Androcur frustrations, emotions, fear of emotions, etc

[Danya (imported)]

I've been seeing a gender therapist at the University of Minnesota. It's official, I'm gender challenged! [Absolutely hated puberty, etc., etc.] Overall, I've been feeling really good that I'm dealing with this. The results I've been getting from Androcur (100 mg/day) have been less than I expected, though. It's been 6 weeks since I started Androcur. My interest in porn and Photoshopping (is this a new word?) out guys' balls because they look so adorable without them have disappeared and that's fine. Of course, I'm sure a shrink would tell me, and I'd likely agree (mind you, it's not necessary for me to accept or even be aware of your own thoughts on shrinks), that it was really MY balls I was removing in the computer. Thing is, I've orgasmed each of the last two nights. For several weeks I had no desire to try but I've been interested in how far I've progressed, regressed whatever! Now it seems there is much less sensation in my cock. Also, and I haven't seen this mentioned elsewhere on the site, it seems like my balls are somewhat less sensitive, kind of numb, too. My prostate is smaller. Don't ask how I know this, but I have my ways and I've got much practice. Perhaps I'm just one of those eunuchs or near eunuchs who is blessed (cursed?) with a continuing ability to erect and orgasm. I'll get my T levels checked soon. My free T was 9.7 pg/ml (on a somewhat arbitrary scale of 7 - 28) within the last year. The mostly meaningless total T was 800. The thing that bothers me is that I don't feel, for the most part, any less male than when I started A. Although I have been much happier and on an annoying regular basis This may just be proof of my gender issue much as giving a MTF estrogen is viewed as proof of the diagnosis if that person feels better on the hormone.

I don't want to increase the Androcur beyond 100 mg/day because of the increased risk of dangerous side effects, like liver failure!

I have definitely become more emotional, at one point feeling I needed to flee a restaurant because I was starting to sob from a wash of strong, although good, emotions. There were two problems preventing a hasty leave. I hadn't finished eating and perhaps more importantly, I hadn't paid the bill. While I am more emotional, and caring as a coworker aware of my 'situation' told me, I'm also my 'ballsy' in my approach to upper management at work. I attribute this to the simple fact that I'm feeling much better about myself.

OTOH, I still have some fear of letting people see too much of my true feelings, i.e., my inner self. Goes back to fear of rejection as a kid. Yeah, I was one of those once, I think. No, come to think of it, I wasn't. Ever. This has really bothered me in the last day or two as I've taken, what for me is, the risky step of telling several people I know how I truly feel about them. These are very good feelings and are related to friendship, caring, conern. No feelings of lusting after a body or anything really exciting like that. And no one's calling me by that darling term 'eunuch pet' that Yoli uses for her pal Barry. Oops, I guess this last sentence is off-topic! Still, I'm still always more than a bit concerned about rejection when I do this. Actually, it's much better than it used to be and I think I'm getting a handle on it now.

Truth is, though, that for the first time since I started Androcur I'm having some emotions I haven't felt for a while and I'm not sure this is a good thing. I've lived alone for the 12 years I've been out as gay and I'm not lonely on my own. I've never been in a relationship with a man, although I've tried to find one. I've been madly in love with one guy who isn't prepared to love me back. Fairly typically for me, although I had a crush on this guy for months, I never had a sexual dream about him and didn't get aroused when we hugged. Seems I'm cursed with needing to feel a genuine emotional bond before there can be arousal. At any rate, I'm now feeling a real need to have a man in my life and I don't just mean anyone available in pants. He has to be someone I connect with and care for. I don't jave a clue how to go about finding this guy or eunuch. I'm not concerned that I may, after the politically correct waiting period, be castrated (or I may not be) and that this will affect my relationship possibilities. In the end, I need to be in the body that is comfortable for me. Everyone deserves that much.

And I at times feel tired of being the nice, sensitive guy. Not that I can really change that or want to. Sometimes I just feel like doing something more rebellious than people expect, like going for castration before the politically correct waiting period has passed. This is just an urge and I won't do that. In reality, I know it's good to take this slowly and deliberately. In addition, I highly recommend it. It is a temptation, though, to skip to the last chapter now.

[JesusA (imported)]

Tomorrow marks ten months since you made your first, very tentative, post on the Eunuch Archive. Think about how far you've come in such a short time. You are definitely far more comfortable with yourself. You seem to have opened up to others (and they appear to enjoy the new you). You've just begun your journey, but you've made tremendous progress already.

[Danya (imported)]

I'd forgotten how recently it was that I made my first post here, Jesus. I barely wrote anything at all. Now, it's hard to shut me up! I've definitely made a lot of progress and part of that is due to connecting with some really nice people on the archive. I don't think I ever would have come this far without the acceptance I've found here. This is really quite an amazing place.

I'll be seeing my gender therapist Thursday when I'll get her report on the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory and Tennessee whatchamacallit tests I took. She was supposed to arrange to have the Univ of Minn sexuality program endocronologist call me to set up an appointment. That hasn't happened. I'll remind her. Perhaps I can continue to see Katie (therapist) and go to an endocronologist not associated with the U, which is considered an out-of-network provider by my insurance. Medica will only cover 40% of the expenses there. If she knows a good in-network endocronologist, that would be great.

It will be three months, end of January, since I started seeing Katie. That's the minimum time they typically want to wait before prescribing hormones. I'd like to be taking something to supplement the effects of Androcur or replace it. I'm just concerned that my testosterone isn't being lowered enough to 'count' as a true test of chemical castration. Of course, I need to get my T level tested. I'd consider more self-medication although I'd prefer to avoid that. Besides, February's just a month and a half away.

[Danya (imported)]

Jesus sent me the link to Richard Wassersug's wonderful article "Disfiguring treatment? No, it was healing." NY Times, March 27, 2007. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/27/health/27case.html. The article has an interesting take on angels and eunuchs. More important, for me, is Richard's description of changes in mental and emotional functioning. I realized I've been starting to experience some of these changes myself. I look at these changes as either benign or positive. Here's what I wrote to Jesus in response to the article:

I do seem to be finding it more difficult to multi-task. I’m fine with this, at least as long as it doesn’t affect my job performance. My employer, like many other companies, I’m sure, stresses that persons in my type of position need to be able to do multiple tasks simultaneously. The truth of the matter, at least from my readings, is that multi-tasking is no more efficient, and may even be less so, than performing one task at a time.

When I was in NJ earlier in the week, there was an emergency at work and I got called. For some reason, I was having a great deal of trouble picturing in my mind something that I’ve worked with fairly regularly. This wasn’t something I do on even a monthly basis but typically forming the mental picture wouldn’t have been a problem. This appears to be a spatial reasoning issue. What I was having trouble with was how the various pieces of a display fit together.

I’ve also found that since starting Androcur, my strong ambition to change careers out of IT and back into science or into an IT/science type of career has vanished. Before my feeling was ‘I’ve got an MS in ecology and a PhD in chemistry, I deserve something ‘better’ and I need to be challenged more, I deserve more money’ and on and on. As I’ve mentioned before, though, I never really enjoyed industrial chemistry, which is where I’d be most likely to succeed in reentering the field. I love science, BTW, and I’ve been very good at it. I definitely do not like the day to day drudgery of an industrial research chemist. I haven’t worked as a chemist for 9 years now so nearly a third of my working life has been in IT. Now I feel more like I'm where I belong, many of my friends are there, the working environment is generally really good and the truth is I make a very decent salary as it is. Status is much less important to me. It was a perceived lack of status that was driving my unhappiness on the job. I still work hard to do a really good job. At this point in my life, status isn’t going to bring me happiness. Besides, I realize now that what was in part driving my status-seeking was a lack of fulfillment in other parts of my life.

While I’m not quite ready to take this step, I may drop my idea of starting a photography side business. The reason is related to my desire for a more active social life. I’m totally crazy about photography and dropping the business idea wouldn’t mean I’d be giving it up as a serious hobby. For the last 3 – 4 weeks I’ve been spending nearly every waking moment at work or doing photography. It’s been very stimulating and I’m constantly learning new skills and honing old ones with the camera. Learning new things has always been important to me. Like my other big passion, playing the piano and organ, photography is mostly a solitary activity. What I’ve never wanted to face is that I cannot do everything I want in life. So it all comes down to what’s most important. I’ve always told myself that other people were the most important things in my life but now I realize that hasn’t been true. I’ll probably make a decision to spend no more than x hours a week with the camera and see how that goes. It doesn’t have to be an all or nothing deal.

It’s been weeks, or even longer, since I’ve had the TV on. I’ll need to power up the thing so I can test the ‘cries at commercials’ effect Richard mentions. Actually, I suspect this would come quite easily for me now.

So, since I’m experiencing many of the mental side-effects of castration, perhaps I am closer than I imagined to being chemically castrated. Despite the fact that I can still get firm erections, although that does take a bit of effort and lots of work to ‘keep it up’. There’s also the fact that I really have little desire to get an erection. It’s nice knowing I can still get aroused if I want it badly enough and even have a mild orgasm.

[mrt (imported)]

For what its worth I got all teared up over the dopy On Star Commercials on the radio when my hormones were in the tank.

Good luck with the Endo. When I was in the middle of juggling treatment and waiting for the first script for HRT I was on pins and needles. No pun intended...

[Danya (imported)]

I'm going out to celebrate at brunch. For now I'll say that I was unable to orgasm even after 1 3/4 hours of trying, last night. There was absolutely no hint that if I'd kept up all night anything would have happened. I'll write some more on what this means to me when I get back. Briefly, though, I was at first kind of in shock.

[tugon (imported)]

Your post reminded me of my opening a Pandora's box of emotions after castration. If someone did something kind I would tear up or if they said something rude I would tear up. I went through this period of being overwhelmed with emotion. I learned to accept this new greater emotional range and enjoy it a great deal. I am able to keep my emotions from being as public as they had been.

Sex was no longer important to me but wow did I need affection. I even wanted a child for about four years. Strange women would come up and hand me their babies. I would just smile and be so happy until they wrestled them away. It was like I was sending out this signal to all mothers that I want to hold their babies. I was in my office at my previous job and this woman came in with her child and handed her to me. I held her for a few moments and we talked. After mother and baby left my boss asked who she was and I had to answer I had no idea. Babies were just handed to me.

It may not seem like it now but rediscovering yourself and finding out who you truly are will one day be remembered as a magical time in your life. It takes work and sharing is so important. Finding others with similar feelings is a blessing and that is why the EA is such an important site for so many.

[Danya (imported)]

So far, Tugon, if someone does something really rude I'm still able to tell them to their face, in no uncertain terms, that they're ticking me off and they'd better stop. This happened with a word friend Friday evening. After that, though, on my drive home, I was crying a bit. Hey, that's OK though. Besides, when I got home I found a message this friend had left. A very long apology detailing each of his transgressions and admitting how inappropriate his behavior had been. Damn right, it had been:D None the less, it brought tears to my eyes again.

Started crying a bit on the way to brunch this morning. Mostly just general happiness! Strange stuff:) I may try the TV commercial acid test for crying later in the day. Actually, Richard Wassersug was crying of a Mothers Against Drunk Driving commercial. I can already relate to getting emotional about that.

[Danya (imported)]

As I stated earlier, before celebrating with brunch, I was unable to orgasm last night after trying really 'hard' for nearly two hours. I didn't even have the slightest feeling that if I just kept it up longer, I'd eventually ejaculate. It was like there was absolutely nothing there to happen. I might as well have been stroking and jerking my lubricated index finger for all the good it was doing!:D

My feelings about this surprised me at first. I was in shock that no matter what I tried nothing was going to happen. Now, dear readers, you being reasonable people might well wonder why the hell I would be in shock since I'm taking a chemical castration drug. What was going through my mind was that 'Hey, this is real now' and I felt, in a way, there's no turning back. Of course, strictly speaking, that's not true. OTOH, I have felt such happiness and peace since I started Androcur, experienced some of the other side effects and started dealing with my gender issues that I'm not sure I can go back, or would want to. So, in a small way that I know can't compare to the real thing, I felt like I'd actually been physically castrated and this was it. I was feeling very hyperactive after this realization, even the 'what have I done?' emotion. Again, this is in part because I feel the eunuch ID very likely does fit me. I wrote a friend late last night about what I was experienceing. I was so hyper I wrote I was out of control. I'm sure he often thinks I'm a little crazy but last night was beyond that. Today, I feel fine about it. I feel certain I could live with never having another orgasm. I'm not certain that's my preferred outcome. If I am surgically castrated, I'd want at least minimal T (or maybe E) replacement for health reasons and perhaps some sexual feellings for a special someone who might enter my life. Even if I'd be left with little sexuality, though, I feel that the most critical thing for me is to feel comfortable in my body. I feel better about that every day.

I'm certain to start over analyzing all this at some point. This is really the first time in my life I'm allowing my emotions, and how 'right' things feel, determine my direction with minor input from my intellect. My biggest concern is 'why do I continue to feel so continuously (very close to it) happy about chemically castrating myself'. On the face of it, it sounds kind of strange, to me anyway. Although there are all sorts of reasons I'd feel this way going back to when I was a kid. I just wonder if I'm really in touch with reality with this non-stop happiness.

[plix (imported)]

Glad to see that for the most part things are continuing to go well for you

Keep in mind though that you have only been on Andorcur for 6 weeks. That really is nowhere near long enough to get a true idea of the effects of castration over the long term. Even I have never really experienced the long term effects as the most I have gone without hormones was only three months.

The thing you really have to be watching for over these next few weeks and months is being hit with a severe episode of depression. It's happened to many on this board who were not expecting it, and it could definitely happen to you.

I do not seem to be sensitive to emotional and mood issues with changing hormone levels for several reasons: 1. I have always had an ongoing mild to moderate depression, which gets neither better nor worse on hormones or off. 2. I rarely express any emotion on the outside as a natural part of my personality and as the result of various childhood issues, and changing hormones don't change this part of my personality. 3. Three months may not have been long enough to experience a severe depression in my case.

But these reasons obviously do not apply to you since you are already experiencing emotional changes. So you still can't rule out the possibility of a severe depression, or even a milder one which may be difficult, and this is definitely something to keep in mind so you will know if it does develop. I seem to be one of very few who do not experience these emotional changes and who do not get at least a mild degree of depression.

Your Total T was a bit high for your age, but your free T was low normal, which is typical for someone your age. Total T is not completely meaningless - it is all my doctor will test for to determine how my shots are working, and it is all you should be interested in to tell how well Androcur is working.

That continuing ability to get erect and orgasm will diminish with time. I was always able to get an erection with direct stimulation even on E, but erections without direct stimulation (which is generally how I define "ability") decreased over time starting immiedately after the surgery. Eventually they ceased altogether. Age also plays a role - many young eunuchs are able to maintain sexual desire and ability (likely getting erections during sex, which is how "ability" is traditionally defined) for quite some time after the cut.

I wouldn't worry too much about liver problems. They are pretty uncommon, and you can always test your liver every 3 months or so to be sure they are not developing.

Best wishes on your continued journey toward discovering who you really are and finding happiness in that identity