6 Natural Ways To Optimize Testosterone That ACTUALLY Work

6 Natural Ways To Optimize Testosterone That ACTUALLY Work

References:
https://sci-hub.se/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S089990079680058X?via=ihub
https://www.nature.com/articles/1602899
https://www.asep.org/asep/asep/BrillaV2.PDF
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33741447/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0960076021000716?via%3Dihub
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1569444/#:~:text=The%20prevalence%20of%20hypogonadism%20was,presenting%20to%20primary%20care%20offices.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6571549/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12711931/
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https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4445839/

Testosterone levels have been decreasing over the years and this could be from a variety of factors such as changes in diet exercise habits environmental effects and other things as well now we know that testosterone levels decrease as we age but it should come to be a little surprising that over time the

Average person had higher testosterone levels 20 years ago this study here shows that between 2006 and 2009 testosterone levels were significantly higher and testosterone levels between 2016 and 2019 for all age groups this should lead us to believe that there must be a shift that has happened in our lifestyle or

Environment that has caused these changes in this video we’re going to look at ways to try and optimize testosterone levels naturally to make sure we are feeling our best first we’re going to look at how certain nutrients can affect testosterone levels there are studies out there that do show that a

Zinc deficiency can lead to hypogonadism in men which is diagnosed low testosterone this study had young adults engage in dietary zinc restriction for 20 weeks which led to a significant decrease in serum testosterone levels they also saw that zinc supplementation of marginally zinc deficient normal elderly men for 6 months resulted in an

Increase in serum testosterone pretty much doubling from 8 to 16 nanomoles per liter this study also states that about 30% of Elder men had at least a marginal zinc deficiency so this a pretty good chunk of people that can benefit from zinc supplementation the dose used in

This study is stated as 459 micromoles which if my math is correct comes out to about 30 Mig of zinc per day someone can double check me on that in the comments I will appreciate it I’m actually not going to correct you on that there’s another study I want to go over which

Had participants taking 30 Mig of zinc 450 Mig of magnesium aspartate and 10 1 12 Mig of vitamin B6 the results are in this chart they measured levels of zinc and magnesium which is good as these levels are right on border so a good chunk of the participants were at least

Marginally deficient in these minerals and once they supplemented their levels increased by a good amount also we can see testosterone levels increased significantly after supplementation with the zinc magnesium and vitamin B6 complex whereas in the placebo group nothing changed if anything there was a slight dip in Mineral and testosterone

Levels now it’s not NE NE to just take zinc if you are not deficient as this study shows that zinc supplementation does not increase testosterone levels if you are not already deficient in the mineral however as seen from the studies before a good chunk of people are deficient in zinc and magnesium so

Getting a good quality multivitamin to close any nutritional gaps you may have may be a good idea to optimize levels now in terms of foods that are high in zinc these include oysters beef crab pork beans chicken and yogur yogurt foods high in magnesium include leafy green vegetables spinach kale beans

Lentils nuts and seeds and whole grains now speaking of nutrients the next thing on the list I want to go over to optimize testosterone is to avoid lowfat diets this study shows that there is a significant decrease in sex hormones on low fat versus high fat diets also the

Study published in the Journal of steroid biochemistry and molecular biology found that lowfat diets decrease men’s testosterone levels by 10 to 15% that is a pretty substantial difference and a little confusing as most countries kind of condemn fat intake especially the United States and United Kingdom now

It is no secret that high amounts of fat intake can lead to cardiovascular disease and cause tons of other complications but low fat intake is also detrimental for testosterone production as seen from this study low testosterone can also cause cardiovascular problems and increase risk factors for that

Disease let’s take a closer look at that study to see what was going on so what had 206 participants with a mean age of 46 years old lasting 2 to 10 weeks the difference in fat intake was by about 20% between the groups which came to almost 600 calories overall and overall

The study found that total testosterone and free testosterone levels decreased in the lowfat diet group compared to the high fat diet group a limitation to study found was that these diets may have been lower in zinc which is a common feature of vegetarian diets and marginal zinc deficiency has been found

To decrease total testosterone as I mentioned earlier it’s unlikely that this played a massive role in the lowering of testosterone but it can play a small world so it is something that’s good to mention so keep in mind that it is possible that the trend of eating lowfat Foods overall has caused a

Decrease in testosterone levels over the years fat intake has decreased by 10% since the 1960s when the US dietary guidelines advised a reduction in fat intake we can’t completely conclude that a lowfat diet will reduce testosterone but it seems that it is connected in some way however people should also

Understand that being overweight or obese also drastically reduces testosterone levels along with increasing risk factors for many other diseases so if sticking to a lowfat diet is a good way to help you lose weight then sticking to that type of diet will probably be more beneficial for you over

The long term it’s just that we should be aware that a lowfat diet can reduce testosterone levels so if that is your main concern then avoid a low-fat diet to optimize levels also remember that you shouldn’t be just going on a high fat diet CU that also has many many complications including cardiovascular

Disease as well so getting a good intake of fat overall is good to optimize your heart health and your testosterone levels now an interesting one I want to go over is plastic and hormone levels this study showed that following acute exposure to microplastics the serum testosterone content reduced and sperm

Quality declined resulting in male reproductive dysfunction in mice now this is obviously a study done on mice and not humans so it’s possible that the data will not transfer to humans but it is something to keep in mind that Plastics can possibly have an effect on testosterone levels plastic concern is

Mostly due to heat and degradation so although you can prevent that from happening by storing it in a cool place for example it’s very difficult to know how something was manufactured under what conditions so although you can follow safety precautions you have no idea how the manufacturer is doing it

Themselves basically Plastics can release xenoestrogens which basically can trick your body into thinking it has more estrogen than it actually does thus causing it to produce less testosterone the more estrogen you have the less testosterone your body will make to hone down on that estrogen overall I would

Avoid Plastics as much as possible since it is not only harming hormone levels but also not the best thing for the environment either now the next thing I want to discuss is weight and exercise first thing is weight too much body fat can lead to a decreased amount of total

And free testosterone now we all know that all of the major health risks associated with obesity such as diabetes and cardiovascular risk but we can add testosterone deficiency to that list as well in a study by molan and others titled prevalence of hypogonadism in males aged at least 45 years old the hym

Study it showed that 52.4% of all obese men have testosterone levels below 300 nanog per decaliter which translates to 10.4 nanomoles per liter being overweight is defined as having a body mass index or BMI between 25 and 30 while obese is a BMI above 30 I want to

Quickly go over how low testosterone levels are related to obesity in a simple way there’s an enzyme in the body called aromatase this enzyme is responsible for converting testosterone to estrogen fat cells have an abundance of this enzyme so the more fat on a particular male the more fat cells the

More aromatase the more testosterone being converted to estrogen the worse the testosterone deficiency so a simple way to increase testosterone levels would be to lose weight to reduce the amount of fat cells and aromatase now exercise is a great way to lose weight and it’s also a great way to increase

Testosterone levels especially if you’re doing weightlifting high-intensity workouts such as hit also increase testosterone but they are not as effective as weightlifting this is because you increase muscle mass more when lifting heavy weights versus circuit training and muscle mass triggers the body to create more testosterone so this is kind of the

Opposite of an overweight mechanism that increases estrogen increased fat will increase estrogen but increased muscle mass will increase testosterone something to be cautious of however is that cycling or jogging for several hours can actually decrease testosterone levels doing an 8 minute mile or jogging for 20 minutes a few times a week isn’t

Going to reduce testosterone levels by any meaningful amount and the overall health benefits outweigh the small chance of a tiny testosterone decrease but I just wanted to mention it to differentiate between which workouts increase or decrease testosterone levels now alcohol is the other thing that can affect testosterone levels two different

Studies here to get the same result the first one says both testosterone production and spermatogenesis seem to be affected by alcohol abuse in a dose dependent manner heavy drinkers are more likely to have a poor testicular function than moderate consumers and the second one says heavy acute alcohol drinking decreases blood testosterone in

Men due to an effect on the testicular level so alcohol can have an effect on testosterone levels and also on sexual function as well as other things heavy drinkers experience the worst of these symptoms heavy drinking is normally defined as having more than 15 drinks per week or basically more than two

Drinks per day for men it’s about half that for women but alcohol not only directly affects testosterone and other hormone levels but it also has a heavy effect on sleep and that’s what I want to go over next now sleep is obviously something that can affect all aspects of

Your life and it is no different with testosterone we are going to take a look at this study which had a pretty good design to it it is a small study but 10 participants slept at home for 8 hours for one week then went into the laboratory for three nights to sleep for

10 hours followed by eight nights of 5 hours of sleep here we see that daytime testosterone levels were decreased by 10 to 15% in this small convenience sample of young healthy men who underwent one week of sleep restriction to 5 hours per night a condition experienced by at

Least 15% of the US working population by comparison normal aging is associated with a decrease of testosterone levels by 1 to 2% per year that is a massive difference in testosterone levels and the swing happens very quickly when you lack sleep 5 hours is clearly unsustainable over a lifetime but even

One week of sleeping less than 8 hours reduce testosterone levels by over 10% for healthy young males now ways to improve sleep are obviously all over the huberman Lab podcast by turning off the lights and avoiding screen time close to bedtime getting sun exposure first thing

In the morning for at least 15 minutes of possible avoiding caffeine for at least 90 minutes after waking are all ways we can improve our Sleep Quality I’m a big believer and tracking data to help improve health and the Apple Health app isn’t the greatest sleep tracker but

It does a decent job for free especially if you own an Apple Watch wearing that to sleep will track your data pretty well so as we can see there are plenty of ways to optimize testosterone levels by just simply adjusting lifestyle and habits sleep diet exercise micronutrients and even plas can play a

Role in reducing testosterone levels in the body so I hope this was helpful in kind of understanding how we can optimize testosterone levels that’s it for this video thank you all for watching and I’ll see you all next time