I’m finally getting my hormones! I’m gonna do injections, and my doctor said she’s comfortable prescribing me oral progesterone as well if I want it. And it’s a female hormone, so why shouldn’t I have it, right? I know it’s supposed to help with breast development, and maybe libido, but I haven’t done as much reading about progesterone as I have estrogen. Should I start it at the same time I start estrogen? Is it even worth taking? Would love to hear others’ thoughts and experiences
EDIT: Seems like the rough consensus is to wait around a year, so I think that’s what I’ll plan on doing. Thanks y’all!
yep, just makes it harder for me to sleep as long - doesn’t seem to make me more tired or anything, but I just don’t stay asleep as long.
Taking 100 mg prog rectally fixed that for me, it allows me to sleep my normal amount.
It does alter my sleep, though. (I cycle prog every week, I start it after my injection and then stop mid-cycle so I have maybe 3 - 4 nights with prog and then 3 - 4 nights without it.) When I start and stop prog, I notice a difference in terms of how much I dream, etc.
Oh thanks ! You’re cycling prog just for the dreams ? It’s pretty neat imo !
oh, no - I cycle prog because there is no other way to build up a backstock otherwise, and to match the monthly hormonal cycles we see in cis women. And also because I primarily use prog for sleep, not anything else, and that’s only relevant when my E levels are high, which is only during part of my cycle.
Most people probably take it for breast growth; I wasn’t motivated by breast growth (my boobs are big enough, even if they seem small on my frame) and I’m not 100% sure prog actually ever resulted in more breast growth for me anyway.
I started it as an anti-androgen mostly, and as a way to help me sleep when my E levels were elevated when I did monotherapy.
Now I guess I can technically live without it (when I travel sometimes I just forget to take it and it’s fine), but I do get better sleep at the height of my cycle if I take prog, so that’s what I use it for now.
I have read about taking it replicate the menstrual cycle but on a monthly basis, and I have thought about it. Surely it will ease the regular mood cycle we go through. It’s starting to get to me…
I guess I’ll see when I get there since I’m still under a year of hrt
it’s hard to follow a monthly basis when my actual hormone changes are on a weekly cycle, it’s based on the pharmacokinetics of estradiol valerate, when a half life is around 3.5 days and I inject once a week, I have a cycle then that has highs and lows over a weekly period (not a monthly period).
So, the week is like a compressed month - I have highs and lows and in a monthly cycle, progesterone levels rise when estradiol levels rise, so I just roughly do something similar by taking prog when my E levels are gaining and peaking, and then stopping as my E levels drop and then bottom out before my next injection.
regarding mood, I didn’t really solve the mood issues until I had an orchi - my mental health got much better after that. Before then I was doing monotherapy and I struggled to sufficiently block T production even with very high levels of E (like >500 pg / mL at trough, which is really too high for long-term levels).