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[joziel]

Who uses Oestrogel and divides their doses AM and PM??

I'm on 5 pumps now and my main symptoms are at night. (Insomnia, heart beating hard, buzzing feet and inner tremors, startling at any slight noise and not being able to get into deep sleep.) It's hell.

One thing I haven't tried is dividing my dose. I wonder if my levels aren't quite lasting me through the night...?

I'd be interested to hear from others who divide doses, whether they found that helps or made no difference... ?

[Tinkerbell]

I was on 3 pumps and used it at night. I needed to go up to 4 recently and I put forth dose on in the day. I did think about and splitting equally but not good at remembering in day due to my working pattern.

[Gnatty]

I have tried it all ways and settled on all in the morning. Too much at night gives me bad insomnia. Those symptoms for me indicate too much oestrogen. I know we are all different though. I would try cutting back by half a pump to start with and see if it settles. You may have just slightly overcooked!

[joziel]

Thanks Gnatty but def not too much (if anything - too little). I've slowly increased from 1 pump and the symptoms haven't improved. (Well they did get better but not go entirely about 1-2 months ago. I don't now why it has all got bad again.) I had bloods done at 4 pumps and only had 283pmol and some of that would have been mine, so the current theory is that I'm not absorbing very well enough to override the fluctuations which cause these neuro symptoms and probably need to get up to 400-600pmol.

But I can only increase a pump every 4-6 weeks and if I get to 6 pumps and bloods are still not high enough (will test during my period) then will have to try a different form of estrogen. Already tried patches but wasn't absorbing well from them either. Probably Sandrena next.

[Scampidoodle]

Did you have your levels checked at day 21 joziel?

[joziel]

Tested day 16, when my own body should have been contributing a lot. So even worse really, in terms of the amount I might be getting from the gel.

[Banjo1973]

Hi Joziel,

I was on Oestrogel (very happily) then approx 4 months ago its stopped being effective. I slowly upped and upped it to 6 pumps (tried splitting doses with no real improvement). 2 weeks ago I switched to Sandrena. Within a day I felt better. Might be a different story for you, but for me Sandrena has been a game changer.

[joziel]

Thanks Banjo. How long were you on Oestrogel for before it stopped working? Was it anything to do with the cylindrical lid saga?

And also - what dose of Oestrogel were you on and what dose have you found to work with Sandrena? Thx!

[Banjo1973]

Hi joziel,

I think  was on oestrogel for about 18 months 2 years. I was originally on about 1 or 1.5 pumps then saw a meno specialist (to get testosterone) and she told me to up oestrogel to 3 pumps for 3 months before thinking about testosterone. 3 pumps worked well, I also got the testosterone (still limited sex drive - but lots of other benefits). This was all great for about 6 months then new oestrogel came along... it completely derailed me. I've had 4 rubbish months and finally ditched 'new' oestrogel for Sandrena. My life is back on track!

[Banjo1973]

Sorry...

Sandrena dose.

1 and a half 1mg sachets. Sometimes 2 x 1mg sachets.

[joziel]

So your 1.5mg or 2mg of Sandrena is equivalent to roughly 3-4 pumps of gel? (The good gel, not the rubbish cylindrical stuff?)

I'm just trying to figure out, if I'm on 5 pumps of gel (will be 6 next week when I increase) and I switch to Sandrena, am I trying to dose the same as 6 pumps - or do I assume I wasn't absorbing all that anyway and start at the Sandrena equivalent of 4 pumps...!?

Tis all a nightmare. I don't know why some of us get this so bad and others just go right through it with no problems. Can more research please be done....

[Banjo1973]

Hi joziel

The official max dose of oestrogel is 4 pumps (I know gynaecologists prescribe more). The max dose of Sandrena is 2 1mg sachets.

Although there is conflicting info on this, more experts state that 1 pump = 0.5mg sachet of Sandrena.

If you look purely at estradoil content then it doesn't add up but maybe Sandrena absorbs better.

I was on 3 pumps of good oestrogel and doing well on 1.5 sachets of Sandrena. As there's much less gel then I can rotate areas to rub it in. (With oetrogel I was running out of skin to put it on!!!)

If you were always on 4 pumps of good oestrogel then 2 sachets is the same. No need to split doses, this sh*t works!

Let me know how you get on x

[joziel]

Thanks, that's interesting. So does that mean that 4 pumps of Oestrogel = 2x 1mg sachets? So I should start there?

Anyway I will do what my Newson dr says (cos I have to!)...

Next week I increase Oestrogel to 6 pumps. I don't hold out much hope. And I don't know what dose of Oestrogel works for me because I was only on the blue lid for a couple of months when I was on 2-3 pumps and I was still adjusting upwards. That wasn't enough, anyway. But I haven't reached the nirvana of symptoms going away totally yet, although they did improve.