AndyJ's Body Enhancement Thread

Andy,

My BP is always around 110/70. Now you know someone in that range.

When doctors say normal they mean “not considered a problem” rather than lots of people with metabolic dysfunction in your friend group will have this. It’s estimated that 88% of Americans suffer from metabolic dysfunction, so it probably is normal - in at least one sense - for people to have an elevated blood pressure that is of concern.

Still stacking Lisinopril and Bumex. For the short term, I’ve cut fluid intake way down so I can spend evenings doing something besides going to the toilet. Yesterday BP was 135/78; I got an hour and a half of intense cardio pushing the lawnmower through thick knee-high grass. When the rest periods exceeded the mowing periods I packed it in for the day. Walking back into the house, I encountered a stray wasp, apparently from a new nest I hadn’t spotted yet. It got me on the left wrist, which is still swollen and painful this morning.

This morning, blood sugar 103, which is normal for me. Pulse OX is 94. The doc wanted me to start tracking that. Mornings used to be 98%, now they’re consistently 93 or 94%. Afternoon and evening are still 97-98%. I made a note to ask the doc about that next week.

Putting the BP cuff on my swollen left wrist would probably be a waste of time. Besides, just touching it still hurts. The instructions for those devices specify the left wrist. The artery to the left arm is larger than the right; that might have something to do with it. In a fit of experimentation I tried both cuffs on my right wrist. The averaged reading was 117/64. Not bad considering I’ve had a few readings in the 200/100 range in the last couple of weeks.

Doctor’s appointment today. I gave him a stack of printouts of the last months’ data logs, he gave me a stack of test reports. Spent 90 minutes on a 15 minute office visit going over everything.

Testosterone way down, estrogen way up, as in “candidate for testosterone replacement therapy.” Due to insurance reasons, he’s handing me off to an endocrinologist to deal with that, also to get a consult on “autoimmune disorder.” Autoimmune is apparently tricky to diagnose. I’ve made a note to ask the endo about parabens and other possible environmental contributors to the problem. I’ve read too much about TRT side effects to be in the “Yay T!” camp if I can avoid it.

My pulse Ox has been low in the mornings, high in the evenings. That’s apparently bassackwards.

Got a referral for a pulmonologist, both for the pulse Ox and to get a new CPAP machine; the old one is six years old and doing strange things, and might be the cause of the odd pulse Ox stuff anyway. We’ll also talk about the short-of-breath thing. Insurance won’t replace the machine unless I see a specialist.

The doc said the 2004 sleep lab determination of COPD might not be valid any more since the diagnosis and limits have changed. That would be a good thing, as I see it. Still have severe sleep apnea, though.

I used to work with lead in a machine shop, and again when casting bullets. I gave the phlebotomist more blood so they can run a check for lead.

BP has been in the 125-135 range when stacking Bumex (diuretic) and Lisinopril (BP med) I dislike the diuretic intensely. He said to drop the diuretic and double up on Lisinopril since I wasn’t having any bad reactions from it.

Two weeks on the exercise schedule so far. Missed one evening when I went to bed early and didn’t expect to sleep through.

Still doing DIY stretching/range-of-motion exercises picked from various rotator cuff and knee replacement pre-op web sites, adapted for my knee and lower back problems. They’re specific to the problems I’m trying to address, and take a lot less time than the tai chi routines I was looking at.

I had expected faster progress, but I still get lots of crunchy noises and shooting pains, and they’re just motion exercises, most of them with no load. It *is* getting better, just not as fast as I had expected.

I want to get rid of the crunchies as much as possible before I start putting load across the joints.

I’m sure there are plenty of negative side effects for some, but I’ve been on it for nearly a year now with basically zero negative side effects and many many positives.

Good to know. I think I’m mostly disappointed; I’ve managed to avoid the array of prescription meds Americans of my age are usually saddled with, and now I’m stuck with one, soon to be two.

I don’t know if it’s nationwide, but all the local surgeons seem to have bought into the New Phrenology of “Body Mass Index”, a number they derive by dividing your weight by your height. “Normal” is 18.5-24.9 (as is usual, where the definition of “normal” comes from is obscure), “overweight” is 25-29.9, and “obese” is 30 or more.

I’ve been to three orthopedic surgeons to see about getting my left knee replaced. They won’t even touch anyone with a BMI over 20. Which leaves out more than half of the people in the supposedly “normal” range. Apparently at, say, 21 BMI, your chances of dying on the operating table are so high they fear for their insurance ratings. So they say.

The interesting thing is, each exam, they measured my height with my shoes on. Height is the disproportionate factor in calculating BMI. Not enough to slide me by their limit, but someone who was close-but-no-cigar, shoe selection and posture might be worth considering.

Another interesting thing was, I hit 5’9” at age 15 or so, and I’ve been that height ever since. A few weeks ago I asked the nurse at my regular doctor to check my height, since there was a height scale on the weight scale. She said I was 5’10”. Considering I was wearing shoes, okay… I’m past the age where people start to lose height as joint tissues deteriorate, so maybe I had a growth spurt somewhere and didn’t notice.

A couple days ago I went to an allergist, who checked my height for some reason. 5’8”. Same shoes. That’s a TWO INCH difference. For a 200 pound person, 5’10 is 28.7, the high end of “overweight.” For 5’8, that’s 30.4, “obese”, and probably in the “go ahead and die, fat boy” category.

That two inch height difference was a surprise. Both weight scales were within 1% of my scale at home.

Hmm… I wonder if I could slide a conehead cranium past them. At least I still have all my hair…

I picked up a “USB hand warmer” from eBay for $10-ish. It’s rated at 5000ma(?). You can supposedly use it as a battery or to charge a phone, but it has heating elements built in two two head levels, 45C and 60C. 45C is 113F. The length is a snug fit between my Size Doctor bell and fat pad. I can wrap a hand towel around it to keep it in place and provide some insulation.

On “45C” the thing gets hotter than I expected. I have a thermometer I was going to use to check the temperature, but it has disappeared in the general disarray of my room. [sigh] I guess I can clamp it between my thighs for a while and see if it gets unbearably hot. Not very scientific, but maybe good enough.

I finally got around to looking at the folder full of lab reports. I’m going to have to do some research to understand what it all means. At least they all have a separate column labeled “ABNORMAL” as well as one with accepted ranges of values.

TESTOSTERONE FREE AND TOTAL
L Testosterone (abnormal) 147ng/dL (reference) 300-720
SHBG 49 nmol/L (reference) 19-76
L Testosterone Free-Calc (abnormal) 21.3 pg/mL (reference) 47.0-244.0

I had stopped taking L-Arginine and L-Tryptophan two weeks before, along with most other supplements, when I started taking the blood pressure med. Morning wood haa mostly gone away; fluffing still works, but takes a while, and doesn’t last nearly as long. Yes, I make notes about all that. I don’t know if the supplements are doing anything to testosterone readings, but they make the difference between “doing pretty good for my age” and “no question about ED.”

Apparently there’s not a carved-in-stone “normal” for the testosterone results; at least, the figures I found on the web this morning were all over the place, as low as 150 and as high as 1200, and the age breakdowns differed as well.

A couple hours’ reading showed most people on TRT agreed with Willis99 and had no bad reactions to report. I was chatting with a friend who reminded me he has been on TRT for twenty years now. We’re supposed to have lunch tomorrow; afterward we’ll swing by his house and he’ll dig up as much paperwork as he can find.

I have had almost all the overt symptoms of low testosterone for a long time. The problem is, they’re the same symptoms as several other maladies, which were duly diagnosed and treated without any noticeable results. I had to ask for the test in order to get it done, but until quite recently, wood and performance were definitely not a problem. It turns out low testosterone doesn’t necessarily affect that.

I’m not sure why my doc didn’t just write the prescription himself, but the endocrinologist is supposed to be checking me for signs of “auto-immune disorder” as well.

Ack! I forgot the rest of the data:

ESTROGEN FRACTIONATED
H Estradiol (abnormal) 45.2 pg/mL (reference) 10.0-42.0
H Estrone (abnormal) 72.9 pg/mL (reference) 9.0-36.0
H Estrogens Total 118.1 pg/mL (reference) 19.0-69.0

I bought a “used, open box” woodworking bench off eBay to use as a cooking area. It’s one of those butcher-block work tables with a built-in vise. The box had seen better days, but didn’t appear to have been opened, all the bits were present and in good shape, and there were *two* complete sets of hardware. Plus the workbench had a lower shelf and a drawer that weren’t shown in the eBay picture. I know, I should be a whiny bitch and demand my money back, but I’ll just live with the disappointment.

I zipped by the local Harbor Freight to pick up some casters so I can roll it around, and a heavy duty power strip to plug stuff into. By noon it was near 100F and I ran out of steam for getting any further than that.

Yesterday I went by both local hardware stores and got about 3/4 of the plumbing fittings I need to get running water. I had to hit eBay for the rest. Even before the ‘rona shortage, their supplies of fittings was sparse and semi-random. All of the wastewater plumbing got done and signed off before I put the new floor in, so that won’t be a problem.

I added some wrist/hand exercises that are supposed to deal with RSI or carpal tunnel syndrome. Nothingburgers except for the “use other hand or wall, bend hand back as far as you can for 30 seconds” one, which made my right forearm muscles twinge, and they’re still complaining.

Also added “neck roll”, to the tune of an absurd amount of snapping, crackling, and popping. The plain old head twists are much better than a few weeks ago, but still not pain-free.

Some of the exercises come from “joint replacement rehab” sites. Two looked easy - a “front lift” where you lay on your back, left one heel two feet from the bed or floor, repeat ten times, then do the other leg. The other is the “side lift”, where you do much the same thing, except laying on your side and rolling over to do the other side. My right hip does not like these. I had occasionally noticed pain from that hip while walking, but I guess it’s one of those things you blow off until it can’t be ignored any more. I’ll ask the doc for an X-ray next time I’m in. I’m hoping it’s just weak tendons or something on that side, though if both knees are gone, I guess it’s not unreasonable a hip joint might go too.

Finally, I’ve grouped my check sheet into three categories; Sitting, Standing, and Laying Down. It all gets done anyway, but splitting the exercises up makes the total look less intimidating. None of the exercises are difficult, but there are a lot of them, as I chase new areas to loosen up.

[“better late than never…”]
================================================== ==========================
DATE: 07/31/2021 day 375 MONTHLY TOTALS
past month / to date
spout: —— / ——
plug: —— / 942h35m
gauge out: —— / 14x
pumping: 68h00m / 35625m
ball pump: 28h55m / 160h00m
ball pull: 40m / 7h35m
ball masg.: —— / 00h46m 7x
ball wt.: —— / ——
edge: 3h30m / 57h15m
clamp: —— / 2h58m
Kegels: 400x / 18,010x
cock ring: 4h20m / 13h35m mostly MOS #3
extender: 72h35m / 253h20m Size Doctor
RLT light: 5h20m / 99h35m
hair: IPL: 3x / 42x
depilatory: —— / 7x
shave: 8x / 57x
BPEL: unknown
hours: 184h20m / 1,925h10m

I’ve been using the Size Doctor extender in its default extender configuration more than before, trying to stretch the skin on the shaft. The extender “floats” on the fat pad, which is still too thick to push a ruler in for a bone-pressed measurement. Without a starting BPEL I’m just making a best guess as to what might be working.

Most pumping has been with the 2-1/8” tube, pulling on the ring scar, which still wants to shrink some if left alone for a few days. Almost all of it has been low-intensity work with the Spectre S2 breast pump.

I am seeing slow but steady results with the ball pumping, also with the 2-1/8” tube and S2 breast pump. The odd twinges along the right vas(?) are gone, and the dime-sized scar on the right side of the scrotum no is no longer painful when pumped.

I averaged 5.5 hours per day of pumping, extending, etc. for July, same as most of the year so far. I’ve been PE’ing at very low intensity, as such things go, so I hope I haven’t been toughening the tunica. For the rehab work, duration has been far more important than strain.

I have worked through my exercise checklist every day without fail, adding a new motion every couple of days.

I found the barbells, dumbbells, and weights I bought long ago. I know where the bench is, but it’s buried so deep under the wife’s crap that it would be simpler to buy another one. I was going to knock something together out of plywood and 2x4s, but at current lumber prices it would cost about the same as buying a new (cheap) one.

I still haven’t finished the backboard for the speed bag. Home and auto maintenance took most of my “mobility” time in July.

================================================== =

Got a call from an endocrinologist’s office today, letting me know they had received a referral from my GP to check my testosterone, estrogen, and diabetes. [sigh] I don’t know which office appended “diabetes”, but it’s not the first, or even the fourth, time I’ve run into the automatic assumption that I’m diabetic. I’ve been sternly lectured about blood sugar and complications from diabetes at some consults and had them just give me a pitying look when I told them I wasn’t diabetic.

This morning’s glucose test: 103. Which *is* up lately; it normally runs in the high 90s. I have logs going back for years.

Appointment: November 4. The local healthcare providers aren’t much for speed or efficiency, and it’s increasingly common for offices to run a 4-day work week. Note my GP’s office sent them the referral two weeks ago; they’re just now responding.

Minutes after the first call I got another, this one from the GP’s office, to come in tomorrow for another blood draw for autoimmune tests. My notes say they took some for that at the last visit, but it’s possible the lab lost the vial or goobered it up somehow.

The lab had munged the blood sample, so the draw was a replacement. I wound up seeing the doc anyway. He wasn’t happy with the BP numbers and wanted me to double up on the Lisinopril again. I started at one 10mg, then two 10mg, and now four. He said just to take them all at once, but I’m spacing them out through the day. Lisinopril is also prescribed for heart and kidney problems, and a couple of web sites mentioned that Lisinopril was flushed out within 12 hours, so when they prescribed for those they did it for twice a day.

My BP numbers bounce all over the place; the doc wanted me to add an average for the daily figures to my log sheets. I’m wondering if Lisinopril’s effect is like a spiky curve. When it’s convenient I’m going to take BP readings every hour and see if those have any correlation with dose times.

The doc is getting used to the “self-directed patient” thing.