I started lifting weights quite heavily at age 18 after my senior year in high school. I was 5’9 weighed about 155lbs and was about 9% body fat. I was a baseball player throughout high school, which kept me in pretty good shape. After graduation, I quit baseball and decided to make weight lifting a full-time affair. I started reading Muscle Media 2000, a magazine geared towards “muscle heads” which soon became my bible. Lifting became quite an obsession; ditched work, skipped classes (college), blew off friends, all to eat and lift! I was very dedicated and determined to get big and strong just like all the guys in the muscle mag’s. Hell, these guys had the chicks, money and drove cool cars right! Big muscles are a sign of power! I knew that I had the potential to have the power! My magazines instructed me on how to eat, sleep, which supplements I “need” to take and how to train. At the end of my 19th year, I weighed about 190lbs lean. I was benching over 280lbs for reps, and was shoulder shrugging about 500lbs, which I thought was pretty good at the time. Creatine started becoming very popular at my gym and MM 2000 raved about it! I immediately went out and bought a bottle. I took creatine and some aminos for a while on and off, and by age 20, I broke 200lbs, and my strength gains were still climbing. Here I started to develop a small belly, due to all the domestic beer and eating every two hours, I suppose. I made a pact with myself, I would get up to 210lbs and then stop there. Well at 215lbs, I said only five more pounds and a hundred more on bench and I’ll be satisfied. However, at this time it was too late, I was going up fast, and nothing could stop me! I was convinced with the help from my magazine buddies, that I could not afford to lose any muscle. I spent so much time building it, there’s no way I’m going to lose it! Pretty soon I was given the nick name Girth. Then at age 22 and 260lbs, people referred to me as ‘little Dorian”, claimed from the monster pro bodybuilder Dorian Yates. I became a power-lifter between age 20 and 22. I was lifting more weight and was bigger than most guys in the gym, including the ones on roids. I was huge, but I didn’t look the way I wanted to look. I wanted to be ripped. I still looked small in the mirror and felt a bit inferior. I was stronger than most everyone around me, benching close to 500lbs, squatting about 800lbs, and leg pressing the sled loaded with plates and a 150lb kid standing on the top!! Yeah, did it all with the help of just creatine, aminos, protein shakes, weight gainers, HMB, various other supplements, a whole lot of hard work, and lots of food! But now it was time to get ripped! Around this time a bunch of Ephedra based weight loss products started becoming popular. Products like Metaform Heat, Ultimate Orange, and the new one Hydroxycut, all were being raved about in all the muscle mags. Man oh man, that Metaform Heat was powerful, before they took it off the market five times! That stuff made me fly through my workouts! I took some of these “cutters” for a few months. Hey, they were all natural! They can’t be that bad! After strict dieting, training and months of herbal speed, I was almost ripped at 210lbs, with very little body fat. I felt like crap though. I was pretty over-trained and too dehydrated from all the dieting. Damn it! Everyone around me was “juicing” and not training half as hard as me. My roommate and all my other gym comrades were all ripped and doing it with ease! All the magazines and roid head writers glorified the power of steroids. “Roids will give any person the edge they are looking for”. If the juice is done right, you can have the body of your dreams. Hey, the pro athletes that I knew, were doing it, and they were achieving stardom! I wanted to experience the power of the “juice”. Just a little boost, and I’ll be fine. One early evening I took my first shot of Testosterone Suspension, at age 23 and 210lbs lean. The next morning I was about 213lbs, and a lot leaner! How the hell is that possible! My muscles were so much harder, and I looked more cut up! I immediately went to the gym and had a fantastic workout. I felt great! Just in one day. This being, because Test Suspension is water based which gets into the system quickly. I became convinced and determined at that moment, that I would complete a cycle of steroids. Continuation of my cycle consisted of ditching the Suspension, and replacing it with Testosterone Cypionate, Testosterone Enanthate, Deca, Primobolan, Novadex and Clenbeuterol, all staggered within a four month period. I went from 213lbs to 225lbs, ripped, I mean ripped! My strength and size went through the roof. Although I never got as strong as when I was 260lbs. My muscles were tearing my workout shirts! I was never sore, and my joints felt great! I had a muscle pump all the time, and my workouts were cake! The owner of the gym I trained at asked if he could sponsor me for the upcoming Powerhouse Classic bodybuilding competition. I said yes. Then something weird started to happen. The power I had achieved, the power that I spent thousands of dollars and years trying to achieve just freaking took over! I became a sort of monster. Everything pissed me off, my dog, family, friends, TV, everything! I broke things, everything. I was so damn powerful. I could throw anyone around. No one could mess with me! I hated everything. Anger and destruction took over. I looked around one day in the gym, and I saw what I had been blinded to before. Almost everyone in the gym was using steroids. The girls the guys, the freaking kids! And they all looked like crap! My roid buddies all were messed up physically and mentally. They were abusive in their relationships, abused alcohol and drugs, were extremely paranoid, had no conscience when it came to selling steroids to teens, and had all sorts of health problems. I looked around, for the first time in my gym life, I really looked around. My God, I was becoming just like everyone else. I faced myself in the mirror and saw a person I didn’t know. I felt like crap, mentally and physically. I had to stop using steroids right then and there. I did. I started to lose weight and strength rapidly. Every joint in my body hurt bad. My appetite was gone. Patches of hair were left on my pillow. I consulted my “friends”; most of their words of wisdom had to do with taking more steroids. Yeah right. One buddy just starting his third cycle in the same year said “dude, you just gotta stay on the juice!” He is no longer around by the way. I stopped using roids in late July of 1998 at 225lbs. By November of 1998 I had lost about 15lbs and looked a bit fatter. I had my brother take some pic’s of me at this time because I knew that I would never look that way again. I felt horrible. By January of 1999 I had lost so much strength and weighed 185lbs. By April of 1999 I weighed 170lbs, and could barely look at myself in the mirror. I couldn’t train, sleep, eat or do anything for that matter. My eyes were sunken in my head, my skin looked like it was falling off my bones, my body hurt terribly, and I was horribly depressed. What the hell happened to me!! That power that I once had, remember, the power that I spent my freaking life and life savings trying to achieve, was ripped from me completely, plus some! I had no strength or vitality left in me at all, and I was only 24 freaking years old! All the damn roid head writers or know it all roid users had no answers for me now! They told me what damn supplements to take and what steroids are the best, but what about when you get sick. What happens when the god damned steroids kill you. What do you take then? None of these bastards have any answers or are willing to help now. In April of 2000 I weighed 163lbs was 5’7, yes two inches shorter, and surprises just kept on coming. Now, not only did I have no strength, couldn’t digest food, had pains all over my body, was consumed by depression, had constant thoughts of suicide, and continued to lose weight, but now my skin looked yellow, there were muscle twitches all over my body, and I couldn’t sleep more than 2 hours a night! Oh yeah, my hormone levels were basically non-existent. By the end of February 2001 I had visited over a dozen doctors and spent thousands upon thousands of dollars trying to get my body back to some sort of normalcy. Nothing and nobody would help me. Finally, in 2003, after seeking out every medical, non-medical, and self treatment I could, I started to regain some energy. I began to attempt to exercise again. Once a week, then twice and up to three times per week. Every workout was painfully horrible. I would periodically have bouts of weight loss, digestive problems and pain that would limit me from exercising or doing day- to- day activities, but I pushed myself. I still push myself, everyday. And I still have muscle twitches, weight fluctuations, and pains. My liver has a cyst on it, is painful sometimes, and my digestion is way out of whack. The list goes on. I guess I’m lucky. Some of my friends are in jail, look worse and feel worse than I do, and some aren’t around anymore to discuss their mistakes, or waste their time writing stories like this one. In my quest to get healthy again, I began my studies of the endocrine system, medicine, and everything there is to know about steroids. My studies lead me down a different path, which has shown me how lucky I really am, to know what I know now. However, there is not a day that goes by that I wish I never made that mistake of using steroids. Not ONE day!
cliffs: Total wackjob has a life meltdown, steroids somehow become the scapegoat due to some sort of logic that only crazy people have and probably due the the fact he had no idea what the fuck he was doing.
this is one of those things written by someone who hates steroids but never actually has used them to try to scare people away. it sounds a lot like the "experiences" of people that got caught up in "sin" while I was being raised as a jehovah's witness. Give me a fucking break
http://www.taylorhooton.com/todd_ganci this one doesn't even say anything bad about steroids besides it made him massive haha
Just got done reading that one too. Basically him just saying he was smart about it and he was fine. He'd need some fast acting esters to do 6wks on 6wks off.
Our doctor told us that the substances would pass out of his system soon, and not to worry about it. He would get through this phase soon and that these were common symptoms. We trusted his advice; after all he’s the doctor. We didn’t know it at the time, but at that very instant the medical profession failed us. Whether our doctor didn’t take the situation seriously or simply wasn’t attuned to consequences of suddenly quitting steroids, the fact is that steroid users must be weaned from the drugs and monitored for the onset of depression during the process. We are convinced now that the psychological effects of paranoia and devastating depression caused by using steroids and then quitting cold turkey is what led Efrain to end his life.
I used much less stuff than most of the guys I knew. My liver enzymes were never elevated, while other guy's enzymes would rise dangerously high.. I also took silymarin (milk thistle) when I was on to help detoxify my liver. I also never took toxic orals like Dianabol, Anadrol or Halotestin. I remember a doctor I spoke with about anabolic steroids back then said "if you want to get big use injectables, if you want liver tumors use orals"
Actually -- I was working at a pharma company for a while and dug through their 5000 some-odd page drug MSDS or something and a few of the steroids actually turned people's entire livers into blood-filled cysts over the long term of treatment (1-3 years), and then returned to normal when they went off. IIRC it was masterone or deca. I was
One buddy just starting his third cycle in the same year said “dude, you just gotta stay on the juice!” He is no longer around by the way.
if you go from 260 to semi lean at 210, you probably produce a lot of aromatase. pretty much all the "mental" side effects that were mentioned in the "article" are likely due to elevated estrogen. when reading this one is struck by the fact that the author did not stop to the "WHY" he felt the way he did and "WHAT" he could do about it, thus probably should not be taking drugs that he really did not understand. People spend lots of time reading, what are essentially worthless advertising rags, and assume that they know what they are doing. Its always good to look at other and perhaps countervailing opinions. No one is right all the time, no idea or theory is right for everyone. Certainly some people are genetically ill prepared for exogenous steroid use, some people are prone to issues from particular types of steroids, and some people even with all kind of ancillary and supportive drugs and supplements just wont do well on gear. On the other hand, for a great number of people steroids can be quite beneficial, particularly when taken in a sensible and well informed manner. There is a lot of bashing of "steroids" by the media and others. However, some of the most commonly prescribed drugs for women are steroids (Birth control). And in general have to say that the rate of side effects from those are considerably greater than found among the average steroid user (who can generally alleviate most, if not all of them, through modulation of aromatase or 5alpha reductase and/or dopaminergics for progestins and prolactogenics) MM2K was decent when duchaine was writing for them, but then again Dan was not all that sharp, he just actually did SOME research. (not dissing DAN, just being honest- at the time he (sadly) was probably among the best informed when it comes to gear. He had some decent theories as well, but he had some really shitty ones. Still have to say that one of his most lasting contributions to bodybuilding, nubain- which he also died addicted to, was not a good thing. well enough rant at the rant... btw- feel that supporting evidence is always a good thing. So for those that are interested. 1: Horm Behav. 2006 Aug;50(2):338-45. Epub 2006 Jun 6. Links Individual differences in estrogen receptor alpha in select brain nuclei are associated with individual differences in aggression. Trainor BC, Greiwe KM, Nelson RJ. Departments of Psychology and Neuroscience, Institute of Behavioral Medicine Research, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, USA. [email protected] Steroid hormones play an important role in modulating social behavior in many species. Estrogens are thought to act on an interconnected network of hypothalamic and limbic brain areas to affect aggressive behavior, although the specific nuclei unknown remain unspecified. We show that individual variation in estrogen receptor alpha (ERalpha) immunoreactivity in the lateral septum (LS), ventral bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (vBNST), and anterior hypothalamus (AHA) of CD-1 mice is positively correlated with aggressive behavior. When males were treated with fadrozole (an aromatase inhibitor), aggressive behavior was reduced, although castration did not reduce aggression. These results suggest that estrogens modulate aggressive behavior by acting on a circuit that includes the LS, vBNST, and AHA and that the source of estrogens is non-gonadal. Fadrozole also decreased c-fos expression in the lateral septum following aggressive encounters. Although the effects of estrogen on aggression appear to involve regulation of neuronal activity in the LS, additional processes are likely involved. These results suggest that estrogen acts in a specific subset of a complex network of nuclei to affect aggressive behavior. Front Neuroendocrinol. 2006 Jul;27(2):170-9. Epub 2006 Jan 10. Links Estrogenic encounters: how interactions between aromatase and the environment modulate aggression. Trainor BC, Kyomen HH, Marler CA. Department of Psychology, Ohio State University, Columbus, 43210, USA. [email protected] Initial investigations into the mechanistic basis of aggression focused on the role of testosterone (T) and a variety of studies on non-human animals found that elevated T levels promote aggression. However, many correlational studies have not detected a significant association between aggression and peripheral T levels. One reason for this inconsistency may be due to differential metabolism of T within the brain, in particular, the conversion of T to estrogen by aromatase. Thus, differences in aromatase enzyme activity, estrogen receptor expression, and related cofactors may have important effects on how steroids affect aggressive behavior. Hormone manipulation studies conducted in a wide variety of species indicate that estrogens modulate aggression. There is also growing evidence that social experience has important effects on the production of estrogen within the brain, and some cases can not be explained by androgenic regulation of aromatase. Such changes in central aromatase activity may play an important role in determining how social experiences affect the probability of whether an individual engages in aggressive behavior. Although studies have been conducted in many taxa, there has been relatively little integration between literatures examining aggression in different species. In this review, we compare and contrast studies examining aggression in birds, mammals, and humans. By taking an integrative approach to our review, we consider mechanisms that could explain species differences in how estrogen modulates aggression. J Vet Med A Physiol Pathol Clin Med. 2006 Sep;53(7):334-9. Links Increased number of neurons expressing androgen receptor in the basolateral amygdala of pathologically aggressive dogs. Jacobs C, Van Den Broeck W, Simoens P. University of Antwerp, Universiteitsplein 1, 2610 Wilrijk, Belgium. [email protected] The present study aimed to determine the extent to which the androgen receptor (AR) is directly involved in the hormonal modulation of pathological canine aggressive behaviour in the basolateral nuclear group (BNG) of the amygdaloid body. A stereological quantification of AR-positive neurons was performed in the BNGs of normally behaving and aggressive male dogs. The BNG was selected because it is involved in sexual and behavioural activities that are influenced by androgens. In the aggressive dogs the BNG contained a significantly higher number of AR-positive neurons compared with normally behaving dogs suggesting differences in androgen activity within the BNGs of both the groups. However, additional mechanisms are likely to be involved because the AR-negative fraction of BNG neurons was also increased in the aggressive dogs. It was concluded that most of the AR was unliganded because a cytoplasmic staining pattern of AR positivity was observed in the canine BNG neurons. This indicates that genomic androgen actions, which are mediated through the AR are of minor importance in the testosterone modulation of canine aggression within the BNG. Other non-genomic mechanisms through which androgens may exert their action in the BNG are discussed. The aromatase pathway is suggested to be the main mechanism through which testosterone exerts its action within the BNG.