Menopause gets a testosterone twist: miracle boost or medical gray area?

For decades, testosterone has been thought of as a male hormone

Now, more women are asking about it, especially those in menopause. Some say it changed their lives

Do you notice a difference with it? I do. Me too. My libido's. Yeah, I know

Others say it did little or nothing. Let me tell you about my first month on testosterone and what I wish they would have told me

So what does the science say? And why do doctors warn prescribing it is like the Wild West

I just wasn't feeling like myself. The brain fog was terrible. When I was talking to patients

it felt like I was stuttering. I was exhausted all the time. I definitely had brain fog. I've

never had issues remembering things. And now I'll find myself not remembering the word for

refrigerator. Two different women experiencing the same issue that more than 6,000 women start

feeling each day in the United States, menopause. For those who turned to standard hormone therapy

to treat those symptoms in the past, a typical cocktail would be estrogen and progesterone

Now an unlikely hormone is increasingly in the mix. Testosterone is a human hormone

That's right, testosterone. Dr. Kathleen Jordan is the chief medical officer at Midi Health

where they use hormones to treat menopause symptoms. She says testosterone plays a significant role in women

Testosterone is not just a male hormone. It's a human hormone. And women actually have more testosterone than they do estrogen But not only is dosing women with testosterone controversial hormone therapy as a whole is as well In the late 1990s 22 of postmenopausal women in the

United States used hormone therapy. That all changed after 2002, when the Women's Health

Initiative released findings that were widely interpreted to show hormone therapy was dangerous

increasing the risk of things like heart disease, breast cancer, and stroke

Almost immediately, the share of postmenopausal women taking hormone therapy was cut in half

and continued to go down in the years that followed. Despite later research finding the risks in that 2002 study were overstated, the fear stuck

Today, less than 5% of eligible postmenopausal women in the U.S. use hormone therapy

even though most women between their late 40s and early 60s experience menopause symptoms

which can last years. And it wasn't until late 2025 the FDA changed its messaging on hormone

therapies. The FDA is taking action to remove the black box warnings from estrogen-related products

But those therapies don't include testosterone. Because the efficacy was not huge and there was

a lot of concern about downstream long-term side effects, the FDA declined to approve it

Dr. Nanette Santoro is an OB-GYN and professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine

She's studied menopause for decades. With no FDA regulations and no insurance coverage

doctors say testosterone carries risk Off use requires careful monitoring It led some to describe the field as the Wild West When we say the Wild West we mean that people operate in on all extremes you know

and I think because there's so much belief or enthusiasm that testosterone can so broadly help

women, people are expanding those limits sometimes beyond like sort of more contained capacity. And

I think that's what people mean when they say that. For Lindsay Lister, hormone therapy came

after she noticed major changes in her health. I came across as not intelligent. I look a little

young, and so a lot of the times people are like, how old are you? You know, is this your first time

doing this? So it was a little strange. And then I just started to look into hormones

Lindsay's treatment began with estrogen and progesterone. When her symptoms didn't go away

Her doctor introduced testosterone. I'd say the testosterone took about eight weeks to really build up enough that I could notice anything

Sleep is one. Brain fog is definitely improving. It's still not perfect

It's definitely better. My blood pressure is back down. My cholesterol is back down

My fasting glucose is back down. My A1C is back down. I was hoping that it could take the edge off, essentially, you know, like just dull the craziness because you really can feel crazy

So I wanted it to dull the rage dull the blood pressure dull all of that but also help me be me again Asha Gray also wanted to feel like herself again in a different way

I'm a licensed sex therapist, and I had no interest in sex

Just none. I was like, you know, every day I'm going through the world, and I'm like, this is not normal

This is not normal to who I am, like a person. After starting hormone therapy, she noticed a gradual change

Let's start slow. let's see what works. And so we started with estrogen. I had to change vehicles and

strengths of estrogen. And I'm like, okay, this is really helping, but it doesn't feel like it's

helping 100%. But with a testosterone, it's like, oh, I can see it. Okay, I can feel it. This is

pretty good. It's not what it was in my 20s or my early 30s. But you know, it's better than it was

Asha says testosterone therapy has not been one size fits all. As her body changes

her doctor adjusts her dosage to find what feels most sustainable and effective

I have some patients that tell me they can't live without it. They feel so much better on

testosterone replacement. And I have other women that tell me they feel no difference. And then we

just have them come off. One woman Straight Arrow spoke with applied a daily testosterone cream

With already elevated cholesterol and falling estrogen levels, she says her doctor advised

caution. After eight months, she ultimately stopped treatment. For women like Asha and Lindsay

it's been a game changer. It's like the missing piece. But to this day, the FDA only approves

testosterone for men