If low testosterone in men causes mood issues like anxiety, depression, low confidence, low energy, do women also experience this?
In: 5524
a couple things:
**1**. most of the brain functions performed by test can be performed by estrogens as well.
**2**. women’s androgen receptors in the brain are much more sensitive than men’s. this is what other commenters mean by women being ‘used to’ lower test levels.
‘androgen’ means ‘man-making’, and androgens are chemicals that activate androgen receptors. not all androgen receptors are the same; receptors in, say, the muscles, body hair, scalp hair, brain, and penis are all different, and can respond differently to the same hormones.
for example, scalp hair and body hair have opposite responses to androgen exposure. synthetic steroids can target muscles in particular, enhancing growth with less effects on the brain, hair, skin, etc., as test would for the same growth.
a man with typical female test levels, and a woman with typical male test levels would run both run into numerous mood issues, because they are differently sensitive, and are adapted to their respective normal ranges.
**3**. women can, and do, experience some low t symptoms. as another commenter noted, women’s test levels are at their lowest during their periods, and this is part of what causes the mood and behavior change that happens during this time. this typically isn’t as noticable as low test in men, since it’s only dropping down to the low end of normal, rather than outside of normal, and it’s effects are kinda small compared to the other stuff happening at that time you already know about.
also, women are more prone to all of the symptoms you listed, they just are more protecred from them than a man would be at equal levels, due to factors **1** and **2**.
source- took a year of psychology in college, and have been involved in strength training for most of my life, leading me to spend about the last 6 years around active steroid users on a daily basis, and picking up on the stuff they learn from researching their drugs. i won’t pretend that i really know endocrinology or neurochemistry, but i know enough about test to answer this pretty confidently.
i hope this isn’t violating the spirit of this sub; it got a bit more thorough than most comments i see here, but i think it should be pretty digestible.
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