So it turns out that, outside of taking a testosterone battery to establish testosterone levels, low T and depression have the exact same symptoms.

And I do mean the exact same:

* lack of motivation for or enjoyment in activities, hobbies, or sex

* Feelings of sadness, emptiness, despair

* decreased energy, fatigue

* difficulty concentrating, remembering, or making decisions

* sleep problems

* high or low appetite, coupled by weight gain/loss

* suicidal thoughts/attempts

* irritability/restlessness

* erection issues

Etc, etc.

It might actually be argued that — for all intents and purposes — low T and depression are exactly the same in men.

But that’s not what I’m going to argue at this moment.

One of the common claims of the man-o-sphere is that testosterone in young men has been dropping steadily for fifty years. The issues with comparing different lab tests aside, let’s assume for the moment that it’s true…

Well, maybe before throwing scores of drugs at the problem, maybe the first thing we should ask is why the scores have dropped. What’s the cause? T-scores didn’t drop out of nowhere.

One of the common claims is that diet and a sedentary lifestyle is to blame — and it’s definitely true that diet and exercise can account for a swing of up to 100–150 nG/dL. That’s enough to account for a drop in T for sure, but it doesn’t account for the large groups of men experiencing such symptoms, including many who do work out and eat right.

So what the fuck is going on?

Recently, I traveled down to West Palm Beach to see yet another doctor about TRT. The main problem with TRT — as you may have already discovered — is that the vast majority of family doctors are completely ignorant about testosterone and TRT, and the vast majority of doctors that know their stuff tend to work for clinics where they’re essentially paid to hand out testosterone to anyone who asks for it.

In short, a catch-22. Those motivated to help you are ignorant, and those who aren’t ignorant are motivated to sell to you regardless of helpfulness.

Which is why I was excited to meet this doctor; he explicitly told me that — because I’m under the age of 30 — he probably wasn’t going to recommend TRT for me.

I love talking with men who are willing to reject potential customers. Those men are most often the ones who value truth over profit, and who pride themselves on giving maximum value to those they interact with — and fuck it if I wasn’t going to sit down and grill him for every last bit of information I could get (this is the fourth doctor I’ve done this to; I’ve gotten quite good at it).

So there I sat in the exam room, a piece of cotton taped to my inner elbow, talking with the doctor for a solid half hour on every topic related to TRT. While I walked away with multiple bits of new information, a single critical piece stuck to my brain, a thought that I’ve been working through for days now.

“In general, for men under 30, I generally see low testosterone occurring for one of three reasons…”

And then he laid them out. Simple as can be.

First, hypogonadism — the least common of the three. It can happen, but generally that’s not the cause of low T in young men. Out of 100 men, maybe 3 will be clinically low, and not everyone with hypogonadism necessarily experiences symptoms. But we DO KNOW that the number of young boys suffering from depression (or low T) is far above 3%. So a malfunctioning pituitary gland isn’t the answer.

Second, prior history of steroid use. Massive doses of testosterone in order to gain muscle or boost performance can wreak havoc with the endocrine system, especially when the person doesn’t follow a proper post-steroid regimen. Same thing here — very few men use steroids.

Both of these were fairly obvious to me. The final one though… never saw it coming. I should have, though.

Third, a history of emotional trauma or abuse.

What the fuck does that have to do with anything?

But then it clicked.

Holy shit…

Strap yourselves in, fellas. This is going to get interesting.

You see, we already know that PTSD can cause depression and low T. In fact, any generalized anxiety disorder, especially anything that results in a prolonged “fight or flight” response in the body. Usually during such an event, the body drastically increases epinephrine (adrenaline), norepinephrine, and cortisol (along with a host of other chemicals) — all geared to prime the body for maximum physical response.

And of course, during that time, production of other hormones and chemicals suffer. Blood is re-routed from the stomach and digestive tract to the limbs, etc. All of this is good, generally — as long as it’s only temporary.

If it’s not temporary, though — if the person is constantly stressed, traumatized, abused, etc — then all the systems receiving temporary deprivation start getting into real trouble, and symptoms start showing up. Depression, stomach problems… and among these issues, low testosterone. These problems persist and even worsen as the body fails to properly ‘cool down’ and deactivate the anxiety fight-or-flight response.

I want to present an argument to you, backed by as much data as I can find. And the conclusion is a radical one: even with low T scores, the solution might not be TRT. And yes, I know I’m on TRT (well, I was anyways). Take it from me: no matter how fashionable TRT and TOT may be in the manosphere, remember that medical fads are still fads, and fads exist out of popularity, not necessity.

So, let’s start.

It’s well known that there’s an epidemic among young men in the West. Alongside the known low-T issue, it’s also known that suicide among young men is 3–5 times higher that of women. It’s also known that suicide is essentially a privilege of the West, as poor countries generally don’t have a suicide pandemic.

Consider also this: the dopamine system in the brain releases dopamine as a reward. It’s not a reward for completing a goal, however: dopamine is released when the reward center of the brain recognizes that you’re making progress towards a goal. The more meaningful the goal, and the faster the progress, the higher the dopamine hit. (here’s Dr. Jordan Peterson rambling a bit about dopamine systems)

So what are we establishing here? Your brain neurology reacts directly to your behavior and to your perceptions. That is to say, you can indirectly regulate your biochemistry through acts of conscious willpower.

This is also true of testosterone. Take for example this study, which determined that body language can influence your testosterone and cortisol levels.

Of course, body language is in part also related to your serotonin level regulation, which is affected drastically by your life success. Dr. Jordan Peterson talks about this at length in discussing lobsters and dominance hierarchies.

Okay so we have evolutionary neurochemistry, behavioral neuroscience… let’s look at a few interesting studies that have come up of late.

In early 2017 a massive study came out as a result of the CDC trying to harmonize lab assays, including assays for testosterone. I’m not going to get into the weeds of what that means for being able to compare numbers from different labs, BUT I’ll share with you two important points that came out of that study (here’s the link with the discussion, which covers some of the details. I’ve included supporting studies for everything else).

First is the admission of something we already know: the CDC has officially recognized that it’s possible for men to technically have “in range” testosterone scores, and still have symptoms of low testosterone. That said, those men are within 100 nG/dL of the bottom of the range. (Article linked here through archive.org)

Second, and more importantly, is this (it blew my fucking mind): testosterone doesn’t actually drop as a function of age. Seriously. Here’s another study that concluded the exact same thing. Article here.

Okay, so how the hell does this related to testosterone in body language and serotonin and lobsters?

Well, it turns out that the average testosterone in old men *on average* doesn’t drop — and “average” is the key term here. Instead, there’s a divergence. It would seem that old men split up into two rough groups: a portion of them maintain (or even mildly gain in) testosterone, and another portion watches their testosterone drop like a rock.

As far as I can tell, the divergence begins to become noticeable in their sixties. Uncoincidentally, that’s also when most men begin retiring. And what happens when men retire? Well, a portion of them simply find a retirement home for them to bide their time while they wait to die. It’s no surprise that anxiety and depression are strongly linked with retirement — and why wouldn’t it? Men define themselves in part by meaningful responsibilities. For many, retirement represents not just a loss of work, but a loss of the purpose attached to that work.

Which is where the other group of retirees come in: people who view retirement as the opportunity to do something even more meaningful with their lives. These are the elderly that you see participating in community events, outreach programs, and often actively engaging with the youth to pass on wisdom and life experience. For these people, life truly starts with retirement.

Side note: it’s been shown by several studies that fat gain has a direct effect on testosterone (here and here). Another obvious point to consider is that obesity as a percentage of the population goes up with age, up until the late sixties, where the percentage begins to drop as obese people die off from heart failure and other obesity-related complications. It should be noted that even through this pattern the average testosterone levels remain the same: so even though obesity matters, it is not the source of the divergence.

And so we have two distinct groups of people: those who lose life purpose with retirement, and those who gain even greater purpose. Not coincidentally, simultaneous with that split is a split in testosterone levels.

The final piece of the puzzle:

Within the Fraternity of Excellence, it should come as no surprise to those who’ve talked to me that I’m a big fan of Jordan Peterson. I give him no small credit in the turnaround in my own life.

But, I’m not the only one. Near the end of his recent infamous interview with Cathy Newman, Jordan Peterson talked about how he’d received nearly 25 thousand messages from young men in the past eight months, all reaching out with the same fundamental message:

“[You’ve] brought [me] back from the brink of destruction.”

Peterson also goes into serious detail about his experiences with young men reaching out to him here. It’s heart-wrenching, and deserves serious consideration. This link too will fuck you up.

And what is Jordan Peterson’s message to young men, saving them from anxiety, depression, and a lifeless swirl down the drain?

“Life is hard, and full of suffering. And you need to endure that suffering. And not only do you need to endure that suffering, but you need to assume that most of that suffering is your fault, and you need to pick up as much responsibility as you can, and carry it.”

Peterson speaks meaning into their lives.

So back to the dopamine riddle. Dopamine is released when your mind senses that you’re making good progress towards a goal that is meaningful.

If the body is set up to reward and reinforce progress towards meaningful goals, then doesn’t it stand to reason that the body also prepares itself for action in the face of meaningful goals?

And one of the ways it prepares itself is through the production of testosterone, so that you can build the muscles and assemble the body language necessary to lift heavy weights and ascend the dominance hierarchy, so that you can achieve your meaningful goals.

Remember that third cause of low T, ‘history of emotional trauma and abuse?’ Think of young men today. Many are suffering from low T, though to what extent we don’t know. But we also know that there is a crisis of meaning going on with many young men, so much so that a rambling old man can sit there and say “life sucks, but work hard and it’ll matter” and he strikes to the heart of millions of young men. And young men are going up in a fucking toxic environment, they are. It’s been statistically shown that female teachers systematically punish young men for speaking out in class. Boisterous boys are thrown on Ritalin and Adderall. High school graduates enter college, where they’re told that masculinity is toxic and sex regret is rape.

And many of these men have grown up with fathers who — while not criminally negligent — have nonetheless failed to prepare their sons for the world or act as any sort of role model by which the sons can mimic in order to survive in a world that has seemingly decided that men simply don’t matter any more. I don’t mean to be hyperbolic here, but: wouldn’t one plausible definition of abuse be to send a boy into the jaws of a ravenous monster, completely unprepared to defend himself?

Is it any wonder that young men today have low testosterone?

But at this point, TRT is a bucket put on the floor of a house to catch dripping water from one spot on the ceiling. The low T is a symptom of a much larger problem: the roof of civilization is leaking.

So if you’ve got depression or low testosterone, and you happen to be a young fella — or you’re an older gent, but your life hasn’t exactly been marked by emotional stability — then maybe TRT is something you might consider as a crutch; aka a bucket to keep the floor dry while you fix the roof.

But you have to fix the roof.

Otherwise, you’ll be a cripple with a crutch, rather than a man with a healed leg. Or in keeping with the previous analogy, a man with a bucket in a leaky house, rather than a man with a sealed roof.

Note, I am not saying that TRT can’t be used. But what I am saying is: if you’ve got low testosterone, then maybe make sure that there’s not something going on in your life that could be the cause. In other words, get your life in order. Clean your room. Get your immediate family (the ones you interact with most) to a good place. Sort out your past, so that you’re no longer haunted by the demons in your memories.

And if you need TRT to pick yourself off the floor to do that, then so be it. But TRT isn’t the final solution; it’s the cast to help you fix your broken leg. I’m mixing metaphors at this point, but…

Sort yourself out. Get your life in order.

Fix the roof.