AndyJ's Body Enhancement Thread

PE day 552
keto day 60

Using the ADS more. Even with the 3/4 pound Gear Keeper my glans gets unhappy. Which is odd, because with the Size Doctor, weight, and pulley system, it’s perfectly fine with 1-1/2 pounds. It might be that I’m usually standing with the ADS and laying down with the Size Doctor. I may have to fall back to the other Gear Keeper, which is just over half a pound, for a while.

Still, I’ve had to skip or take it easy for a while several times; the glans doesn’t like the pump after it gets sore from the ADS.

It’s odd; I can squeeze, press, poke, or rub the glans and feel nothing unusual; it’s when I put a fingertip on it, then lift up, that I can tell there’s a problem. It feels vaguely sparky, like when you reach for a doorknob after shuffling across carpet. It goes away after 12-18 hours. I’m hoping it will toughen up over time.

EQ/energy/attitude/outlook still improving. TRT injection #10 was yesterday. EQ used to fade noticeably by the fifth or sixth day after an injection; now it doesn’t seem to make much difference.

Weight loss has plateau’d for the last couple of weeks. It bounced up from 325 to 328, then down to 324. What I’ve eaten hasn’t changed any. When it warms up outside I will be much more active and able to use the weights, so I’ll just wait and see. No problem staying on the diet. Still seeing the dramatic reduction in allergy/autoimmune symptoms, so I don’t see any pressing reason to go back to Twinkies and Dr. Pepper.

Blood sugar this morning: 88. My wife has a collection of glucose meters; they might vary 15 points from one to another. They’re also not particularly repeatable; a 5-point difference on back-to-back tests isn’t unusual. This particular meter usually reads 105-115, but maybe a quarter of the time it’ll read in the 80s or low 90s. Evening meal is mostly the same thing, so that shouldn’t affect things much. All of the meters average out about 100, so I’m sure everything is fine.

A number of the issues I’ve had are also symptoms of thyroid problems, and I had a full thyroid workup done six months ago, not just the usual quickie test. The workup numbers were all about mid-range. A few weeks ago I came across mention that one indication of thyroid problems was low body temperature. I ordered a thermometer, which came in last week. According to it, my temp runs 96.4 to 97.3. Is the thermometer accurate? How the hell do I know? I’ll just keep logging the numbers and bring it along to the doctor’s office next time I go and compare it to his; I can add a correction factor after that if I need to.

Carbs for January (minus a few days, but whatever)

week 1: 1.2 - 10 - 10 - 2 - 9.6 - 11.2 - 6.2
week 2: 10 - 0 - 5 - 6.2 - 9.2 - 2 - 5
week 3: 10.2 - 4 - 4.8 - 4.8 - 1.2 - 3.6 - 8
week 4: 10 - 10 - 12 - 14 - 6 - 2

Damn. Another blister on the tip.

I have no idea what the tug on the Size Doctor is in its original configuration. I’ve also replaced the springs with might lighter ones. I’ve been using 1-1/2 pounds when using the bell laying on my back, with pulleys. I have a 1-1/4 pound weight I use when sitting in a chair or sometimes over the side of the bed when I’m laying on my side. Yet I still occasionally pull a blister or pull clear fluid out into the cap, with that prickly discomfort. And I’ve pulled fluid out with the bell and sleeve ADS, even with a 3/4 pound Gear Keeper.

I think it’s time to back off anything vacuum-related for a while. I’m going to fall back to jelquing and clamping until I think the glans is completely healed, then try working my way back up with vacuum.

I had to start off with half a pound with the SD bell and pulleys, and slowly worked up to 1-1/2”. As in, it took half a year. Maybe I’ve been pushing it too hard and it was never completely healing up between injuries. I’ll see how a rest period works out.

That sucks Andy. Sorry to hear the SD claims another! I haven’t used the SD for a few months now, after my last blister, but I find I just don’t get as good of a pull from the more standard strap type ADS. Risk/reward for certain. Part of me thinks I should dip the head into liquid bandage pre-stretch! With tape, and with a rubber cap….although I have also wondered whether tape and then a coat of liquid bandage over the tape may make sense. Sad reality appears to be that once blisters start, they’re easier to get again.

I have a couple of glans caps I’ve not used, for some reason. I should probably try one of those when I restart.

The Size Doctor had many advantages when I was first starting, primarily that it only touched my shaft behind the corona, which was a big thing when I was healing from the infection. But now that I can actually wear a cap-and-sleeve setup, I foresee moving in that direction. I don’t have to play the “will it stay or slide off?” game, and I can just roll the sleeve off the bell and remove it instead of wondering if I can get out before my bladder explodes.

And yeah… I always get the blisters at one or both of the original two places. Drat.

Andy, you still in ketosis? If so, how long has it been?

Yep. Since late November.

How are you feeling? Running the body and mind off of BHB can be a true biohack for some people.

Have you noticed any changes in mental sharpness or energy levels? Also, once glycogen is depleted this might support reduced inflammation.

Mental sharpness and energy levels noticeably up and steadily improving… but I went on testosterone replacement therapy about the same time as keto, so I can’t tell how much is keto and how much is TRT.

The reduced inflammation claim turned out to be very real, at least in my case. Pain is way down and mobility is way up.

Other claims are lowered blood pressure and reduced blood sugar. I’ve monitored those for years, and seen no change.

Weight loss hasn’t been all that much yet, but it has been steady.

That’s good news on the improvements in mobility and pain.

Weight loss on keto is much like any other diet, more calories consumed than burned and the body will store as fat.

How is your appetite? Raising the fat percentage on the macros can significantly help with satiety.

No problem there. Another difference from the calorie-counter diets.

As the weight drops the BP will drop. That’s probably the reason for the claims (good old “correlation doesn’t equal causation”). Larger bodies lead to higher blood pressure. It’s not the only factor but it’s a big one. I’m a big guy myself - 230 at age 13, as high as 305 in my early 30s, about 280 now. I’ve been eating a lower-calorie / higher volume diet and it’s going well. Lots of foods that fill you up without being calorie-dense. Good luck with keto though; the best diet is the one you’ll stick to.

That’s what the endocrinologist said. I hope it works that way for me.

Can’t imagine any way that it won’t. Physics dictates that pumping blood through a larger body requires greater pressure and the arteries resist that pressure. To an extent it’s not anything to be overly concerned about (a fit 6’ tall, 200 pound man will just naturally have higher BP than a 5’6”, 160 pound man), but as the numbers skew more and more it takes a toll (speaking from experience here). If the circumference of your waist is half your height or less, you should be good; if it’s larger, that’s a good indicator that BP will likely be high (struggling to get my down at the moment as well). That’s just a rule of thumb though, and high blood pressure can have many more causes, but losing weight will almost certainly mitigate it to a degree.

I’ve used the Size Doctor for over a year, and have about 500 hours in one, mostly as a hanger, though recently as an extender.

This last PE rest session after yet another blister made me realize something I hadn’t noticed before - the chronic rawness and pain I’d been putting up with was gone. I could finger or squeeze my glans as much as I wanted, feeling only fingers and pressure.

I’ve noted how it can be painful to get the Size Doctor off sometimes, and I think a lot of the problem was simply how the gasket scraped my glans badly when trying to get the now-engorged glans out of the bell. It would always come out on its own, eventually, as engorgement subsided… but when you have to go to the bathroom, or to work, there’s no time to wait.

So, reluctantly, I’m going to put the Size Doctor aside. I can’t work up any ill-will toward the device; I’m not shaped right for a sled extender, and I wasn’t able to wear a conventional vacuum extender until quite recently due to a skin problem. The Size Doctor was the only extender that worked for me, and I have to give it credit for that. But now I’m moving to a bell-and-sleeve setup.