hand for english is not my native language.

Thank you again for this space, for when I crashed in august of last year most of the feedback I got from other online forums was really, really negative. As for doctors,generally speaking they think it is mostly in ones head and just offer a pharmaceuticals "solutions". Hopefully more and more people will be directed here and avoid to fall into despair pits that are not even worth to mention.

Anyways, my story short. I am almost 28 yo and. around 2014 I wen't to the derm because of my thinning hair. He prescribed fin and told me it had 0 sides, however I did my research and decide I was not gonna risk it. Bought then other stuff in the prescription (shampoos, minox, tonics, etc) but not the fin and decide that I would reduce the DHT by other means ie: saw palmetto, green tea extract, pumpkin seed oil ( how fool I was)

So fast forward to 2016, besides some ocasional lethargy, brain fog and eye floaters I had no other symptoms that can recall, and was doing really good in the sexual department. That year a lot of good things happened; professionally and personally I was doing good and life eventually got so busy that I forgot to take all the hair related stuff for around 1 week and then it happened.

Friday 19 of august of 2016
The Crash:

That morning I was taking a shower and noticed all of the sudden there was no response down there not even by manual stimuli. That was the beginning of a lot of symptoms that I would not write here but mainly I was dealing with ED, Insomnia.

Remember I told you I bought from the derm the shampoos, etc?. well when I was tossing in the trash cursing all that stuff among with the supplements I made an awful discovery: reading the composition tab of the minoxidil bottle it displayed also "finasteride 0.025%" A chill went down my spine and the bullet I thought that I had dodged had got me and in reality I was exposed to it for at least 2 and a half years. Add to that those natural dht suppressors and a couple of isotretoinie cycles for acne that I took in my early 20's ( I came to discover that there are isotretoinin users that develop something similar to pfs, apparently it hurts your dht as well) anyway at that point I thought my life was over.

Time went by and the symptom that improved the most was insomnia, (it took about 4 months to stabilize and I was able to sleep 6 hours without aids which compared to the first months was huge progress).

Here I want to warn people not to throw away the progress they have achieved by doing silly things, in January I started to use (maybe it was more an abuse) cannabis. And while it helped a lot to temporary relieve some of the symptoms ( most of all mood), the insomnia kicked in hard again ( if I was under the influence I could sleep like a baby but if not then maybe 3 hours tops) the lesson is to cherish your progress and don't toss it away, for any miss step like alcohol, a weekend of bad diet or in this case abusing weed can lead to a huge leap backwards. ( from what I have researched cannabis depletes the magnesium in the brain)

Anyways as for today I have some few good days and some bad, in general I feel that have improved a bit but I am still far from a recovery. In two weeks from today I will start the cleanse and commit 110% on the protocol.

I can definitely tell you that whatever this is, is gut related. You see on my third month after the crash, one night I ate some oatmeal and cinnamon before bed. That night I woke up at 4 am with the worst stomach cramps, turns out the cinnamon was long expired. So, I made some tea and eventually could rest, the thing was that the next morning I woke up not only feeling relieved but with a iron wood, the kind of wood get so hard you actually feel a little pain, the kind of wood that was normal before all this.

Heading now to a full recovery, will keep you updated through the protocol.

Some final words: sometimes I think this condition is kind of a sentence, we are doing sentence and our offense was our vanity. But we can get out of this prison guys, it can be long term, short term but it ain't for life and in the most part is up to us. This experience is really hard but remember that diamonds are made from the hardest pressures on earth.

This experience will make you face with who you are, and can grow out of it to came out a better man, both body and mind. We came into this mess like a vain boys, but will come out like the men we are meant to be.
As Churchill once said: " if you are going through hell, keep walking"

Keep walking guys, we can conquer this.

[Master Mal]

Looks like you and I crashed at exactly the same time. Really sorry about what you're going through, buddy. But the good news is there are people here who have gone through the same thing and come out the other side. Just stick to the protocol.

By the way, stay away from the pot. I know people with PFS that have smoked it and crashed massively, losing a lot of recovery progress. Keep your system pure.

Happy healing. We're here for you.

[K8668B]

I love your point of view. This is the exact way i see it myself- "the battle for our lives", as you say. Welcome. I'm fairly new into the protocol myself. Still extremely early, but feeling a few % better already, and this is what I live for these days. Keep up the good attitude!

[Holistic]

Seems we did Master Mal, it sucks but hopefully we will come out of this together and grow. The pot was dumb indeed, though It made me cope a bit more with the situation,it trowed away months of recovery definitely not worth it... (I guess something similar can apply to antidepressants (pharma), as they are only a short term relievers that could break more havoc in our system). Keep the system pure indeed! Thank you K8, we need to display a lot resilience... I know it´s easier said than done, and I know this road won´t be short and by no means a cotton candy one, but to fight this with all our being is all we have left for, that and our mutual support to get through it. Thanks for the encourage guys. For this week though, is there any preparation or transition in diet suggested right before the juice feast?, I will start this coming Saturday and want to do it the right way.

[K8668B]

Seems we did Master Mal, it sucks but hopefully we will come out of this together and grow. The pot was dumb indeed, though It made me cope a bit more with the situation,it trowed away months of recovery definitely not worth it... (I guess something similar can apply to antidepressants (pharma), as they are only a short term relievers that could break more havoc in our system). Keep the system pure indeed! Thank you K8, we need to display a lot resilience... I know it´s easier said than done, and I know this road won´t be short and by no means a cotton candy one, but to fight this with all our being is all we have left for, that and our mutual support to get through it. Thanks for the encourage guys. For this week though, is there any preparation or transition in diet suggested right before the juice feast?, I will start this coming Saturday and want to do it the right way.

I may not be the right person to answer this, but the juice feast, or water feast is the precise starting point of the protocol. So i did nothing differently leading up to it. I picked a date when i was going to begin, and once i began, and finished, THEN i started all of the new things that im doing in my diet currently. thats personally what i did.

[Durantia37]

I'd go on the chi recovery diet or something for a week - something really strict like that, maybe going more vegetable intensive and less meat each day. That will pre-clean you a bit and develop some discipline. And I'd personally start the juice feast with a 24 hour water fast. This will mentally level you out a bit. Just my recommendation.

[Holistic]

Hi gentlemen, thanks you for the suggestions,

here is a small update:

Today is the day 1 of the feast and cleansing stage, originally it was scheduled to start yesterday but Friday afternoon I drank a bit of tequila with some friends, it was maybe 4 or 5 shots, and I did not get drunk, was more like a small celebration due to some life achievements, (I had not touched alcohol for months prior to Friday)anyway my sleep this week was ok I would say. The only supplement I am taking at this point is liquid magnesium and maybe that has helped, nonetheless, Friday night the sleep was really poor, most likely because of the alcohol. Anyway I decided not to start the cleanse yesterday but today, and yesterday was more to prepare for the cleanse, so thought the day I only had some chicken broth, and some gluten free pasta and chicken, last meal was around 9pm.


As for today I have been only juicing, ( maybe 1 and a half qt so far) and have to admit that I´m already craving for some solid food!. The good thing is that this coming week is known down here as "holy week", kind of like a spring break in the U.S, so no work, no school, etc. So, ideally this week would be just to focus on the fast and try to relax, however on april 17th I have to submit a relatively difficult academic paper for college (read some texts and then do an essay about em) so I only have this week to prepare that. I am thinking the next 3-4 days I will be just laying still and by no means would try to focus on it, but hopefully maybe from Thursday on I can start working on that. That being said, I want to ask those who have gone through the cleanse, how well could you focus your mind after a couple days? Physically I will rest for sure, but mentally...well I have to get that paper done.

Another question regarding the magnesium, should I stop the intake as for the cleanse? I know you are not supposed to get any herbs and most pills, but what do you guys think regarding the liquid magnesium? (I guess cold showers, sun and other stuff are ok, but, I think maybe will start cold showers after the cleanse, since I don´t see myself starving and also taking a freezing shower, lol... however if it has to be done, so be it.)

As for other news, this week I have found some isolated place on my campus perfect for sunning the boys, the sun really makes a big impact in the whole well being feeling! Also, the lost recovery due to cannabis seems to be slowly getting better. This week I have been getting some consistent morning wood, maybe 4-5 days a week. Nothing else thought the day though, but hey is something to start. Only major changes I have done so far are taking out the gluten, refraining from fap (10 days so far), sunning the boys and the magnesium.

Looking forward to jump fully into the protocol after this cleanse! most of my life I have been a skinny guy, ( 5`10¨between 140- 155lb) so probably after this cleanse I would be really thin, but planing to recover that in the gym and good diet.


Depending on how I feel will extend this cleanse to 14 days, being 7 - 10 the minimum.

Will keep you guys updated.

keep your spirit strong!

[Holistic]

Entering day 5 of the cleanse right now, today was not the best day. Had to go out to make some errands and got to drank 2.5 qts before running out of juice about 3 pm.

Finally got home about 9pm and was starving, so I made more juice but I mindlessly threw some random veggies and fruits in the blender bad idea! the result: A really grotesque dirt tasting juice. Managed to drink half a qt before almost throwing up. Threw the rest of it down the toilet and now feeling drowsy and with the chills.

Red cabbage, kale, kiwi cucumber and brocoli juice NEVER AGAIN!

[Holistic]

Hey everyone, time for a short update:
Now eight days into the cleanse, today was a good day but I had to spend most of the day working on a really difficult academic paper (believe me it was), because of it I did not have the time to make enough juice, maybe drank 2 Qts of juice and the rest was just water with some honey and a bit of ground nutmeg. Maybe thats why im feeling lightheaded right now. What I want to underline about today is that despite being 8 days without eating I somehow could focus really well on the subject ( I would say even better than the usual) and did the whole paper with moderately effort. On the downside I have diarrhea as for right now, ( maybe for the high fructose as I drank today most fruit than veggies) I hope that condition disappears tomorrow since at 10 am I have to expose todays work in front of the whole class for about 3 hours...lol!! Oh well, Wish me luck.

Will keep you updated.
Keep the spirit strong!

[Master Mal]

Stay strong, buddy.