In this episode of the Sexual Health for Men podcast, Dr. Anne Truong MD explains why testosterone naturally declines after age 30 and how low levels affect libido, energy, muscle mass, and overall vitality. She first outlines natural strategies—morning bodyweight squats, hip‑hinges, planks, and other compound movements performed between 7 am and 10 am—to stimulate large muscle groups and boost testosterone up to 30 % compared with evening workouts. She then discusses lifestyle factors that suppress testosterone, namely chronic stress, poor sleep, and excessive alcohol consumption, emphasizing cortisol’s antagonistic relationship with testosterone. When lifestyle changes are insufficient, Dr. Truong reviews medical options: bi‑weekly testosterone cypionate injections (with a recommended every‑3‑day schedule due to a 72‑hour half‑life), the newly FDA‑approved oral testosterone (still under observation), and sustained‑release testosterone pellets implanted in the buttock fat (her preferred method for steady, bioidentical delivery). She stresses the necessity of regular hormone monitoring—free testosterone, SHBG, estradiol, and DHT—to avoid complications such as hair loss, prostate inflammation, estrogen‑related fat gain, or DHT‑driven acne. A patient case illustrates stress‑induced low testosterone (260 ng/dL at age 42) and the decision to use pellet therapy. Finally, Dr. Truong recommends the Mediterranean diet as a research‑backed nutritional approach to improve circulation, reduce inflammation, and support healthy testosterone levels. The episode closes with a call to action to subscribe, share, and access her free resources and book on common ED mistakes.
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Men over 30, your testosterone is tanking. Before jumping to treatments, try this. Do bodyweight squats and hip hinges specifically between 7 and 10 AM. This morning window naturally spikes your T levels. Also cut the stress, poor sleep, and alcohol. When lifestyle isn't enough, consider medical options like biweekly cypionate injections or sustained-release pellets. But here's the crucial warning. Never take testosterone blindly. You must monitor your free T, SHBG, estradiol, and DHT. If you don't track these, you risk severe side effects like hair loss and prostate inflammation. Do it safely, get your labs checked, and subscribe for more men's health tips.
This podcast is for you, the modern man. I'm Dr. Anne Truong MD, your host. I'm an intimate health medical doctor and bestselling author of the book Erectile Dysfunction Fix. I'll do a deep dive into sexual health and performance and how it affects men of all ages and backgrounds. So let's get started and be sure to visit my website at sexualhealthformenpodcast.com for more information and resources from the show. See you on the inside.
Anne Truong MD.
So if you want to increase your testosterone— testosterone is helpful for men for libido, erection, energy, muscle mass, strong bones, energy, focus, and less fat accumulation. So if you want to increase your testosterone, and your testosterone naturally decreases After the age of 30, it decreases 1 to 2%. So by the time you're like 60, you'll probably lost at least 30% of your testosterone level. So what does that mean? That means that when you get older, like in your 50s, you start to accumulate more fat around your waistline and you have fat along the chest, less muscle mass, become more flabby and less energy. Less libido, and you may even notice less firm erection as well. Now, it's not only testosterone that contributes to less firmness, other factors too, but testosterone is one of that reason. And testosterone is what makes you a man, a man, right? So if you find yourself taking naps, you find yourself not able to focus, you find yourself not able to be as productive as you used to be, well, most of the time, it's probably your testosterone. So, well, get your testosterone level checked, but there are natural ways that you can increase testosterone. And that is by doing bodyweight, weight training, or compound bodyweight. So what does that mean? That means that if you do exercises like squats, just hinging squats, where you just squat down to your butt is about the same level as your knee, and then come up again quickly. If you do like 12 repetitions, I And 3 sets of that, that uses the leg muscle, the buttock muscle, the abdominal muscle. Those are big muscles of the body. And also do a hip hinge where you bend your hip way down low and then come up again. So squat or hip hinge or hip where you just bend your back and then come up. What that does is that it activates large muscle groups in your body that will be challenged. And if you're muscle gets stronger, then it sends a signal to your body that you need to have make more testosterone because testosterone help build more muscle. And if you have more muscle, then your body have to make more testosterone. So if you do just squats, if you do hip hinge where you bend over and then stand up, if you do like plank exercises where you do a plank on your arm, or even on your forearm. Well, those exercises are made to increase big large muscles. If you do that, and if you do it first thing in the morning between 7 and 10 AM, you will make more testosterone than if you were gonna exercise at nighttime. And why is that? Because at 7 to 10 AM, cortisol level is high and testosterone level is high. So when you exercise in the morning, your levels are high. So if you exercise, it will actually be helping make more. They'll be higher. Okay. And you can actually make 30% more testosterone in the morning versus doing the same exercise at night. To be efficient with your training, exercise in the morning between 7 AM to 10 AM. And sometimes that's hard because you got to go to work. Well, nothing to say you can't do it earlier at 5 or 6 AM and then go to work. So if you don't work at those hours, then shoot for 7 to 10 AM. And you don't have to do it every day. You just do it like 3 or 4 times a week. And you don't need to join a gym to do that as well. I mean, it'll be good if you do, but you don't need to. You know, just do use your own body weight. Okay. And it will be as effective. Natural way to increase your testosterone. Now, also know that your testosterone level will also dip as well. It will dip when you are stressed and when you don't sleep well. It will also dip when you drink alcohol. One of the primary cause of low testosterone is alcohol and stress and sleep. So you're not sleeping 7 hours straight, your body's not going to be able to make testosterone. And if you are stressed, either work, family stress, what happened with stress is that it increased cortisol, which is a stress hormone. And then cortisol is the opposite of testosterone. Cortisol will lower testosterone, and also alcohol will also lower testosterone as well. Now, daily consumption of alcohol, more than 14 drinks a week, will do that. And I stress daily consumption. So those are the common things that will decrease your testosterone level on top of aging. The other day I saw he was 42, but his level was 267. Your range, it should be around 300 to 900. His was under 300 and he's only 42 and he exercises, he eat well, he doesn't have high blood pressure, high cholesterol. He doesn't drink that much. But why is his level low? His level's low because of stress, because he owns a business and he work a lot and travels a lot. And yeah, that will totally do it. But this patient of mine, he's healthy, doesn't have any ED issues, just have low testosterone level. And most likely it is from stress. And so if that's the case, then either decrease the stress. He owns a business, so it's hard not to be stressed. And so we're going to have to supplement it. So you either decrease the stress or you can supplement testosterone with either pellet. There's several ways to supplement testosterone. You can supplement testosterone through injection where you do injection yourself. I recommend testosterone cypionate twice a week. Most clinics do it once a week or even once every 2 weeks. That's way too long. Testosterone cypionate half-life is 72 hours. So within 72 hours, it will be less than 50%. So you've got to inject every 3 days for it to be optimal level. So that's testosterone cypionate. So now there's another way to take testosterone orally. It come out, FDA just approved an oral testosterone orally. I don't know how well that worked yet. They're waiting for people, they're waiting for feedback on that. I have not given it out because it's not covered by insurance at this time. And a patient have to pay for it by per pill. So waiting to see the result on that as compared to injection. And then the form that I particularly like is pellet, which is insertion of testosterone pellets, which is like the size of a Tic Tac. And I insert that on the buttock area, in the fat area. Think of it like a reservoir where you embed the pellet in the fat of the buttock area and you put in several pellets. Some men will require between 6 to 10 pellets, and those pellets are released as testosterone every day. And it's bioidentical, meaning that it is natural from yam, and it releases testosterone every day, and it has less complication than doing the injectable with testosterone cypionate. So I prefer getting testosterone through pellet because it's better absorption, daily production, less side effects as well. So there's ways of injection testosterone, oral, and then pellet. The oral, I don't know about efficacy of that. Still waiting to see. So between the two, the most popular ones, probably pellets and injection at this point. And you have to measure the levels. Once you started, you probably have to measure the level within 6 weeks to see where you're at. And you have to measure not only total testosterone, but free testosterone, and also SHBG, which is sex hormone binding globulin protein. And then you have to measure estradiol, which is a female hormone, which is converted from testosterone. And then you have to measure DHT. Which stands for dihydrotestosterone, which is, gets converted from testosterone. And dihydrotestosterone is inflammatory for hair and also for prostate. So if you're on testosterone, make sure you get tested for blood work for conversion to estrogen and dihydrotestosterone, because if you have high level of dihydrotestosterone or DHT, that will cause hair loss. And also cause inflammation to the prostate. And if you have high level of estrogen, which come from testosterone, then you will have more body fat development in the chest area and in the belly area. However, men do need estrogen because estrogen will help with libido as well too. So you do need some, but not a lot. Women have 10 times more estrogen than men, but men have 10 times more testosterone than women. So if your body is not making that much testosterone anymore, then you need to get supplemented. And I just told you a story of one of my patients who owns a business. His level is low. The reason why he has low testosterone because of stress, and it's hard to decrease stress when you own a business. So we're supplementing his testosterone with pellets at this point. And monitor it closely. He doesn't have the symptoms of low testosterone, but it certainly is very low. 260 at 42, that is low. So make sure if you are— want to know what your testosterone level is, you can get a blood work to see. Then you can determine whether you're going to need to be supplemented or not. Okay, Modern Man, if you're struggling with weak erection, low energy, the food you eat could be be the big part of the problem. One of the best research-backed ways to boost circulation, support healthy testosterone, and improve sexual performance is the Mediterranean diet. It's packed with food that open up your blood vessel, lower inflammation, and fuel your hormone naturally. I've seen men notice real improvement in both energy and erection within weeks when they shift to this style of eating. So check out the Mediterranean diet link right here below and get that as soon as you can. Stronger testosterone and better erection.
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