After reading the various posts on this forum on checking blood markers and a few other posts on general health, I decided it was time for me to take matters into my own hands and start truly monitoring and mapping my health as best as I could. In general I don’t have any serious health problems, although I have a weak stomach/bowels and my energy is not at an optimal level.
I’d say I noticed mostly that I am not at this optimal level when I started doing crossfit. I’ve always been a good and pretty competitive athlete, but since a very long time I have trouble with recovery. A day after crossfit my body would be in ruins, while my partner would be ready to go again. I wondered why? Similarly, my sex drive after being with a girl would go down and only with my very top girls I’d feel like going 2-3 in one day. I’m in my late twenties, but felt that such symptoms came early for me, especially given that I do plenty of sports and eat decent.
What steps did I take/will I be taking?
First of all, I spent about 270$ on blood tests, I live in South America, so this might be more expensive or cheaper in other countries. This would be my baseline from now and onward to see what had changed whenever I would become sick. I hope to retrieve some of this money through insurance, but if not, I still consider it an important investment. I also asked my general doctor to send me all results of previous blood tests done in my life that he had stored. As such on some markers I can make a comparison over time. Let’s start with reviewing these results one by one.
I write this all down, since I think others can be inspired to take action and also because it would be less work for others to check their markers if they see how I reviewed them. Secondly, some guys on this forum know a lot more than me about such things and if they would have input it would be very helpful and welcome off course.
Some general markers:
NOTE: reference values vary a lot depending the source and depending the country they use different tests and/or units. Tests were done in the morning after a 12 hour fast.
Age:25-30, BMI: close to optimal.
Cardiac health
-Blood pressure: 130/80 – Fine, 120/80 is optimal.
-Glycemic value: 78.4 – Below a 100 is ok.
-Cholesterol:
201.7, slightly problematic as the ref. value is 120-200.
-HDL Cholesterol: 49.6, should be below 60 so ok.
-LDL Cholesterol: 125.1, below ref. range of 130 but ideally would be below a 100.
-Triglycerides:
198.7, should be below 150, so this is too high
Based on these last results a problem seems to have arisen, so I decided to do some extra calculations which are important:
Cholesterol/HDL: 4.04, good = below 5
LDL/HDL: 2.5, between 2-5 is optimal
Triglycerides/HDL: 3.98, just below ref. value of 4, but no margin there.
So the problem is mostly the triglycerides and has been for some time for me. Recommendations here are healthy fats (Omega 3), fiber, avoiding red meats and smoking. I don’t smoke, but do eat a lot of meat, still I think carb intake is the main reason.
We continue:
-Creatinine: 1.11, 0-7-1.2 so OK.
-Uric acid (?): 5.16, 3.40-7 so OK.
-Glucose: 84.9, between 70-110 is the ref. value but optimally under 85, so I’m good. I was worried about this one, because diabetes runs in the family.
-GGT: 17.9, 0-65 U/L OK
-Total Lipids: 575.1, 400-800 OK
-CRP (Inflammation): >1, >5 so OK
-Calcium: 9.47, 8.80-10.20 OK
I also checked all my blood values (hematology), there’s quite a few, so I won’t go into detail. They do them with every blood test I believe. All were in range for me.
Let’s check some other values:
-AST (SGOT): 24.8, 0-40, optimal is 21 OK
-AST (SGPT): 32.8, 0-41, optimal is 24 OK
No big liver problems, good news since I like me a drink sometimes. Bilirubin was fine as well in former tests.
-TSH: 2.14, 0.27-4.20, optimal is below 2.1
-FT3: 3.54, 1.80-4.20 OK
-FT4: 1.10, 0.70-1.70 OK
Thyroid seems to be working fine based on those last 3.
-Estradiol:
57, 7.6-43, ideally this would be between 10-30 pg/mL, so this is problematic.
-DHEAS (adrenal function): 309, 80-560, ideally between 400-500, should be higher.
-FSH: 3.88, 1.5-15, ideally above 5 but below 15, so should a bit higher as well.
-Insuline: 2.60, 2.60-24.9, ideally below 3 so OK.
-LH: 2.14, 1.7-8.6 OK, although according to my lab, but CleanSlates article suggests 6.0-19.0 mIU/ml, most internet sources seem to state that my levels are not problematic.
-Total Testosterone: 669 ng/dl, 0.28-11.1 so OK midrange let’s say. 617 is the average testosterone level for men between 25-34, with 170 standard deviation, so I’m within normal range.
-Free Testosterone: 10.17 ng/sl, 4.25-30.37, ideally between 15-30. Officially it’s within range, but according to guys here and in sports environments it’s definitely suboptimal. The average for men between 25-34 here is 12.3, with standard deviation of 2.8. Below average, but within range, not something I’m satisfied with.
Former tests indicated that I did not have any shortage of Iron or Transferrine either. I feel like I should’ve tested Vit. D as well, but since I get sufficient sun I didn’t do it. I also supplement B-vitamins since quite a while so didn’t get that checked so far. I also checked for parasites and STDs, came out clean.
So what have I learned so far. First of all, I seem to have two larger problems and a few sub-optimal values. The larger ones are triglycerides and Estrogen (Estradiol). The first has a lot to do with diet, so I should be able to improve it, although it has been a lifelong problem for me. I don’t eat specifically bad nor very good, so I wonder what the origin is here. Anyone had any success bringing triglycerides down? I’ve already bought some fiber supplements (Noni, Psyllium Husk) and Omega 3-6-9 supplement. This combined with eating less sugar rich products should have an effect. It should also further improve my cholesterol levels.
The second problem lies with Estrogen, which is too high. Other hormones are ok, but not perfect. Am I wrong to think that if I would be able to lower my estrogen production, it would have a positive effect on the other hormones? How to lower estrogen levels? What causes it?
One of the main causes is being fat, that is not the case for me so I can rule that out. I also don’t eat soy products. Plastic use can be one of the causes for me. I generally drink water out of one of those huge water coolers, maybe that is not such a good idea after all. Will have to see how I can substitute plastic containers. I’m going to start eating more cruciferous vegetables as well as they are very beneficial. Broccoli especially. Still the cause is not that clear to me yet. I don’t use a lot of chemical hygienic products and I eat a good amount of organic food.
One interesting thing I read is that berries contain Calcium-D-Glucarate, which is a fiber that binds with bad estrogen molecules and removes them from the gut. I remembered visiting Colombia and buying a small container of blue berries every day. I never felt so vibrant and horny ever before. I thought it was the Colombian ladies but who knows this might have been a factor.
What else is good: citric fruits, beets, maca and stop drinking beer. I’m also going to try a DIM, Curcumin and nettle supplement.
Any other suggestions or observations? I'm happy so far to have been able to identify to problems through doing bloodwork and I think with some personal changes my next results can be a lot better. If any experienced members see other things noteworthy, all information can help me go forward and I'd be grateful.
One last thing I wanted to mention is that right after doing these tests, I went to a chiropractor. I didn’t really have much confidence that it would do something, but since it was cheap, I decided to give it a try. After about 2-3 sessions, the only thing I noticed is that I got a lot more morning boners. Very obvious difference, so perhaps there was some kind of blockage in my system. I feel more flexible as well. If I research chiropractic effects on hormones, I find almost no evidence, but for me it seems to have done something. After this realization I haven’t checked any markers so far.
Many thanks to member CleanSlate for his article here:
http://www.trtguide.com/labs/
This link was also mentioned somewhere here and is definitely useful:
https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/blood-simple
