Men's Health

Everyone wants to remain vigorous, strong, and healthy. To stay that way requires dedication and hard work, which you are perfectly willing to do. So, you work out 4 times a week. You take nutritional supplements regularly. You are careful about your diet, and try to get enough sleep. And yet, you notice that you just don't feel the same way you used to. Something is different. It takes you longer to recuperate from those hard workouts than it used to. Some days you can't even do the same number of repetitions or sets that you did the week before. Some days you could swear that your muscles are actually shrinking. You try several different supplements and switch up your exercise routine, but nothing seems to help. In addition, other problems begin cropping up. Stubborn fat bulges around your love handles, hips and belly appear that won't go away even with diet changes and targeted exercise. You are more tired than normal. Your flexibility decreases. Your sleep patterns become disrupted. You begin to feel depressed. Your doctor tells you that your cholesterol is high, and that your blood sugar is approaching diabetic levels. Everything begins to hurt more, especially your joints and muscles. So what is going on? Did you do something wrong, or is this just a part of getting older that you have to accept?

Testosterone is considered an "anabolic" or "growing" hormone. That means that it helps support your body's ability to repair itself and stay healthy and active. This property is well known, and is the reason why some athletes use testosterone injections to boost their body's levels far above normal to achieve better than expected muscle growth in response to exercise. While we have all heard of the dangers of using "steroids" in this fashion to push our bodies beyond what they were designed to do, there are also dangers if our testosterone levels are below the normal, healthy range. Low testosterone levels have a bad impact on health. One recent study showed that men with low testosterone levels had higher levels of abdominal fat, overall body fat, and insulin in their bloodstream. Unfortunately, most men will develop testosterone deficiencies as they get older. Simply getting a blood test may not be the answer. Unless they get the correct testosterone blood test their low testosterone levels may not be discovered as not all blood tests are adequate. As testosterone levels decrease with aging, specific symptoms and changes in body systems occur. These include:

• Decreased energy
• Loss of muscle mass
• Decreased libido or interest in sex
• Erectile dysfunction with loss of erections
• Muscle weakness and aches
• Inability to sleep
• Depression
• Infertility
• Thinning of bones or bone loss
• High cholesterol and triglycerides
• Decreased flexibility
• Higher blood sugars

Supplementing low testosterone levels has a very beneficial effect on our bodies. For example, a recent 3 year long study showed that testosterone replacement led to a significant loss of overall body fat and a significant gain in overall body lean mass when given to healthy men over age 65. Another recent study showed an average 15% increase in fat free mass, an 11% decrease in fat mass, a 20% increase in muscle mass, and a 56% increase in muscle protein synthesis when given to men with low testosterone levels. There are also other beneficial effects in addition to the muscle gain and fat loss that occur when low testosterone levels are brought back into the normal, healthy range. Cholesterol and triglyceride levels decrease, blood sugar levels decrease and are easier to control, and sex drives increase for both men and women. In some people, low testosterone levels are thought to contribute to "Metabolic Syndrome." This is a relatively new medical term that refers to the combination of high blood sugars, high cholesterol and triglycerides, and high levels of "inflammation" measured in the bloodstream. Metabolic Syndrome is known to increase the rates of heart disease. Bringing testosterone levels back up into the healthy range reduces Metabolic Syndrome, and therefore reduces the chance of heart disease. Maintaining a healthy level of testosterone in women also promotes weight loss, healthy bones and muscles, and maintains sex drives.

While maintaining enough testosterone is very important for men and women to stay healthy, men also need balanced levels of progesterone and estrogen as well. For a man, estrogen and progesterone are like salt and pepper for food. Small amounts of salt and pepper make food taste better, and small levels of estrogen and progesterone make a man's body function better. Normal male levels of estrogen and progesterone protect and may even improve brain function, protect the heart, strengthen bones, and maintain a healthy libido. However, too much estrogen or progesterone, just like too much salt or pepper, causes problems. Elevated levels of estrogen can cause loss of muscle tone, increased body fat, fatigue, and an enlarged prostate. Increased estrogen levels also cause testosterone levels to fall, resulting in a loss of libido and sexual function, as well as all of the other problems associated with low testosterone. Unfortunately, one of the major problems that men often experience as they age is too much estrogen!

It is common for men to experience enlargement or "hypertrophy" of their prostate as they get older. Known as Benign Prostatic Hypertrophy (BPH), it causes the prostate gland to increase in size, and therefore makes it difficult to urinate properly. Men who are experiencing BPH have difficulty starting and stopping urinating, and often have to get up several times a night to urinate. While it is often thought that prostate enlargement is just a natural part of a man getting old, it is actually due to a hormone imbalance.

As men age, several factors combine to significantly reduce their testosterone levels. The first factor is a normal, mild decrease in testosterone production with age. Along with this, his metabolism slows, and he begins to accumulate abdominal fat. Loss of muscle tone Increased body fat, stroke, enlarged prostate and eventual prostate cancer, decreased sex drive and sexual function, heart disease, male symptoms of estrogen/progesterone imbalance may follow.

Fat cells contain an enzyme called "promatase." This enzyme actually takes testosterone and converts it to estrogen. At the same time, the liver becomes less efficient at deactivating estrogen, so whatever estrogen is created hangs around longer. The increased levels of estrogen also cause his body to make more of a protein called Sex Hormone Binding Globulin. This protein grabs onto testosterone in the blood stream and deactivates it. The rising levels of estrogen also begin to interfere with the way that testosterone interacts with individual cells. Normally, small amounts of estrogen are designed to counteract the stimulating effects that testosterone has on sex cells. As the levels of estrogen rise, some of these cells get stuck in the "deactivated" position despite the presence of testosterone. This leads to loss of libido and sexual arousal. Higher than normal levels of estrogen also interfere with the brain centers that are supposed to regulate how much testosterone is produced, and accidentally tell them to reduce production. Thus, the typical pattern is that men produce more and more estrogen as they get older, and less and less testosterone. In fact, one study showed that estrogen levels are often higher in an average 54 year old man than in an average 59 year old woman!

Having too much estrogen is unhealthy for men, and is called "estrogen dominance." This term unfortunately causes a lot of confusion. It does not mean that there is more estrogen than testosterone. Just like salt and pepper in food, a man's body needs small amounts of estrogen and progesterone. Too much estrogen is like too much salt, it ruins things. Thus, estrogen dominance simply means that estrogen levels are too high and are not properly balanced by "anti-estrogen" hormones like progesterone. Common symptoms and risks of Estrogen Dominance in men include:

• Loss of erections
• Loss of sex drive
• Loss of muscle tone
• Increased body fat
• Fatigue
• Enlarged prostate (BPH)
• Diabetes
• Heart disease
• Stroke
• Cancer, especially prostate cancer

By bringing the hormone levels of testosterone, estrogen, and progesterone back into a normal, healthy range for males, the symptoms and health risks of unbalanced hormones can be alleviated

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