Are the stabbing pains skin-deep like an insect sting, or deeper like a pulled muscle?
this post was submitted on 19 Apr 2025
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deeper, like a pulled muscle. My paranoid brain thought blood clots immediately buuuut that seems unlikely
When I started HRT, my doctor had me ramp up the antiandrogen slowly over the course of 4 weeks. It was spironolactone and that caused some odd issues shortly after the increase day. Also I was on 4mg/day of sublingual estradiol. The weird feelings were weakness and an inability to regulate temperature, but nothing painful.
Other antiandrogens are available, it's probably a good idea to make some sort of change to your medicine. Pain is usually an indication that something is wrong.
Not only slowly ramping up, but starting one then the other separately (i.e., starting one, then starting the other two weeks later) means you can isolate which one is causing you problems
See https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/14985192 and paging @will_steal_your_username@lemmy.blahaj.zone
this seems similar to what she was describing, pain in legs after injecting estrogen
EDIT: I should say, I've never experienced this, even when I was taking bicalutamide. I did have some sensations I would describe like a body buzz, but it was never painful (was pleasant, even).
You might experiment with different doses and see if switching to spiro makes a difference. Might also try monotherapy, just see if any of those experiences are different.
But yes, bioidentical estrogen should be totally safe, esp. if you are injecting it or using it transdermally. Oral is still safe, but it's very spikey, and arguably not as great:
Estradiol levels are found to rapidly rise on the order of ten times that of the peak of oral estradiol, then rapidly decline with an elimination half-life of a few hours (Kuhl, 2005).
For that reason I wouldn't recommend oral, even though it's so popular. I would assume negative side effects like mood swings, slower and uneven testosterone suppression, and low average estradiol blood levels are more likely on oral. Still, lots of people are fine on oral so it's more something for you to experiment with and see what works best for you.
For me they stopped eventually, but was there constantly for a few days after each injection. I tried three different esters and thought the newest one worked because of different ingredients, but when I tried one of the previous ones again I had no pains. I dunno if it was caused by stress, if me doing more exercise or eating better helped, or really have any good explanation for what happened and why it stopped.
I also did have some random but minor pains when I first started HRT, before I tried injections, but it was very bearable and stopped within a few weeks. To me it seemed like different kinds of pains because my body got new instructions etc, like my ligaments changing, but I don't really know. All I know is it was just briefly now and then before stopping.
sounds hopeful, yay! Glad that they eventually went away ❤️
I should have specified in my post, but I was taking oral estrogen.
Unclear whether it matters or not, but you might experiment with other routes of administration as well as dose to see if they make a difference. Hopefully that other post will give you some helpful ideas, too, in case it's related.
I've not heard about a common reaction like that to estrogen, but I'm not a doctor. No clue about bicalutimide though.
Can confirm I didn't have this when I took bicalutamide, nor is it a typical side effect.