Brain and Brawn
New member
So...here goes everything...(also, sorry this is so looong and if this is in the wrong thread, please redirect me if it is)
A little history about myself. I'm 24, almost 25 now. Most of my life, I've been obese. At the age of 12, I had the blood pressure of a 45 year old smoker from WAAAAAY too much salt intake. Around the same time, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's Thyroiditis (on my mothers side), and have been on levothyroxin ever since. Without draining on about my life, I eventually reached a peak weight of 345lbs at the age of 17, and stayed there for roughly 2 years. At that point, I had had enough and started to hit the gym. I lost a lot of weight, roughly 115 lbs, but I also did so in a VERY fast and wrong manner. I shed the majority (probably 105 lbs) of the weight in about an 6 month period. I never really watched what I ate, I just ate considerably less and started to become VERY active. Most of my training revolved around cardio first, followed by (what I thought at the time to be the way to do things right...) weight training. Problem was, I never did any of the really big, basic, core compound lifts (namely the deadlift and the squat) out of fear of hurting an already previously injured lower back.
After losing all that weight I took some time off to travel and enjoy life, but I was never satisfied with what I had done. I went from being obese to skinny fat, and lost a lot of strength along the way. I returned to training seriously about 2 years ago, watching my food intake meticulously using an app for the iphone, and starting with the p90x program. I finished it, and it certainly helped me increase my overall athleticism (for instance, I went into it not being able to do a push up) but again, it wasn't enough.
Afterwards I started back at the gym again and continued off from my old routine. This only lasted a few weeks before I realized I needed to change things. So, I did some research, and found a program called "Starting Strength" and adopted it. Except I chose to continue in a caloric deficit while doing so. Well, even though I trained in a deficit, I saw some amazing gains in both strength and size (particularly my shoulders and back), but like all good things my "newb" gains stop coming.
And that kind of takes us to where I am at today. I continued the Starting Stregth after platueing a few times, doing the proper outlined de-loads and pushed through some plateus. During all my training periods however, I have ALWAYS trained in a caloric deficit. I will occasionally go over my daily allowance, hell, I've taken even a whole week to do so, to help maintain my metabolism from time to time. Currently, my training consists of Layne Norton's PHAT training program (Power Hypertrophy split), as I wanted to introduce more than just the 5 or 6 basic exercises outlined in Starting Strength.
Age: 24 (25 for the sake of argument)
Weight: 240 Lbs +-5lbs
Height: 6'5"
Goals: Increase strength, Fill out loose skin, Shed remaining BF, perhaps one day compete
Current "Big/Core Lifts" Stats (in LBS)
Squat: 245 x5, 5 working sets (3 progressive build ups)
Deadlift: 265 x5, 1 working set (5 progressive build ups to max)
Bench: 180 x5, 3-5 working sets (with 2 progressive build ups)
Clean and Press: 115 x5, 5 working sets (no warm up needed as generally done after something else related)
(As you can see, I'm far from an olympic champion, but I am happy with the progress I have made)
My diet is pretty "clean"(no junk food/fast food), but I know there are areas I can clean it up a bit (ESPECIALLY THE SODIUM INTAKE. These next two weeks I will be eliminating anything that i don't have to cook myself, or can eat raw.
My typical average weekly macros are as follows:
Average Caloric Intake:
2950 cal minus approx 500 through exercise
Protein/Carbs/Fats Ratio:
30-35%/30-35%/30-35% (varies only slightly, usually pretty much even across the board)
Sodium Intake:
Anywhere from 4000mgs - 7000mgs
(I have blood work done regularly and blood pressure done due to my hypothyroidism, and the doc says I'm as healthy as a horse besides my thyroid issue)
Now, for my questions (of which there are MANY)
1) I've attached pictures to give you a better idea of where I'm at (sorry they suck, I've never done this before) Oh and that fold across my stomach was from when I was born with a diagrammatic hernia. I'd like people to constructively critique me, as I've had people tell me different things I should do. Some people say I should bulk, others say cut further. I've had measured with calipers my BF and it came out to around 16%, but I also have a lot of loose skin from being obese for most of my life. What is your guys opinions? I'd like to bulk, but I'm afraid that I'm not lean enough for the nutrients to be partitioned to their greatest efficiency yet, and that in my attempts to build muscle, I'll end up putting on too much fat.
What about the use of AAS to help mitigate where the nutrient partitioning? I'm currently looking into starting my first cycle...which is a great segway into my next set of questions...
2) I googled the Andromed Labs website and have been in talks with a man who claims to be "Boss". He was kind enough to give me a reference code, and I am excited to finally begin this journey. Thing is, these discreet talks I've been having with Boss are through a non secure email. Now I was under the impression that they preferred to talk to people through safe-mail and the likes. Is that suspicious? I even offered to move our conversations over to a cyber-rights account, but he just said even those aren't truly safe anyways.
Also, when I initially asked Boss for references, he countered and said that normally, I was to provide him a reference so that he could trust me. I mentioned I was in Canada and my back story and he seemed to trust me enough to give me a temp code, I'm just trying to make sure I'm not being scammed. What can you tell me about their products? Many people seem to be having great success as far as the forums claim, but I've noticed many (but not all) of these people have only been around for about a year or so, which in my head makes me wonder if they were accounts made in advance to help the promotion of their products.
HOWEVER, I am open to listening to people advice about what I should do as well. As excited as I am to start using, I am someone who likes to go into things fully prepared. I've been researching a LOT over the past 3 years about everything I could sink my teeth into on this and MANY other sites. If its the communities overwhelming opinion that I should train natty for a little while longer, so be it. I am simply in need of any advice I can get.
IF I were to begin using, my protocol would look something like this
12-16 weeks of either Test Eth, or a blend of Prop/Eth/Cyp 250-300mg, twice per week spaced out (rotating injection sites of course)
HCG - Still debating on if I should follow the 500iu every week while on protocol, or simply the blast at the end of the cycle
Aromasin - I've read 12.5 ED is a standard doing protocol for this
Nolva on hand incase of any sensitivity
PCT would be the standard Clomid dosing, with a continued low dose of aromasin, and the above mentioned Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG) blast 10 days before the 4 days before the start of PCT
I have many many more questions, but most will be answered by people responses I imagine, and I can gather more information based upon those responses as well. I'm just stuck right now.
TL: DR Cant lose weight, scared to try to bulk natty at least, and cant tell if I'm fat or just lose skin. Lots of questions
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A little history about myself. I'm 24, almost 25 now. Most of my life, I've been obese. At the age of 12, I had the blood pressure of a 45 year old smoker from WAAAAAY too much salt intake. Around the same time, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's Thyroiditis (on my mothers side), and have been on levothyroxin ever since. Without draining on about my life, I eventually reached a peak weight of 345lbs at the age of 17, and stayed there for roughly 2 years. At that point, I had had enough and started to hit the gym. I lost a lot of weight, roughly 115 lbs, but I also did so in a VERY fast and wrong manner. I shed the majority (probably 105 lbs) of the weight in about an 6 month period. I never really watched what I ate, I just ate considerably less and started to become VERY active. Most of my training revolved around cardio first, followed by (what I thought at the time to be the way to do things right...) weight training. Problem was, I never did any of the really big, basic, core compound lifts (namely the deadlift and the squat) out of fear of hurting an already previously injured lower back.
After losing all that weight I took some time off to travel and enjoy life, but I was never satisfied with what I had done. I went from being obese to skinny fat, and lost a lot of strength along the way. I returned to training seriously about 2 years ago, watching my food intake meticulously using an app for the iphone, and starting with the p90x program. I finished it, and it certainly helped me increase my overall athleticism (for instance, I went into it not being able to do a push up) but again, it wasn't enough.
Afterwards I started back at the gym again and continued off from my old routine. This only lasted a few weeks before I realized I needed to change things. So, I did some research, and found a program called "Starting Strength" and adopted it. Except I chose to continue in a caloric deficit while doing so. Well, even though I trained in a deficit, I saw some amazing gains in both strength and size (particularly my shoulders and back), but like all good things my "newb" gains stop coming.
And that kind of takes us to where I am at today. I continued the Starting Stregth after platueing a few times, doing the proper outlined de-loads and pushed through some plateus. During all my training periods however, I have ALWAYS trained in a caloric deficit. I will occasionally go over my daily allowance, hell, I've taken even a whole week to do so, to help maintain my metabolism from time to time. Currently, my training consists of Layne Norton's PHAT training program (Power Hypertrophy split), as I wanted to introduce more than just the 5 or 6 basic exercises outlined in Starting Strength.
Age: 24 (25 for the sake of argument)
Weight: 240 Lbs +-5lbs
Height: 6'5"
Goals: Increase strength, Fill out loose skin, Shed remaining BF, perhaps one day compete
Current "Big/Core Lifts" Stats (in LBS)
Squat: 245 x5, 5 working sets (3 progressive build ups)
Deadlift: 265 x5, 1 working set (5 progressive build ups to max)
Bench: 180 x5, 3-5 working sets (with 2 progressive build ups)
Clean and Press: 115 x5, 5 working sets (no warm up needed as generally done after something else related)
(As you can see, I'm far from an olympic champion, but I am happy with the progress I have made)
My diet is pretty "clean"(no junk food/fast food), but I know there are areas I can clean it up a bit (ESPECIALLY THE SODIUM INTAKE. These next two weeks I will be eliminating anything that i don't have to cook myself, or can eat raw.
My typical average weekly macros are as follows:
Average Caloric Intake:
2950 cal minus approx 500 through exercise
Protein/Carbs/Fats Ratio:
30-35%/30-35%/30-35% (varies only slightly, usually pretty much even across the board)
Sodium Intake:
Anywhere from 4000mgs - 7000mgs
(I have blood work done regularly and blood pressure done due to my hypothyroidism, and the doc says I'm as healthy as a horse besides my thyroid issue)
Now, for my questions (of which there are MANY)
1) I've attached pictures to give you a better idea of where I'm at (sorry they suck, I've never done this before) Oh and that fold across my stomach was from when I was born with a diagrammatic hernia. I'd like people to constructively critique me, as I've had people tell me different things I should do. Some people say I should bulk, others say cut further. I've had measured with calipers my BF and it came out to around 16%, but I also have a lot of loose skin from being obese for most of my life. What is your guys opinions? I'd like to bulk, but I'm afraid that I'm not lean enough for the nutrients to be partitioned to their greatest efficiency yet, and that in my attempts to build muscle, I'll end up putting on too much fat.
What about the use of AAS to help mitigate where the nutrient partitioning? I'm currently looking into starting my first cycle...which is a great segway into my next set of questions...
2) I googled the Andromed Labs website and have been in talks with a man who claims to be "Boss". He was kind enough to give me a reference code, and I am excited to finally begin this journey. Thing is, these discreet talks I've been having with Boss are through a non secure email. Now I was under the impression that they preferred to talk to people through safe-mail and the likes. Is that suspicious? I even offered to move our conversations over to a cyber-rights account, but he just said even those aren't truly safe anyways.
Also, when I initially asked Boss for references, he countered and said that normally, I was to provide him a reference so that he could trust me. I mentioned I was in Canada and my back story and he seemed to trust me enough to give me a temp code, I'm just trying to make sure I'm not being scammed. What can you tell me about their products? Many people seem to be having great success as far as the forums claim, but I've noticed many (but not all) of these people have only been around for about a year or so, which in my head makes me wonder if they were accounts made in advance to help the promotion of their products.
HOWEVER, I am open to listening to people advice about what I should do as well. As excited as I am to start using, I am someone who likes to go into things fully prepared. I've been researching a LOT over the past 3 years about everything I could sink my teeth into on this and MANY other sites. If its the communities overwhelming opinion that I should train natty for a little while longer, so be it. I am simply in need of any advice I can get.
IF I were to begin using, my protocol would look something like this
12-16 weeks of either Test Eth, or a blend of Prop/Eth/Cyp 250-300mg, twice per week spaced out (rotating injection sites of course)
HCG - Still debating on if I should follow the 500iu every week while on protocol, or simply the blast at the end of the cycle
Aromasin - I've read 12.5 ED is a standard doing protocol for this
Nolva on hand incase of any sensitivity
PCT would be the standard Clomid dosing, with a continued low dose of aromasin, and the above mentioned Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG) blast 10 days before the 4 days before the start of PCT
I have many many more questions, but most will be answered by people responses I imagine, and I can gather more information based upon those responses as well. I'm just stuck right now.
TL: DR Cant lose weight, scared to try to bulk natty at least, and cant tell if I'm fat or just lose skin. Lots of questions
View attachment 550066View attachment 550067View attachment 550068View attachment 550069View attachment 550070
