The Life Plan (62 page)

I’m not a fan of this approach. Its absorption can be affected by weather conditions, and it can be transferred to your partner, or even your kids or grandkids. Plus, you need to apply it daily.

This testosterone delivery method slowly leaks into your system as it dissolves over a period of weeks. Problems arise if levels become too high; you’ll need to have a pellet taken out. Low levels mean another pellet needs to be inserted.

While this method works great for younger men with viable, healthy testicles, it’s less effective for the 50-plus crowd. This therapy, which is injected at the abdomen, stimulates the testicles to create more testosterone on their own.

This is my preferred method, because it provides a more steady state of testosterone in the bloodstream.

Before you rush out to your doctor’s office, there are a few very important things you need to know. Testosterone replacement therapy is not for everyone—many of you can achieve the same results naturally by changing your lifestyle! There are many things we can all do to increase our levels of testosterone without the help of the pharmaceutical industry.

The first is improving your eating habits by following the Life Plan. Proper nutrition plays an all-important role in keeping testosterone levels up. Men must eat plenty of protein, because protein stimulates the hormone glucagon and the muscle-building responses important for testosterone release. Also eat more vegetables and nontropical fruit (skip the bananas and pineapple) and be sure to greatly limit the intake of simple sugars and starches (high-glycemic-index carbs). Since they create a state of chronically elevated levels of insulin and cortisol, these hormones oppose the action of testosterone and interfere with its production. Also, don’t forget about essential fatty acids (omega-3s) found in fish and flaxseed as well as some saturated fats. These nutrients are essential for the body to produce testosterone. Studies clearly show that low-fat diets result in low testosterone levels, and diets higher in protein, lower in carbohydrates, and moderate in fats result in the greatest sustained high levels of testosterone. If your diet is low in fat and protein and high in complex carbohydrates and fiber, your testosterone level will remain very low, and you will never be able to build muscle mass and strength no matter how hard you train.

Topical [daily]

Under the tongue [twice daily]

Intramuscularly [weekly or twice weekly]

Subcutaneous T Implants [T pellets/depot T] once every 3 to 6 months

The next area of importance is exercise. Both the lack of physical activity and excessive physical activity (overtraining) will decrease your testosterone level. It is the duration, intensity, and frequency of exercise that determine testosterone levels. Testosterone levels increase the most when the exercise is short and very intense. It’s the core exercises, such as squats and bench presses, that train large muscle groups and do the best job of raising testosterone. This explains why squats help build upper-body muscles.

Testosterone actually decreases during extended periods of endurance training. After 60 minutes of exercise, cortisol levels begin to rise and testosterone levels decrease as a result of overtraining. This decrease can last up to six days. For this reason, some men who follow my program split their training sessions up and don’t perform aerobic training during the same session that they lift weights. If your testosterone levels are not an issue, then you don’t have to split your training.

Finally, make sure you get a full eight hours of sleep as often as possible to maximize your testosterone production. Hormone production is greatest when your body is at rest, which is why it’s important to get good sleep.

For the average man, foreplay takes between three to six minutes, while orgasms last on average 10 to 16 seconds. In order to up your average without upping your testosterone, exercise your pelvic floor muscles (PC) with Kegels. Aging, obesity/overweight, and weak connective tissue all put stress on your pelvic floor muscles and weaken them. The goal is to strengthen the PC to achieve better sexual gratification, by making your erections stronger and harder with more ejaculatory control.

Research by urologist Dr. Frank Sommer demonstrated that men doing PC exercises had 80 percent stronger, harder erections—performing better than those taking erectile dysfunction medications such as Viagra. Another study, led by Dr. Grace Dorey, showed that 40 percent of men who learned how to do Kegels were completely cured of ED and 35 percent had significant improvement.

Step one: Find your PC muscle.
What you don’t want to do is squeeze the wrong muscle. Here’s a simple way to make sure you have it right: The next time you have to urinate, stop your flow midstream. The muscles you use to do that are part of the PC. But don’t make this a habit, because interrupting urine flow can cause bladder problems.

Variations with 5 to 10 minute sessions.
Start at 10 reps and increase to 20 to 30 reps, repeating several times a day. It will take three to four weeks to notice a difference.

Tighten the PC, holding for a slow count of 3; relax and repeat 10 times.

Tighten the PC and relax as many times as you can in 10 seconds.

Tighten your entire abdomen and PC, then force the pressure outward by bearing down.

Quickly tighten and relax the PC using a fluttering movement for 1 to 5 seconds, then repeat.

There is a wide range of bioidentical hormones that you can consider replacing, depending on your current health status and deficiencies you may have. However, not all hormone therapies are the same. Synthetic hormones like methyltestosterone carry a black box warning connecting it to liver cancer. It has also been shown that growth hormones from cadavers cause cancer. I prescribe only pharmaceutically approved hormones, which are plant-based, natural, and safe. These hormones produce the same physiological responses as the body’s natural hormones.

Besides testosterone, the other hormones I most commonly prescribe for men are DHEA, thyroid hormone, melatonin, and on rare occasions, growth hormone after appropriate testing (see Chapter 11).