I am 37yo.

One year ago I did a checkup and asked for my testosterone levels because I was feeling my libido was lower than normal.

The results came back and my numbers were 377 ng/dL, free test was 9 ng/dL and SHBG 23,6 mmol/L.

It was low, but within the normal range.

Everything else was perfectly normal.

Now almost a year later I am feeling that things are worse. I can go a week without feeling any desire. I still have morning wood, but it is not every day like it was. I have sex with my SO, but I can easily lose my erection.

I scheduled an appointment with an endocrinologist from my health inssurance, but it has a spot only in July!

So I went to a lab and did a blood test for testosterone and it is indeed worse.

It is now 255 ng/dL, free test was 6,5 ng/dL and SHBG 19 mmol/L.

I am physically active, lift weights 4 days per week, can squat relatively big numbers, am not overweight (on mornings I have a six pack) and drink alcohol only on weekends.

Is this drop normal when you reach 40s or there is probably an issue here?

I thought HRT was for when we were in our 50s.

Anybody has gone through anything similar and can share your stories?

UPDATE 2024/04/06: Couldn't find any spot with a Endocrinologist right away so I went to a urologist.

Urologists these days, at least here in Brazil, are well versed in TRT and knows exactly what to look for.

Turns out I have some issues that could be causing my low T. My left testicle is way smaller than my right which indicates that things are not working. I also have varicocele (enlarged veins in the scrotum), which in some cases can cause low testosterone and in a lot of cases can lower your sperm count and quality.

So he ordered blood tests to check all my hormones as well as Triglycerides and other things, ultrasound of my balls and spermogram.

It'll probably take a week or two to have all these done and I'll come back here with the results.

I am also noticing some symptoms besides libido, like poor sleep (I am waking up a lot more in the night, like 4+ times) and really low muscle gain for someone who lifts for 10 years and can push some heavy weight. There are some things in me that it could be linked to this. I feel like I am just pushing through life these days, feeling a little beaten and just going through the motions. It could explain my exacerbated cynicism and lack of interest in everything.

It could be that my body has been working against me for some time.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

The Cannes Film Festival is in May and I thought we should find four movies related to Cannes to watch in May. Maybe a bit of a risk since it isn't exactly full of well known mainstream movies, but I promise there is more to choose from than French arthouse movies. The criteria is simple, the movie must have been presented at the Cannes Film Festival at some point.

On the official website you can browse through all movies that has been in competition over the years. To narrow it down there is a list of all the Palme d’Or winners or more broadly every movie that have won any award at Cannes. This list all movies that have been in competition per year in alphabetical order

Rules

• Have been in the official program on the Cannes Film Festival in any year
• Not one we have done before
• Only one nomination per user
• Please only nominate if you intent to participate
• Upvote the post(s) with a nomination you would like to be picked for discussion next month
• Please state the title of the movie clearly on the first line, and add any additional general comments in the next paragraph to keep voting simple

In case of ties in the number of votes, random.org will decide. Voting closes Sunday.

I've spoken with some authors who are working on non-fiction books. I've noticed that some of them know their books intimately and can correct me if I mis-relay a section back to them that I've read. They can do this without checking the actual book and I've then verified that I was incorrect.

Others have told me that by the time they were finished a seemingly infinite number of edits, they can't bear to read their own book again and just sent it to an editor at that point and released it.

I was surprised by the latter but it does remind me of my own experience writing very long papers in college. Is this common in your own experience?

On the original book nomination thread, a couple of people nominated nonfiction. If we read nonfiction, I want to have a separate voting thread for that category so that everyone can submit books. However, should we? This thread is a chance to vote no for nonfiction and if voting yes to suggest a frequency such as 1 in 3 books, 1 in four books, 1 in six books etc.

If voting yes, please suggest a rate to read nonfiction books in proportion to fiction ones.

Edit , I am counting these as alternative options. Either we read some nonfiction or we don't, so please vote in a way that reflects your honest opinion.

This topic is part of a series. It is meant to be a place for users to discuss creative projects they have been working on.

Projects can be personal, professional, physical, digital, or even just ideas.

If you have any creative projects that you have been working on or want to eventually work on, this is a place for discussing those.

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

There have been a number of threads recently that have touched on this topic recently, and I thought the conversation deserved its own place.

My default worldview for the past decade+ has been something best characterized as naturalistic or materialist (the totality of reality can be explained by material and its interactions.) I've had a few things challenge this view recently, namely the "Hard Problem of Consciousness." I'll post my own comment about what moved me from hard materialist to agnostic on materialism, but I encourage you to post your own reasoning in your comment!

Added the qualifier to the title as web3 understandably earns a lot of eyerolls haha. At the same time, a lot of web3 focused places seem to have a specific mindset about what "should" be done so I wanted to ask here.

I worked in the space at startup (ironically making web2 services to assist in web3 so I’m still an extreme novice). But my time there was a constant push / pull between convention and money and innovation and the unknown. The company I was at would try to appeal to big companies in hopes of finding a product market fit, who looked to us for guidance on what to do in this new space where they hoped to make money. Trend after trend would pass and it would be entertained whether we’d jump on it because product market fit.

The most desirable companies were household names with non-web3 userbases because they meant unprecedented reach. But to make web3 approachable to them, you’d have to define a UX that didn’t exist and would be pulled in a tug of war between two forces. The first mindset optimises for the purest idea of giving the user power— UXs that were obvious about the concepts of transactions and transferrable assets. The other wanted to replicate web2 UXs in web3, to the degree that a user gives temporary control of their wallet to a developer so the developer performs transactions as them.

Then, there is the data and pseudonymity piece. Companies have been taught that data is valuable, and one of the values of a blockchain is an identity that exists outside of any one company. But if all of your assets are on a blockchain— either under your public key or perhaps under a few that might transfer assets only between each other— then your identity can be known (not so private) and also cannot be monopolized and sold (because your data is public).

In the background, as this all happens, is the decentralization argument. At the end of the day, my company used EVM nodes operated by another company (which themselves might be wrappers around something offered by AWS). What is meaningful decentralization alongside specialization of labor? What is decentralization in a world that has billionaires and enormous companies who has the means to buy resources and set up tons of nodes?

Being out of the space now, I do think a decentralized database with immutable scripts, user-managed transferrable assets, and transferrable identity has enormous value. But recently I’ve been wondering how much of that can be accomplished in the private sector. In my time there it felt like the startup needs (enterprise customers, increased ARR) constantly compromised the will for innovation efforts.

Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

I'd define decent as the minimum expectation I have for having someone in my life. I use the term a lot, but I had never been clear on what I mean by it. I think for me its that the person broadly reciprocates the work I put into the relationship, both in kind and degree, unless I explicitly say otherwise. I'd say most of my interpersonal problems would fit under this; mainly being expected to put in a lot of emotional effort, and either they don't reciprocate it at all, they unambiguously do not match it or they ignore me when I tell them I don't care about gifts and act like the infrequent gift makes us equal.

But that's me, and I expect there are many more varied expectations from y'all. So, what make some a decent person to you?

Hi y'all,

I owned a PlaySation as a kid, but I don't remember playing it much. I was much more stuck to my Nintendo 64 playing Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, and MegaMan 64.

Well, I got it in my head that I wanted to play MegaMan Legends 2, which only came out on PlaySation as far as I can tell. I've started playing through MegaMan Legends again before I get to the sequel, and I'm having a really good time.

I was hoping I could hear form y'all about some of your favorite games so I could dip my toes deeper into the PS1 library. What are some of your favorites? Anything particularly odd, unique, or with a very specific point of view? I'll try any genre. Some games I've dabbled with or had my eye on to play: Parasite Eve, Vagrant Saga, Xenogears, Koudelka, and most notably perhaps, Metal Gear Solid. I've never played any Metal Gear games, but the story and world building is so interesting from what I know about it that I really want to give it a try. Also, if anyone knows of some cool Japanese only fan-translate games, would really love to hear about those.

tldr: favorite ps1 game? any weirdo shit i should play?

edit 03/31: the love for ps1 is HUGE. thanks to everyone for all of the great responses. will respond in time. been taking time to sample a bunch of these. my experience with tildes's gaming community has been awesome.

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

I've been doing a lot of work with my therapist and it has been suggested that I might have a mix of both Autism and ADHD.

I have always related to Autism to a certain extent but I would never say it because I felt like I didn't really fit because some things I do don't make sense it that context. I was also obsessed with learning to be human since young and have a lot of systems to deal with it and apparently that means I've been masking for a very long time.

But my therapist also brought up ADHD and that has explained a lot about some the things I'm still currently struggling with. But again, when I look it up, I don't feel like I fully fit. But also, I have developed a lot of systems over the years to deal with my issues and function like a normal human being. So a lot of the things I struggle with is hidden because I've "fixed" them.

I'm still reluctant to say I have either of those two things because I feel like an imposter. So I've just settled on Neurodivergent and think that I can always learn the tools that help people with ADHD even if I don't have it. Because if the tools work for you, then why not?

But my therapist has suggested getting diagnosed because it does change what kind of medication you might get. I'm currently on medication for anxiety and depression.

So now I'm wondering how common it is to have a mix of both ADHD and Autism. For those who have both, what is it like for you? What is your daily life like? What are your struggles and how do you deal with them? When did you realise you might have a mix of both? How do you feel about yourself and your brain?

I apologize if this isn't the right place to ask this. I don't post very often and am getting used to it.

The kinds of change I'm referring to are hard to put into words. A few examples may be switching from one end of the political spectrum to the other, leaving one country or culture for another, religious conversions and deconversions, or leaving behind one's family. Often, these changes are caused by deeply personal events like receiving a serious medical diagnosis, conflict, the death of a loved one, midlife crisis, or merely examining one's values or beliefs. There are countless other examples of both changes and causes, many of which I've never considered.

There is shared experience between these changes: the world hasn't changed, but somehow everything is different. Everything is in a completely new light; it's as if you've moved between parallel universes. Not everyone has had or will have such a moment, but these changes seem to be the most important in catalyzing who we are. As much as we think sharing opinionated memes or arguing at Thanksgiving is going to shape or mold people around us, it is often personal experiences that actually make such change possible. And some small number of people do experience profound change: racists become antifascists, liberals become stanch conservatives, Christians become atheists. These sorts of life-altering changes are often what tell us most about who a person is.

I made this post because the discussion of these changes are among the most valuable discussions I've had with others, and people often don't get socially-acceptable opportunities to share something so personally important to them. This is potentially a heavy subject, so don't feel that you need to share or elaborate any further than what's comfortable for you.

Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

The game approaches greatness -- it is within sight of excellence -- but something holds it back. Maybe it's a glaring, unignorable flaw, or maybe it squanders an excellent idea with subpar execution.

Whatever it is, the game could have been great but instead it's, unfortunately, something less.

What a game that's like that for you? Why?

What has your brain been spending its time pulling apart and thinking about?

It doesn't have to be a complete thought, or something you've come to a conclusion on. It can be as messy or odd or significant or inconsequential as you feel.

Inconclusive, directionless, stream of consciousness posts are welcome. This is a place to mull over the topic out loud, outside of your head -- not necessarily to take a stance or make a point.

It’s been a few weeks now since the release of iOS 17.4, which

[…] provides new options for app marketplaces, web browsers and payments for residents of the European Union. […]

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am a firm believer in the underlying regulation to it, and have been ever since the possibility of this becoming a reality was in the Brussels air. But so far, I haven’t really been able to come up with a truly practical use case.

Furthermore, I haven’t seen any marketing for an Epic Store, Meta Store, or similar “app marketplaces”, but this may be attributed to the still rather… wobbly legal situation surrounding, notably, still having to direct payments to Apple while not using their store for app distribution. I don’t think there has been any follow-up from Apple (or the EU) that retracts these conditions.

So: Have any fellow EU resident ~tech’ies done anything fun or interesting with this new freedom yet?

To those not affected by this regulation, what would you like to “sideload”, or are perhaps already sideloading on Android?

Do any of you think big companies will move their entire palette onto an alternative store anytime soon, e.g. Facebook and sister products? To be honest, I doubt this will happen, otherwise it would’ve long occurred on the Google Play Store as well.

My ideas were:

• I’ve thought about trying to install Minecraft (the full version, probably using Pojav), or a game of similar caliber, on my phone just for fun and to see how well the iPhone GPU really fares against a “real” game, but didn’t find the time yet for looking into it.
• Also personally, I’d love to see a real “root-capable” shell on iOS, but I don’t think that will ever be a thing irrespective of how much sideloading Apple is forced to allow into their OS.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

I've noticed that my phone's home screens have become a bit cluttered and figured it's about time to clean it up. So I tried searching online and found tons of recommendations and suggestions, but figured I would ask users here if anyone has any tips for productivity or efficiency, or just something that works for you. Might give me some good ideas to try out, and hopefully can benefit anyone else reading this thread.

Do you have tons of home screens or just one with a ton of folders? Do you use many widgets or not at all? Do you organize apps by how frequently you use them? Or how similar the apps are to each other? By color of the app icon? Or something else entirely?

Seriously, any help/suggestions/ideas would be appreciated.

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

I just got a new phone, and I opted to download all the apps I usually use manually, rather than having them transfer over automatically. It's like a nice cleanup thing that I get to do every couple of years. I feel like I partially should just have a list somewhere of the apps I usually use and was wondering what people would download first (plus if I forgot anything)

For me, this was my process yesterday:
Password manager - Bitwarden - mostly so I can copy/paste my logins for everything
Authentication - Not listing these but ya know
VPN - MozillaVPN - just something for hostels and travelling
Browser - Firefox Beta or Nightly - for downloading my new wallpaper and general use (including Tildes!)
Sleep + Alarm - Sleep as Android
Car things - My car app, EVGo/Electrify America - getting around and things
Rideshare - Uber and Lyft - When I'm in a new city!
Food - Doordash, Grubhub, asian specific food apps - to eat when I'm lazy!
News - Boston Globe, AP News, BBC - Kinda obvious what they're here for
Todo - TickTick - Checklists and all that
Fitness - Fitbit, my smart scale app, and my gym app - general fitness stuff
Language Learning - Duolingo and Lingodeer!
Banking + Investment + Payments + Insurance - not listing these but yeah!
Music + Podcasts - Spotify
Streaming - D+, Netflix, Vudu, Peacock, Max, Movies Anywhere, Dropout, Hulu, Prime Video, Twitch - General Streaming
Books - Kindle and Audible
Messaging and Social Media - Signal, Beeper, Messenger, Discord, Slack, Instagram, etc. - just daily entertainment and connections
Games - Slay the Spire, Dead Cells, Nonograms, Don't Starve, Cards of Terra, Bloons, etc.

Bonus Q: I've been thinking of trying to add Obsidian to my general day to day, how? Might ask a question about this later though!

This topic is part of a series. It is meant to be a place for users to discuss creative projects they have been working on.

Projects can be personal, professional, physical, digital, or even just ideas.

If you have any creative projects that you have been working on or want to eventually work on, this is a place for discussing those.

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

Surprised there's not really a thread yet, so I'll start it. What plans have you made for today's eclipse? I know people have traveled from all over the world to see it.

We happen to live in the path of totality so no travel needed. Actually even less travel than we thought. We were going to go to a parking garage at a nearby mall, but it turns out we have a pretty good view of the sun from our backyard! We also went to grab fast food as a treat and saw a bunch of people walking to the nearby park.

How about everyone else?

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

A couple of years ago I heard a knock, went to the door, saw the FedEx guy walking away, called out to him, then again and again, louder and louder. He just walked into his truck and drove off. And my front door was right on the street, so there's no way he didn't hear me.

Today my mother opens the door after a knock, and the driver's driving off. And he waves at her as he goes.

I have lots of other complaints about FedEx, and I wonder if these stories are symptoms of a dysfunctional company, mistreating workers, etc. Or maybe we're just on the beat of a dude with a 'tude.