I originally posted this on ironforlife http://www.ironforlife.com/t5228-an...craze-of-them-quotbeing-for-everyonequot.html
But I thought I would share it with everyone so people learn from my mistakes.
I'm writing this in hopes to sway some peoples minds away from focussing on Anabolic Steroids as an end all answer to getting big.
I will be the first to admit, I started Anabolic Steroids too young. I was a fairly scrawny child at 16, but I was gifted with fairly good strength genetics. The first time I lifted weights for real was at age 16, coming out of a martial arts background as a child I was physically fit and able to bench press 225 for a decent amount of reps, although my 6ft frame carried very little mass. After doing this, I was hooked for life, nothing empowered me more than adding more weight to the bar.
I would go home from school, choke down a bunch of terrible tasting protein powder and raw eggs that no matter how much i mixed, would still go down with the consistency of sour milk then look in the mirror in hopes that a new mysterious muscle would pop up that hadn't show before. I lived for nothing other than the gym, I found myself becoming a social recluse, training 2-3 times per day. I purchased a weight set used fairly cheap, nothing fancy, just a flat bench and some plates. I would wake up in anticipation for the day to come, because today was the day I was going to be huge! My alarm would ring, and unlike most students my age, I could not wait to get out of bed. I would run to my basement and jump on my bench. I would do set after set of bench presses back to back with sets of curls and military presses. I'd then hop in the shower and just barely catch the buss to school, usually burning a good 500 calories trying to chase the thing down as it was leaving!
At the time, I was playing football, OL, I had a lot of heart and some good strength, but I was missing one thing... SIZE. My football coach brought this up to me one day, saying he could help me but I couldn't tell anyone. Well that day still sticks in my head as a moment in the Robert Frost poem The Road Less traveled:
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth
Then took the other as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet, knowing how way leads onto way
I doubted if I should ever come back
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence
Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference
To this day I wonder if I chose the right path, trying to justify it in my head that I am a better man for it. However in retrospect, thinking with a clear head, it was a terrible choice. That was the day I entered into the "dark side" as many users call it. After school I met up with the coach in his office where he gave me several bottles of Testosterone and a plastic bag filled with pills he didn't quite have a name for, I later found them to be anadrol tablets. He then handed me some syringes, which I have to admit at my age scared the pants clean off me! They looked huge, but as the saying goes, no pain - no gain. He advised me to take "two shots of the testosterone into my glutes and 2 of those pills a day", I left his office filled with suspicioun and paranoia. I looked around every corner just waiting for the FBI or DEA to come and arrest me and lock me away for years and years, but they never came and I made it out into the parking lot.
I can never explain to you the feeling I had when I made it home safely with my new bag of goodies, it was both a feeling of relief and excitement. I was going to be big! No one could stop me now. I immediately ran into the bathroom, my Mother nor my Father was home at the time, but I still took the extra precaution of locking the door, checking it twice, then moving a laundry basket in front of the door incase of that one in a million chance that one of my parents would come home early, try and open the bathroom door and have the lock malfunction. No sir, I was taking no chances on this, if I was anything, I was thorough. I pulled from my backpack a syringe, quickly unwrapped it and sat there staring at it for a good five minutes. "He wants me to stick this in my ass!?" I exclaimed vocally after running the thought of it through my head... shh i must be quiet, the neighbors might hear. I had no idea what to do really, I just pulled a bottle out of my backpack, jammed the needle inside of it and pulled back on the plunger. The question of exactly how much I'm supposed to be doing never really crossed my mind, he was very specific.. "two shots per week", so I filled the syringe full of the oil, paying no mind to what dosage I was taking exactly, I later learned it was over 1 gram of testosterone. Now was the hard part, I held in my hand what seemed to be a harpoon filled with chemicals. To me, at my age it looked like something you would kill a whale with, but this was going to be injected right into my ass! I will be honest, it took me over an hour to actually work up the nerve to inject myself. I finally said to myself the slogan I would hear over and over "no pain - no gain" and jammed the bowie knife sized needle directly into my right glute and pushed on the plunger as hard as I could. Yes, it hurt, quite worse than I expected actually, but that was the price I would pay. I then took two of the pills he gave me, and immediately ran downstairs to work out. That night after supper was almost entirely dedicated to me posing in the mirror, I swear I was in front of it for atleast two hours looking for new lumps and I would have bet the farm that I could actually see myself grow.
Time past, and I did grow. I was becoming a monster, and I was only 18! I don't know exactly how many cycles I did in that time, but I will say time on = time off didn't apply. I knew nothing about post cycle therapy (pct) or anything other than "draw, shoot and pump". I had started to hang with the wrong crowd around that same time as well, I was big and I wanted to let everyone know that I was stronger than them. I'm the first to admit it, I became a bully, not a school yard bully but the kind of bully who would go up to someone in a club and call his woman a bitch just to throw some hands with someone. I lived off aggression, it was my ultimate drug. Getting hit and hitting back, I wanted the world to know I was the biggest, I was the strongest and I would take no prisoners.
At 19 years old my life changed dramatically, it all came crumbling down at once. I was arrested and sentenced to 4 years in prison, suddenly I wasn't the bully anymore. My first night was hell, I was away from my family, my friends, everyone who cared. Fast forward two years later to my release under house arrest for several more months. Scars from stab wounds, slash wounds and punches. These were the only trophies I received inside and I wore them as a badge of honor. At the time, I felt myself a badass, I was king gladiator. I was put inside hell, and came out alive. Boy do I feel dumb looking back on that now. My steroid use however did not stop in prison, although it did take a small hiatus until I could acquire some dianabol, which I used for quite a long time without worrying about the consequences.
My poor choices in life didn't stop there, I was still getting into fights, still juicing non stop and I do believe today, that I was absolutely a scared little kid trapped in a large mans body. Sure, I was getting my life on track, going to college, working hard all at the same time, but still making the same mistakes over and over. That's when it started.. the pain. Everyday aches from my shoulders to my feet. Everything would hurt none stop. You see, i grew so fast and became so strong while I was young and undeveloped, my tendons and joints did not have time to adjust. I felt like an old man, but hey - I had a solution! Nubain, the most evil drug out there, more evil than heroin in my eyes. They say the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist, well that pretty much applies to this in a way. At the time, it was seen as an end all cure for whatever pain was bugging you. It was also heavily accepted within the bodybuilding/gym scene and considered in the same class as steroids to many. Well I used it for quite some time, the pain wasn't as bad but was still there until one day I couldn't get anymore. My friend told me it would be a week. A week! The worst news of my life, you see I had no idea of its addictive properties. The next week was spent in bed vomiting and shaking, not training and eating like it should have been. At that point, I said to myself - that's it, never again. I would never lie to myself like that, and I never touched it again.
That still left me with one problem.. the pain. Torn ligaments and tendons, floating cartilage, torn rotator cuffs. The doctors would ask me if I just came home from war! This was about the same time I started to really straighten my life out, everything but the steroids were gone from it and I focussed on nothing but work/school/training. I would just black out the pain from myself and learn how to channel pain into mental clarity.
Now lets fast forward to now - at age 25 I stand 6ft tall and weigh 320 lbs with visible abs. I'm a district manager of a chain of gyms, and I have a wonderful girlfriend, great house and nice cars. I'm not something you see everyday, unless you're watching cartoons. I lift weight most people will never touch and on the outside I look ''in shape". The truth though is that I'm far from "in shape", my cholesterol is shaky to say the least, same with my blood pressure. At age 22 I suffered from jaundice which was steroid related. My joints kill and my endocrine system is shot to hell.
Now I look back at that poem and wonder what I would be like now if I waited to use steroids, what if i waited until I was 21? What about 23? What about right now? I'm guessing I would probably be in just about the same shape and my body wouldn't be so damaged. I've always been told patience is a virtue, well I never had any. My father also told me once that if he knew he was going to live this long he would have taken better care of himself, looking back I wish I listened.
Do I have any real regrets? No, everything I have done in the past has shaped me into what I am today. Would I do it differently if I had the chance knowing what I know now? Of course.
On these boards I see far too many people jumping on anabolics when there is really no need for them. I see people who weigh under 200 lbs using as much gear as seasoned veterans and I see kids starting at the same age I did.
Here is my advice to anyone thinking about using steroids, research everything there is to know about weight training and diet. Step up to the dinner table, eat your HEART out. 2-2.5 grams of protein per lb of bodyweight. Train hard, look into new training methods, new training partners, anything that could spark your growth. Exhaust all of these methods until you see no increase in size or strength, and then consider adding steroids to the mix ONLY after weighing the bad vs the good. Research your hearts out, this is your body you're playing with and you only get one!
I'm sorry for dragging this out so damn long, I guess I just like to ramble, but I hope you all get the point.
But I thought I would share it with everyone so people learn from my mistakes.
I'm writing this in hopes to sway some peoples minds away from focussing on Anabolic Steroids as an end all answer to getting big.
I will be the first to admit, I started Anabolic Steroids too young. I was a fairly scrawny child at 16, but I was gifted with fairly good strength genetics. The first time I lifted weights for real was at age 16, coming out of a martial arts background as a child I was physically fit and able to bench press 225 for a decent amount of reps, although my 6ft frame carried very little mass. After doing this, I was hooked for life, nothing empowered me more than adding more weight to the bar.
I would go home from school, choke down a bunch of terrible tasting protein powder and raw eggs that no matter how much i mixed, would still go down with the consistency of sour milk then look in the mirror in hopes that a new mysterious muscle would pop up that hadn't show before. I lived for nothing other than the gym, I found myself becoming a social recluse, training 2-3 times per day. I purchased a weight set used fairly cheap, nothing fancy, just a flat bench and some plates. I would wake up in anticipation for the day to come, because today was the day I was going to be huge! My alarm would ring, and unlike most students my age, I could not wait to get out of bed. I would run to my basement and jump on my bench. I would do set after set of bench presses back to back with sets of curls and military presses. I'd then hop in the shower and just barely catch the buss to school, usually burning a good 500 calories trying to chase the thing down as it was leaving!
At the time, I was playing football, OL, I had a lot of heart and some good strength, but I was missing one thing... SIZE. My football coach brought this up to me one day, saying he could help me but I couldn't tell anyone. Well that day still sticks in my head as a moment in the Robert Frost poem The Road Less traveled:
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth
Then took the other as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet, knowing how way leads onto way
I doubted if I should ever come back
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence
Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference
To this day I wonder if I chose the right path, trying to justify it in my head that I am a better man for it. However in retrospect, thinking with a clear head, it was a terrible choice. That was the day I entered into the "dark side" as many users call it. After school I met up with the coach in his office where he gave me several bottles of Testosterone and a plastic bag filled with pills he didn't quite have a name for, I later found them to be anadrol tablets. He then handed me some syringes, which I have to admit at my age scared the pants clean off me! They looked huge, but as the saying goes, no pain - no gain. He advised me to take "two shots of the testosterone into my glutes and 2 of those pills a day", I left his office filled with suspicioun and paranoia. I looked around every corner just waiting for the FBI or DEA to come and arrest me and lock me away for years and years, but they never came and I made it out into the parking lot.
I can never explain to you the feeling I had when I made it home safely with my new bag of goodies, it was both a feeling of relief and excitement. I was going to be big! No one could stop me now. I immediately ran into the bathroom, my Mother nor my Father was home at the time, but I still took the extra precaution of locking the door, checking it twice, then moving a laundry basket in front of the door incase of that one in a million chance that one of my parents would come home early, try and open the bathroom door and have the lock malfunction. No sir, I was taking no chances on this, if I was anything, I was thorough. I pulled from my backpack a syringe, quickly unwrapped it and sat there staring at it for a good five minutes. "He wants me to stick this in my ass!?" I exclaimed vocally after running the thought of it through my head... shh i must be quiet, the neighbors might hear. I had no idea what to do really, I just pulled a bottle out of my backpack, jammed the needle inside of it and pulled back on the plunger. The question of exactly how much I'm supposed to be doing never really crossed my mind, he was very specific.. "two shots per week", so I filled the syringe full of the oil, paying no mind to what dosage I was taking exactly, I later learned it was over 1 gram of testosterone. Now was the hard part, I held in my hand what seemed to be a harpoon filled with chemicals. To me, at my age it looked like something you would kill a whale with, but this was going to be injected right into my ass! I will be honest, it took me over an hour to actually work up the nerve to inject myself. I finally said to myself the slogan I would hear over and over "no pain - no gain" and jammed the bowie knife sized needle directly into my right glute and pushed on the plunger as hard as I could. Yes, it hurt, quite worse than I expected actually, but that was the price I would pay. I then took two of the pills he gave me, and immediately ran downstairs to work out. That night after supper was almost entirely dedicated to me posing in the mirror, I swear I was in front of it for atleast two hours looking for new lumps and I would have bet the farm that I could actually see myself grow.
Time past, and I did grow. I was becoming a monster, and I was only 18! I don't know exactly how many cycles I did in that time, but I will say time on = time off didn't apply. I knew nothing about post cycle therapy (pct) or anything other than "draw, shoot and pump". I had started to hang with the wrong crowd around that same time as well, I was big and I wanted to let everyone know that I was stronger than them. I'm the first to admit it, I became a bully, not a school yard bully but the kind of bully who would go up to someone in a club and call his woman a bitch just to throw some hands with someone. I lived off aggression, it was my ultimate drug. Getting hit and hitting back, I wanted the world to know I was the biggest, I was the strongest and I would take no prisoners.
At 19 years old my life changed dramatically, it all came crumbling down at once. I was arrested and sentenced to 4 years in prison, suddenly I wasn't the bully anymore. My first night was hell, I was away from my family, my friends, everyone who cared. Fast forward two years later to my release under house arrest for several more months. Scars from stab wounds, slash wounds and punches. These were the only trophies I received inside and I wore them as a badge of honor. At the time, I felt myself a badass, I was king gladiator. I was put inside hell, and came out alive. Boy do I feel dumb looking back on that now. My steroid use however did not stop in prison, although it did take a small hiatus until I could acquire some dianabol, which I used for quite a long time without worrying about the consequences.
My poor choices in life didn't stop there, I was still getting into fights, still juicing non stop and I do believe today, that I was absolutely a scared little kid trapped in a large mans body. Sure, I was getting my life on track, going to college, working hard all at the same time, but still making the same mistakes over and over. That's when it started.. the pain. Everyday aches from my shoulders to my feet. Everything would hurt none stop. You see, i grew so fast and became so strong while I was young and undeveloped, my tendons and joints did not have time to adjust. I felt like an old man, but hey - I had a solution! Nubain, the most evil drug out there, more evil than heroin in my eyes. They say the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist, well that pretty much applies to this in a way. At the time, it was seen as an end all cure for whatever pain was bugging you. It was also heavily accepted within the bodybuilding/gym scene and considered in the same class as steroids to many. Well I used it for quite some time, the pain wasn't as bad but was still there until one day I couldn't get anymore. My friend told me it would be a week. A week! The worst news of my life, you see I had no idea of its addictive properties. The next week was spent in bed vomiting and shaking, not training and eating like it should have been. At that point, I said to myself - that's it, never again. I would never lie to myself like that, and I never touched it again.
That still left me with one problem.. the pain. Torn ligaments and tendons, floating cartilage, torn rotator cuffs. The doctors would ask me if I just came home from war! This was about the same time I started to really straighten my life out, everything but the steroids were gone from it and I focussed on nothing but work/school/training. I would just black out the pain from myself and learn how to channel pain into mental clarity.
Now lets fast forward to now - at age 25 I stand 6ft tall and weigh 320 lbs with visible abs. I'm a district manager of a chain of gyms, and I have a wonderful girlfriend, great house and nice cars. I'm not something you see everyday, unless you're watching cartoons. I lift weight most people will never touch and on the outside I look ''in shape". The truth though is that I'm far from "in shape", my cholesterol is shaky to say the least, same with my blood pressure. At age 22 I suffered from jaundice which was steroid related. My joints kill and my endocrine system is shot to hell.
Now I look back at that poem and wonder what I would be like now if I waited to use steroids, what if i waited until I was 21? What about 23? What about right now? I'm guessing I would probably be in just about the same shape and my body wouldn't be so damaged. I've always been told patience is a virtue, well I never had any. My father also told me once that if he knew he was going to live this long he would have taken better care of himself, looking back I wish I listened.
Do I have any real regrets? No, everything I have done in the past has shaped me into what I am today. Would I do it differently if I had the chance knowing what I know now? Of course.
On these boards I see far too many people jumping on anabolics when there is really no need for them. I see people who weigh under 200 lbs using as much gear as seasoned veterans and I see kids starting at the same age I did.
Here is my advice to anyone thinking about using steroids, research everything there is to know about weight training and diet. Step up to the dinner table, eat your HEART out. 2-2.5 grams of protein per lb of bodyweight. Train hard, look into new training methods, new training partners, anything that could spark your growth. Exhaust all of these methods until you see no increase in size or strength, and then consider adding steroids to the mix ONLY after weighing the bad vs the good. Research your hearts out, this is your body you're playing with and you only get one!
I'm sorry for dragging this out so damn long, I guess I just like to ramble, but I hope you all get the point.
