What does it feel like to have Klinefelters' syndrome?
Posted , 68 users are following.
Another contributor wishes to discuss what it feels like to have Klinefelters' syndrome, so I thought I'd start a discussion on that topic, see what comes of it?
I'd like to be able to choose XXY as a place to put this discussion, then we can chat about what it feels like to be fat, or to have gynaecomastia, or to be sterile, and any other disease associated with being XXY.
6 likes, 399 replies
kirk_olofteh XXYGuy
Posted
Since I've found out about my condition a year ago checking, I've gone through a Micr-Tese surgery were biopsies multiple biopsies of testies were performed, I've done blood tests to check for testosterone, FSH, and LH for which the level of testosterone has been in the 50 range when for a normal XY individual my age it should be between 350 and 1250 therefore have been using Axiron (topical gel) to get a booster of this hormone. I have never had gynocomastia, my shoulder's length has been broader than my waist, I have decent amount of muscles around my shoulder and other areas, I've always been skinny.
Psychologically, it's been very tough on me to learn about my condition. The hardest hit recently has been my lack of energy possibly due to testosterone level and the fact that I always loved to go to school but realizing now that I suffered from learning disabilities (possibly dyslexia and ADD/ADHD, I still have to study these more and find remedies). While in university I never did any homework but managed to get my degree; sometimes I had to repeat some of the classes. Recently I have been told that many XXY people also have mitral valve abnormalities so I have been recommended to see a cardiologist to do an echo of my heart. Has anybody else have had their heart checked for any abnormalities?
I have to admit that having someone to talk to like XXYGuy has helped my psyche quite a bit and am very thankful for his candid openness about this topic.
In the past ten months I have had many depressing moments and a few times I broke out crying and couldn't stop. Embarrassingly a few times at work and just last week in front of my wife for which I was trying hard to hide because she's going through IVF. Overall as I'm learning more about my condition, I'm becoming more at ease with it but deep down I ask myself and God, "Why me, did you choose to give this condition? Why did I have to be the lucky one?" But then again, I think, overall in many of the conditions out there, we have been lucky in the sense that we can have a normal life; there are variations and conditions that are very drastic that end up in institutions or need 24/7 care.
XXYGuy kirk_olofteh
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kirk_olofteh XXYGuy
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I wish if there is a convention or gathering of some sort to one day meet you in person.
i have to say that I still experience reading disabilities but as my wife puts it when I read blogs here or something that interests me, I am alert and remember the cases without having to re-read over and over again. When I used to read science textbooks there were evidence of dyslexia and I needed to read a page over and over again until I could remember a few things.
As I read newer blogs, here, I still like your approach in answering people's questions and I tend to agree with you every comment I read.
Keep it up sir and once again thank you. You put my head back on the track of life.
melly555 XXYGuy
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XXYGuy melly555
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My doctors name is John delahunt, he works at Wellington Public Hospital, Newtown, Wellington, New Zealand. I've known John since I was 17. He didn't start me on testosterone therapy until after I was 18, after I became legally adult and able to refuse, or accept, as I so chose without needing parental consent. My doctor was very reluctant to use full dose testosterone therapy, starting me of such a low dose I didn't even notice it. His other reason for waiting was that my body was not showing signs of testicular failure, hence no symptoms of Seminiferous Tubule Dysgenesis. My balls were functioning until October that 18th year!
So I have no experience of testosterone therapy being offered to people who don't say they want it.
melly555 XXYGuy
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XXYGuy melly555
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Klinefelters' syndrome is not a notifiable disease, nobody has ever been forced into hospital for threapy to treat hypogonadism!
Nobody has ever been forced to have testosterone therapy, although I expect there's the odd teenage boy who had the choice taken from him with his parents assuming all control.
Such situations always end in disaster as the boy rebels as soon as he hits 18, and then slowly but surely succumbs to hypogonadism, which is why doctors do not force hormnone therapy on anybody. Doctors want willing patients who take their medicine, they don't want a constant fight that saps energy and achieves nothing! That's the sort of thing controlling partents do, not smart doctors!
We only have metric in New Zealand too! I would not call a 55kg adult 'fat' unless she were 4 feet tall! 180cm is roughly 6 feet, so 165 cm is roughly 5'4" 'Google is your friend!' I'm 5'9" and I weigh a lot more than 55kg! I don't think I have ever weighed less than 65kgs as an adult!
melly555 XXYGuy
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XXYGuy melly555
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melly555 XXYGuy
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XXYGuy melly555
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I'm not aware of mitral valve defect being part of KS, and since KS can't develop until after the onset of puberty, it's impossible as the MVD is present from birth. Nobody was ever born with KS, although there are plenty with KS who think they were born withy it, and their doctors too!
Central obesity, both my parents had central obesity, neither of them were XXY, my sister has central obesity, and she's not XXY, and I have it too, developed it after I stopped working so hard, exercising altogether actually. Exercise reduces, even prevents obesity. Genetics does not cause obesity, lifestyle does. Even people with Prader-Willi syndrome are obese because they eat too much and exercise too little. If we all ate less and exercised more we'd all lose weight.
Oh and I met a woman on Facebook who just added me to her KS page without asking, and before she knew my stance, we're not fat (those of us who are) because of out genetics but because we eat too much and exercise too little. Her son is XXY and fat, and he's fat because she fed him too much, and didn't get him exercising enough. The whole family is fat too, but only her son is fat because he has KS, a prepubertal boy! Prepubertal boys can't get KS, is a post onset of puberty set of symptoms.
So she blocked me from her group as I won't be changing my mind, or facts, just because they don't fit with the commonly held misunderstandings.
See my profile picture, that's me, sucking my belly in.
If you read through here you'll discover XXY males who were even fertile, there is no symptom of KS that can be said to be indicative except Seminiferous Tubule Dysgenesis.
melly555 XXYGuy
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XXYGuy melly555
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The major symptom of Klinefelters' syndrome is Seminiferous Tubule Dysgenesis, otherwise knows as 'atrophied testes' and females don't have testes so how can you possibly have Klinefelters' syndrome? Oh you think you were told by some doctor that 'you have testes in tghere somewhere' well I think you're mistaken, it is simply not possible to have opposite 2 sets of functioning gonads, and you have ovaries!
It is possible to be a hermaphrodite and have 2 ovaries and a testi, or two testes and an ovary, but those people get pretty sick and are admitted to hospitals in extreme pain, needing urgent surgery. Errant gonads tend to cause major problems as the testes are contantly on the move looking for that elusive scrotum to migrate to, which is not possible in a female. And males with ovaries have no good luck as being immune to oestrogen like AIS females do in being immune top testosterone. They develop pretty damn quickly female secondary sex characteristics, which may or many not, get them diagnosed before they get terribly ill?
The medical profession really isn't all that good at discovering sex related medical conditions. Those of us who have been diagnosed ought to count ourselves as bloody lucky!
And what you say, is so far away from my experince, I cannot relate to it. Maybe a group for the Transgendered is better for you?
melly555 XXYGuy
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XXYGuy melly555
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So everything you say is 100% true is it? Yeah I've heard it all before, every year another person comes along with some, well outside what they think is strange, account, and it isn't. XXY females are well documented in medical literature, all you have to do is look for it. I don't have to look, I know it's there.
So as that doesn't get my attention as expected the story has to get more and more strange, and I'm supposed to say "Ohh wow" and I don't, I just think of the claims made and compare them to my experience. My experience is one of not being treated with testosterone to the best extent. That XXY guys are often all lumped together as if they really are all the same, all requiring the same level of therapy regardless of how they actually respond.
So I could go along to my named doctor for years, and even though I showed no sign of physical maturity, he did not think to increase my dose, as I was getting the maximum dose the medical profession had decided was appropriate for XXY males!
I've come by XXY men who have strange stories to tell, maybe you'll discover them too, they do live in Australia after all! Men who claim their doctors didn't know the type of testosterone they were taking couldn't be measured in a standard blood test! Men who claimed they were forced to have hormone therapy, men who claimed when they requested female hormones were denied them.
However my experience and my discussion with doctors here, in Australia, in America, in Canada, in Britain, all come to the same result, NOBODY is forced to take hormone therapy. The medical profession is reluctant to give testosterone to anybody.
But like the XXY men in Australia you're different. There's no doubt about it, everything you say, and they say, is the god honest truth. So you'll be delighted, as they were (not really) to tell us the names of the doctors who treated them, and where they work/ed, who forced them to have surgery and hormone therapy, and ruined their lives?
If you want to believe you have KS, believe it, feel free, tell as many as you like, but don't expect everyone on the planet to believe you. It would be an outrageous imposition on logic and common sense. Only males can have Klinefleters' syndrome. Adult females are supposed to have breast tissue, and of course you know Gynaecomastia is a symptom of KS, and Gynaecomastia is not found in femles, for them the 'condition' is called 'Breasts!' Females also have pubic hair in the triangle female fashion, so do untreated XXY males. And fat distribution in the female form they also get when they're not treated. It's not really any wonder some of them think they're more female than other males. So would it be very strange for a woman with XXY sex chromosomes to think she has KS when some of the symptoms of KS are the normal body formation of females? No I don't think so!
And if your doctors really are doing and saying as you claim, I'd sue them.