Erections after castration and on female HRT

[AlmostThere (imported)]

I had an orchiectomy last summer. Best thing I've ever done! But my question is about erections. A few weeks after the surgery I went back on oral estradiol (2mg/day). I had no involuntary erections for the next 6 months, even had a little shrinkage of the penis. That was all great. But now I'm starting the next phase of my MTF transition so last month I upped my estrogen dose to 6 mg/day (with my endo's permission) and now I get huge erections all night, morning wood, and my penis size is back to what it was pre-orchie. What's the deal with that? I thought the combination of estrogen and the complete lack of testosterone would kill all the erectile function of this stupid thing, but instead it's more active than it's been in over a year. Anyone else have a similar experience?

[cheetaking243 (imported)]

I had an orchiectomy last summer. Best thing I've ever done! But my question is about erections. A few weeks after the surgery I went back on oral estradiol (2mg/day). I had no involuntary erections for the next 6 months, even had a little shrinkage of the penis. That was all great. But now I'm starting the next phase of my MTF transition so last month I upped my estrogen dose to 6 mg/day (with my endo's permission) and now I get huge erections all night, morning wood, and my penis size is back to what it was pre-orchie. What's the deal with that? I thought the combination of estrogen and the complete lack of testosterone would kill all the erectile function of this stupid thing, but instead it's more active than it's been in over a year. Anyone else have a similar experience?

Mileage varies. Significantly. Some friends have reported that they lost all erectile function on Spiro alone, and they actually had to take testosterone to be able to get erect. I myself have unfortunately had all of the function of the damned thing remain alive and well despite my levels of T and Free T consistently testing out at levels even lower than the bottom of what's supposed to be the "normal" range of a cisgender woman.

All I can say is, get your hormone levels checked by an endo, (sometimes the body does over-react to rapid changes in hormones by overcompensating,) that way you'll know if there's anything going on, and if the levels check out, unfortunately it might just be personal variation. I wish the no-erection fairy had blessed me, but unfortunately it didn't, and that's just how my body is, this might just be how your body reacts, it depends.

[JesusA (imported)]

Your experience is not unexpected. There has been quite a bit of research on the role of estrogen in maintaining normal sexual functioning in males castrated after puberty. Davidson et al. (1983) reported that a 48 year-old man who had been castrated to cure his severe post-vasectomy orchialgia experienced no change in frequency of erections while using Premarin and Provera. He and his wife had the same frequency of intercourse.

Erik Wibowo, with whom I have coauthored a couple of papers, did his PhD research on sexual functioning of rats castrated after puberty. Estrogen maintained full male sexual behavior. Several publications have come out of Erik's work, including some on human males (with data from the Eunuch Archive survey).

Probably of greatest interest to EA members would be his publication with Richard Wassersug, Estrogen in Men, which is written at a popular level without the academic language of most publications on the subject.

I can send both of the articles to anyone who sends me an email address that will accept PDF attachments.

More importantly, however, I don't understand why your Endo has you on ORAL estradiol. There is a far great risk of blood clots with the oral, than with the transdermal. You need to ask about changing your prescription to the safer method.

______

Davidson, JM, Camargo, C, Smith, ER, & Kwan M. (1983). Maintenance of Sexual Function in a Castrated Man Treated with Ovarian Steroids. Archives of Sexual Behavior, vol. 12, no. 3, pp. 263-274.

Wibowo, E & Wassersug, R. (2014). Estrogen in Men. American Scientist, vol. 102, pp. 452-459.

[Frida G Cavic (imported)]

OMG

I thought I was the only one in this world experiencing woods almost everynight in spite my castrate T levels . of course they are weaker but they´re extremely annoying. I´m not on any replacement so I can´t blame to oestradiol . perhaps the guilty was adrenal testosterone.Also I´m taking bromocriptine by prescription ( a dopamine agonist) that would be another reason. I´m waiting for my endo started me officially on oestrogen by the next two months. I hope oestradiol don´t worse the thing and I wish belong to the group who oestrogen do not increase erections.

[Rocket Number Nine (imported)]

Switching your hormones up in general leads to some alterations in libido and all that. Give it a couple months though and things will probably even out and normalize a bit.

I'm not mtf or transgender or anything but for two years I've been on antiandrogens and injected estradiol, and one thing the injections have made me notice is their effect on my libido, purely from the nature of injecting estrogen and how your levels are different throughout the week. Higher estradiol levels lead to higher libido on their own for me, and the opposite for lower levels.

On spironolactone I found my libido constantly very low, couldn't even get erect sometimes, which sucked. When I switched to cyproterone, at first I'd get erections all the time and very easily, but after like 40-50 days it began to settle out more, and my libido is present but very low, yet my equipment is relatively functional if it needs to be used. No semen obviously, but other than that it does get erect still, and I don't have any problems typically getting it erect like I would on spironolactone. Sometimes I simply don't feel like it though and nothing can get me fully erect or if it can, nothing can finish it off. It all fluctuates, really. Generally it's like this: I can use it if I want, but the need or desire to use it never really rises on its own unless I purposefully initiate it or someone else does.

I haven't had any morning wood since the early stages of taking anti-androgens though, and my penis size has decreased a bit (although I've been trying to not lose size). Even when my libido flared up upon first switching to cyproterone, my penis size remained stable (did not increase in size :/) and I still didn't get any morning wood or random erections. It always takes a bit of physical stimulation to get it erect, even with a high libido relative to what is typical for me.