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FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you have questions about us, our DIY HRT or the ordering process? You’ll find the most common questions answered here. If your questions are not answered there, you can contact us at any time.
Apart from these common questions, please see our general information about Shipping, Payment and Refunds/Returns.
Why / when to buy from us?
Can you offer other payment methods than crypto?
Help with crypro payments
Is it safe?
Dosage
Materials Needed
Opening the vials
Application
Storage and shelf life
Will we offer Estradiol Valerate?
Will we offer vials without benzyl alcohol?
Links, Resources and further information
Why / when to buy from us?
Hopefully you do not need to buy from us. If you have access to HRT health care that cares for you adequately without legal obstacles, year long waiting times and arbitrary gate keeping – and if you can afford it: please make use of it.
Buying HRT privately from online pharmacies is sometimes possible, some places even help you getting prescriptions from doctors online. Buying homebrew HRT like ours is a last resort and we are sad that it is sometimes the only option available.
Can you offer other payment methods than crypto?
Unfortunately no. Crypto payment is the only way of payment we can offer. But don’t worry, it is safe and not at all that hard to use, please see our help section on crypto payment.
Help with crypro payments
Please see our dedicated Payment Page, where we give an overview over the payment process in the shop as well as an explanation of what you need.
Is it safe?
Homebrew is not as safe as prescription medicine. But what you are getting is what we personally use for ourselves, made with the highest care:
- Ingredients are selected to be as universally safe and allergy free as possible. The carrier oil is MCT with a low risk of allergies. It’s viscosity does not require the use of a solvent, lowering allergy risk. We do use 2% benzyl alcohol as preservative necessary for multi use vials.
- We use preparation surroundings with air filters and procedures as clean and safe as possible. Vials and lids are alcohol washed and depyrogenated using dry heat for 90 minutes and the product is batched and filtered at .2 micron. Sealed vials are terminally sterilized for another 90 minutes at 121°C.
- We have both ingredients and final product professionally lab tested for concentration and contaminants and we publish verifiable lab results on the product pages.
Our listed example dosages are based on our own experiences and publicly available information. They work and are way inside safe ranges.
That said, we cannot offer professional medical advice (for what that is worth). While the dosages are medically safe, hormones do have effects (duh), that can influence your mood and wellbeing. Please use good judgement when chosing or changing your dosages and listen to yourself.
Similarly, our product is not unlike to what you could produce with care for yourself. We use it ourselves to great effect but you must chose whether you feel comfortable using it.
Dosage
Dosage is very individual and depends on various factors. For monotherapy without an anti-androgen/testosterone blocker you will need to aim for higher values than for use with blockers.
Some suppliers do not like to give suggestions, other suggest really high values without any explanation. We have decided to list suggested starting doses together with an explanation as a guideline for you to start out and use the product safely.
We list a low, medium and high dosage on the corresponding product pages together with possible application frequencies. Low dosages are meant as a starting value for use with an anti-androgen, medium is a good starting point for monotherapy. The high dosage can be used for monotherapy to ensure high enough estradiol levels where no blood tests are possible.
All of these are safe to use, but there is no need to use more than required in your situation. If you have access to blood test, you can settle on any dosage in this range that still keeps your testosterone levels under about 50ng/dl.
Blood levels will only reach stable values 4-8 weeks after starting with injections or adjusting dosage. When changing dosage, try to avoid frequent or large jumps but give yourself the time to adjust, feel differences and changes. Do not change more than one factor at a time, like blockers and estradiol, to better judge the effects.
Materials needed
Recommended materials are
- single use alcohol pads
- insulin syringes (1/2″ or longer, 28G to 30G needle)
Chosing a syringe with a U100 scale is easiest as 1 unit on the syringe is 0.01 ml (ie. draw 15 units for 0.15 ml).
On an insulin syringe with U40 scale 1 unit is 0.025 ml (ie. draw 6 units for 0.15 ml).
The following suggestions assume that you use a syringe of that sort or similar for subq injection.
Opening the vials
To open the vials before the first use, pry open the circular middle part on top of the metal cap, using the tip of a knife or similar, taking care not to damage the rubber stopper underneath. The exposed bit of the rubber cap is where you will insert the needle to draw from the vial.
Do not remove the metal cap from the vial, it is needed to keep the rubber stopper fixed in place and sealed!
Application
Disinfect the top of the vial before drawing, as well as the place of injction with an alcohol wipe and use a new syringe for every application to avoid health risk and contaminating your vial.
Start by drawing air into the syringe to the level you want to draw estradiol from the vial.
Insert the needle into the exposed circular bit of the rubber stopper. Hold the needle at a slight angle, while keeping the bevel of the tip facing away from the rubber and apply slight pressure directly downwards. This reduces the chance of the needle cutting a bit out of the stopper (“coring it”).
Inject the air into the vial and then draw from the vial while holding the vial above the syringe. This can take 30 seconds because of the viscosity of the MCT oil we use. You’ll see the liquid be drawn in slowly and air rising to the top. You can draw a tiny bit more than needed, and push it back into the vial together with the last air bubble. Do not worry about tiny bubbles of air that may be left, they do not do harm.
Most people find subcutaneous application into upper outer butt the easiest, but thigh and belly works nicely, too. Losely grab a fold of skin and fat and insert the needle at 90°. Push the plunger slowly, take a pause if you need to, and then wait some 10 to 20 seconds before removing it. You can apply light pressure to the injection site for a short while.
Replace the cap onto the needle and dispose of the syringe, preferably in an appropriate secure container.
Storage and shelf life
Store vials (opened and unopened) in a dark place at room temperature, for example in a drawer or inside their cardbord box! The vials are not very sensitive to temperature, but crystalization of the estradiol esthers can occour on low temperatures. If that happens warm the vial e.g. in your hand or by putting it in a warmer place and shake before use.
The shelf life of unopened vials is printed on the label and typically is at least 3 years. Opened vials can last for up to 1 to 1.5 years if stored dark and only drawn from with new syringes each time.
Please discard vials if they show signs of contamination or other noticable defects to the vial or the seal. Take special care when using large needles to draw, as they run the risk of coring the vials, meaning cutting out a piece of the rubber when inserting the needle. This might leave the vial open for contamination and render it unsafe.
Will we offer Estradiol Valerate?
Probably not. As opposed to estradiol enanthate, valerate has the downside of requiring a solvent, thus being more prone to causing allergic reactions. Furthermore it does not really support an application frequency of one week or more but should be taken every 4 to 5 days. Enanthate is the better option all-around.
We do offer estradiol undecylate now as an ever longer term option that is perfect for application frequencies of two weeks, stretching up to four weeks if needed.
Will we offer vials without benzyl alcohol?
No, for safety reasons we will always use 2% of benzyl alcohol in the vials, which is needed for vials that are multi use and are supposed to last multiple months.
In case you are asking because of possible negative reactions/allergies to it, do not confuse the essential benzyl alcohol with the optional ingredient benzyl benzoate which is used in products based on castor oil and which may lead to irritations at the injection site. We do not use benzyl benzoate.
Links, Resources and further information
For more information about HRT, transgender healthcare, sources for equipment, etc. see the following external sites: