am i just being paranoid.

[Bare graves]

long time no post. before i go on with my crappy thread i just want to thank this site and you guys. i would of never gone to judo or thai boxing and probs would still be doing crappy ninjtusu. thank ****. ive had a few fights and im loving it.

anyway im strarting to think i have a test problem. im 20 and have been on and off with the gym for about three years with tiny gains that could of been because i was vegan or many other things. even now with me eating 150 to 200g of good protien a day my recovery is destoryingly crap and my gains small.

but what makes me think its to do with testostorne is because i have no chest chair and only have to shave every 2 or 3 weeks. my pecs resemble boobs but im hoping that is to do with my mild
pectus excavatum.
my libido is not really great either.

i always try to work out my legs and eat dark greens and sat fats also i have played around with zma in the past for the deep sleep. but this has not really changed anything. Am i just being a paranoid tool or is this something i should look into? thanks

[doofaloofa]

Do you suffer from any other symptoms

High pitched voice, small adams apple, low levels of aggression, etc?

Its a personal question, but both your testicles have decended normally I am assuming

[philmgriffin]

seems like sensible advice here.

Natural testosterone boosters...

Get Rid of the Flopping Belly

Or you'll grow a pair of fetching breasts to complement it. Carrying excess body fat elevates your estrogen levels, and that may cause your testosterone levels to sink, says Joseph Zmuda, an epidemiologist at the University of Pittsburgh. Louie Anderson is proof enough of this. Two or three extra pounds won't cause this hormonal shift; it really occurs once you're 30 percent over your ideal body weight. "Unfortunately, that's pretty common now," says Dr. Dobs.

But Lose Only One Pound a Week

When you want to trim down quickly, you probably starve yourself while exercising like a madman. One of the many reasons this stops working in your 30s, when your natural testosterone levels start dropping, is pretty simple: Cutting your calorie intake by more than 15 percent makes your brain think you're starving, so it shuts down testosterone production to wait out the famine. "There's no need to reproduce if you're starving," explains Thomas Incledon of Human Performance Specialists in Plantation, Fla. Ironically, this dive in circulating testosterone stops you from burning body fat efficiently, so you're actually thwarting your hard efforts to melt that tire off your gut.

Skip the Atkins Fad

Research suggests that eating a high-protein, low-carbohydrate diet can cramp your testosterone levels. High amounts of dietary protein in your blood can eventually lower the amount of testosterone produced in your testes, says Incledon, who observed this relationship in a Penn State study of 12 healthy, athletic men.

Your protein intake should be about 16 percent of your daily calories, Incledon says. So, if you're the average 170-pound man who eats 2,900 calories a day, you should eat about 140 grams of protein daily, which is about the amount in two chicken breasts and a 6-ounce can of tuna.

Have Morning Sex

German scientists found that simply having an erection causes your circulating testosterone to rise significantly -- and having one in the morning can goose your natural post-dawn testosterone surge. It's a sure bet you'll burn a little fat, too.

Stick With Tough Exercises

To beef up your testosterone levels, the bulk of your workout should involve "compound" weight-lifting exercises that train several large muscle groups, and not just one or two smaller muscles. For example, studies have shown that doing squats, bench presses or back rows increases testosterone more than doing biceps curls or triceps pushdowns, even though the effort may seem the same. This is why doing squats could help you build bigger biceps.

Make Nuts Your Midnight Snack

Nuts are good for your nuts. Research has found that men who ate diets rich in monounsaturated fat -- the kind found in peanuts -- had the highest testosterone levels. "It's not known why this occurs, but some scientists believe that monounsaturated fats have a direct effect on the testes," says Incledon. Nuts, olive oil, canola oil and peanut butter are good sources of monounsaturated fat.

Squeeze Out Five Repetitions per Set

Throwing around 5-pound dumbbells won't help you effect a rise in testosterone. Start off by using a heavy weight that you can lift only five times. That weight is about 85 percent of your one-repetition maximum. A Finnish study found that this workload produced the greatest boosts in testosterone.

Do Three Sets of Each Weight-Lifting Movement

Researchers at Penn State determined that this fosters greater increases in testosterone than just one or two sets. Rest a full minute between sets, so you can regain enough strength to continue lifting at least 70 percent of your one-rep maximum during the second and third sets.

Rest Harder Than You Work Out

If you overtrain -- meaning you don't allow your body to recuperate adequately between training sessions -- your circulating testosterone levels can plunge by as much as 40 percent, according to a study at the University of North Carolina. The symptoms of overtraining are hard to miss: irritability, insomnia, muscle shrinkage, joining the Reform Party. To avoid overtraining, make sure you sleep a full eight hours at night, and never stress the same muscles with weight-lifting movements two days in a row.

Drive Home Sober

To maintain a healthy testosterone count -- and titanium erections -- cut yourself off after three drinks. "Binge drinking will kill your testosterone levels," warns Incledon. Alcohol affects the endocrine system, causing your testes to stop producing the male hormone. That's one reason drinking often causes you to go limp at the moment of truth.

Have a Sandwich at 3 p.m

As any sensible woman knows, the way to put hair on a man's chest is to fill his stomach. Your body needs a ready supply of calories to make testosterone, so regularly skipping meals or going for long stretches without eating can cause your levels of the hormone to plummet. Then again, that's probably the warden's plan.

Buy the Fried Tortilla Chips

If you want to raise your testosterone score, eat a diet that includes about 30 percent fat, and not much less. Your body needs dietary fat to produce testosterone, so eating like a vegetarian aerobics instructor will cause your testosterone levels to sink drastically. This is bad, unless you actually are a vegetarian aerobics instructor.

Stop Surfing for Porn at 2 a.m.

Sleeping less than seven to eight hours a night can screw up your circadian rhythm. That's why it's no wonder your testosterone levels are higher in the morning after a good night's sleep. So if your work or social schedule keeps you stooped in perpetual jet lag, don't be surprised if you stop craving sex. At least that'll make it easier to stay out of bed.

http://www.timinvermont.com/fitness/boosttes.htm

[W. Rabbit]

How mild is your pectus excavatum? Is your heart ok?

Are you on any medications (prescription or otherwise) that might affect your estrogen levels? There are many heart medications that do this.....which is why your mention of excavatum stood out to me...just curious.

For the record, I am 35 and didn't grow much chest hair or start shaving more than once a week until I was in my late 20s. Today, I am a quite a bit beastlier, so my wife forces me to shave regularly. That's marriage for you.

The "on and off" at the gym part is probably why you only see modest gains.

[CrackFox]

Or you could, you know, talk to your doctor about it - instead of going with random **** off the internet.

[Snake Plissken]

Or you could, you know, talk to your doctor about it - instead of going with random **** off the internet.

^^^^
what he said.
unless you have left sufficient samples on your computer where some dude could swap your monitor across the internet......

[CaseyRyback]

I think it's a little paranoia. Have you always been like that? I wish I didn't have to for 2 weeks.

As far as not seeing gains, you kind of answered your own question being on and off at the gym. Get in the gym (or train MA) at least 4x a week and don't stop. It definitely won't happen over night.

I'd also second getting your levels tested if you're concerned.

[philmgriffin]

Damn vegans, stop eating phyto-oestrogens and then whining when you grow breasts.

[Yoj]

im 20 and have been on and off with the gym for about three years with tiny gains that could of been because i was vegan or many other things. even now with me eating 150 to 200g of good protien a day my recovery is destoryingly crap and my gains small.

There's a good chance your gains are what you made them, you don't mention what gym work you've done, but if its on and off with a bunch of isolation stuff, which is popular in gyms, I'm not surprised, lift heavy, lift compound.

[Bare graves]

my pectus is not bad enough to have heart meds or at least i assume so. im no longer vegan either :( philmgriffen. also i have not touched achool in three years. when im not at the gym i do push/pull ups and squats at home. however as i get bad ass doms for like 7 days i cant really lift that often. the reason why i asked on here first is because id hate to go waste the doctors time by being a paranoid idiot. its just the moobs thats really pointing to low test