After you stop TRT (testosterone replacement therapy), your body has to restart its own testosterone production. In studies of different groups of men, it was found to take several months to a year or more. Your provider can plan the stop with you.
Can you stop TRT once you start?
Yes, you can stop TRT once you have started. It is a decision to make with your prescribing provider, who can plan the timing with you. Testosterone treatment can control the symptoms of low testosterone but does not cure the condition. How quickly your body adjusts after you stop, and what you notice along the way, differs from man to man.
What happens to your body when you stop TRT?
When you stop TRT, the testosterone you were taking leaves your body, and your own production has to restart before your levels climb back. TRT is a prescription treatment for people whose bodies do not make enough testosterone (see our guide to what TRT is). Your brain tells your body to make testosterone using two hormones called LH and FSH. While you are on treatment, your brain can turn those signals down. After your last dose, those signals have to rebuild.
The timeline after your last dose
The testosterone from your last dose leaves your body first. Its half-life, the time it takes for half of a dose to leave your body, is about eight days for testosterone cypionate, a type of testosterone injection. That means most of a dose is gone within weeks. Your body’s own hormone signals take much longer to recover, and the studies below found that to take months to a year or more. The table shows the time points researchers measured. It is not a week-by-week schedule of how you will feel.
Table 1. Recovery time points from studies of men who stopped testosterone, each in a different group of men.
| Time after your last dose |
What is happening |
What the sources show |
| First weeks |
The testosterone from your last dose clears, and your brain’s signals (LH and FSH) to make testosterone can still be turned down. |
Drug label for testosterone cypionate (Depo-Testosterone): half-life of about eight days. |
| Around 6 months |
In this group of men with low testosterone, levels fell back to about where they were before treatment. |
In 274 frail men aged 65 to 90 with low testosterone, levels in the men given testosterone were back to about their starting level six months after they stopped. The authors found the effects on muscle strength and quality of life did not last. |
| 12 to 24 months |
In a different group, the brain’s signals (LH and FSH) were still recovering. |
In a follow-up of 303 men from a two-year trial of testosterone undecanoate injections, LH and FSH in the treated men recovered slowly, and full recovery may take longer than 12 months. |
Each row comes from a different group of men, so these are ranges researchers have found, not one timeline for everyone, and your provider’s lab work shows where you are. To see what to watch for, read our guide to symptoms of low testosterone.
What will you notice, and will the benefits last?
Your testosterone goes back toward where it was before treatment, so the symptoms that led you to start may come back. In the trial of frail older men in Table 1, the effects of six months of treatment on strength, lean mass, and quality of life were not there six months after the men stopped.
How well men keep the benefits varies. In one study of 151 men with low testosterone who had responded well to TRT, 92 did not keep the benefits of treatment for six months after stopping, and 59 did. Men who had taken TRT longer, and men who exercised regularly, were more likely to keep the benefits.
These are patterns across groups of men, not a prediction for any one man. Our guide to types of TRT compares the main options.
What happens to sperm count and fertility?
TRT can lower sperm production, and it may recover after stopping, though the timing varies. A review of sperm recovery after testosterone therapy reports that normal sperm production may return in a reasonable number of men given enough time, and that some men do not recover or cannot wait for recovery. Men planning a family should tell their provider before they stop their TRT.
Studies of healthy men who took hormones, including testosterone, on purpose to stop their sperm production, as a form of birth control, give a rough idea of timing. In those studies, the estimated chance that sperm counts returned to 20 million per mL, a lab indicator of fertility, was 90% within 12 months. These men did not have low testosterone, so your timing may differ, and a sperm count is a lab result, not a pregnancy rate.
How a provider plans stopping TRT with you
At Dynamis, you work with a licensed provider who reviews your symptoms, health history, and lab work. Your Personal Health Coach, who responds within 2 hours by phone, text, email, or the patient portal, supports you while you and your provider make the plan. If you want to stop, your provider agrees on a plan and timing with you and checks your levels afterward.
Questions worth bringing to your provider:
- Which labs should I have, and when after my last dose?
- How long should I expect recovery to take?
- What should I do if my symptoms return?
- How do my family plans affect the stop plan?
- How can my coach support me through it?
You can read more about testosterone replacement therapy at Dynamis and how Dynamis works, or talk through where you stand on a kickoff call.
