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PaperclipPerfector  6mo ago (text post)   1864 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for October 25, 2023

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

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To further the whiplash from my last comment, anyone here have any experience with tren?

If you're not willing to discuss it in public, feel free to DM. I have internalized LBBTQIA+^2 philosophies and my own transhumanism to the extent that I wish to transition from male to MALE.

Jokes aside, I'm just curious, and it seems trivially easy to get it here if I cared to do so.

Doing tren just for the hell of it would be profoundly stupid, it would shut off your own test production, make you (even more?) depressed, possibly turn you gay, irritable, frustrated for no reasons whatsoever, possibly give you life-altering acne, hair loss, increased fluid retention in the face, and then of course there is the systemic organ damage that it would cause. Literally the only positive effect would be that you'd have increased muscle growth, but from what I've gathered of your comments you haven't exactly optimised protein intake, sleep and workouts, so you have plenty of low-hanging gains to be had.

So hypothetically, if you're gay, depressed and balding already...

It could turn you straight! Bad outcomes abound.

I am under the impression that most of the side effects can be minimized, if not avoided, by a sensible regime and cycling.

I'm idly curious, I'd like to be better informed before trying it, since I'm well aware of the risks involved.

what I've gathered of your comments you haven't exactly optimised protein intake, sleep and workouts

Undoubtedly, but you try managing the last two while working as a doctor! About the only muscles that get a good workout are my glutes from running up and down the stairs. There are Ortho bros who manage to stay shredded, but I'm not them. I've heard that someone who doesn't even lift yet takes tren gains more muscle over a period of time than a natty person working out.

only positive effect would be that you'd have increased muscle growth

And what do muscles entail? Attractiveness? Higher social standing? Luck with the ladies? I'm not in it for the sake of being a beefcake.

At any rate, I have tried working out consistently for about 6 months when I was in college. Sure, I lost weight and became more toned, but I certainly didn't look very muscular. I am aware I probably did a pretty bad job of it, especially when it came to nutrition, but it's not like I've never hit the gym. I find it boring and painful, and in this case I see a tempting shortcut and only wish to know what are the odds of their being a bear trap under the leaves (for certain definitions of bear).

I've heard that someone who doesn't even lift yet takes tren gains more muscle over a period of time than a natty person working out.

This is bullshit.

Could you elaborate? I've also called that bullshit in the past, but no longer remember why.

@MollieTheMare actually covered it here: https://www.themotte.org/post/730/wellness-wednesday-for-october-25-2023/153185?context=8#context

I will add the caveat that it was in the context of two absolute beginners. I'm not putting much faith in it either way.

It's bullshit even in this context.

I guess your word is as good as that of a random forum denizen's claims I half remember from years ago.

The study you are thinking of is probably this one. I would highly recommend against interpenetrating this as all the benefits of strength training with just some side effects.

(1) They measured fat-free mass not muscle mass. Steroids like Tren make you uptake water in the muscles, you get "fullness" in the form of water when taking anabolics, but the study wasn't long enough to measure real substantial muscle growth. This also explains the cross-sectional area measurement. The water thing is just like a turbo version of what happens with creatine.

(2) The strength increase in the training non-steriod group was greater than the steroid only group. The additional strength in the steroid group is probably largely attributable to two factors

  • Slight increase in neural drive from steroids, this is nothing compared to long term strength training.
  • Better leverages from being bigger. Your muscles are class 3 levers, just being bigger means you can lift more weight. Getting stronger in this way is not necessarily good for you, you can achieve the same thing by getting supper fat.

This study does come up all the time, but it was wayyyy to short to conclude that you will gain more actual muscle not training on gear than resistant training. If you talk to any experienced bodybuilder who is open about steroids they all think training is still important. If you don't stimulate your body for specific muscle protein synthesis all you will do is end up looking freakish and ogre like, not jacked and fit looking.

The side-effects are also no joke, even if you don't care about potentially nuking your nuts, Tren in particular can absolutely make your mood terrible.

Finally, I have to say I'm skeptical you've tried enough actual resistance training to dismiss it as a better primary option. Six months is barely long enough to try one training method. Can you really say you've given your full effort to trying: traditional bro split style stuff, calisthenics, pure strength training, crossift style stuff, and circuit training? I saw below you are already talking about training twice a week. Starting strength can be done in three 60 minute sessions a week (if you can superset your warmups for upcoming exercises between working sets). Is that really too much to ask? If you eat enough the gains will be obvious. You could easily put 100 pounds on a novice squat in 6 months. Faster progress than that, aided by steroids, is enough to tear tendons off the bone.

I highly appreciate you tracking down the study, far more reliable than my hazy memories of someone making claims on Reddit!

When I considered that taking tren might beat working out, I wasn't actually implying my plan was to take it and sit on my ass, I'd do my best to augment it with strength training, even if I would strongly prefer to get better results with less work.

So it's not like I'm under the impression that I can or should go that route, the only way I know of to become permabuff without exercise is to be born with a myostatin knockout mutation, like some lucky people or Highland cattle haha.

Six months is barely long enough to try one training method. Can you really say you've given your full effort to trying: traditional bro split style stuff, calisthenics, pure strength training, crossift style stuff, and circuit training?

I was aiming for pure strength training at the time and working out about 3-4 times a week and targeting different muscle groups as I went. I won't claim it was a perfect showing, but I do hate cardio (I ran HIIT for 6 months, and I hated it!).

Either way, I appreciate your input, and thank you for clearing things up!

I've heard that someone who doesn't even lift yet takes tren gains more muscle over a period of time than a natty person working out.

That statement is a little bit suspect, I think. I don't think I really believe it myself. I've yet to meet a really big, muscular guy who didn't go to the gym, or at least train calisthenics hard,

I'm not claiming it as gospel truth, but steroids are a helluva drug. The comparison in question isn't a super buff guy, that almost certainly takes serious effort regardless of PED, but a comparison between two beginners, one simply using tren and not working out versus one remaining natty and hitting the gym.

I'd believe it. You're getting pushback but it's all in the form of "trust me bro".

I was watching a Youtube video from Jeff Nippard yesterday. He said it's possible for an untrained person to gain 15 pounds of lean muscle mass in a single MONTH using steroids.

So it's clear that the results of using steroids are simply miles above what you can get naturally.

Many people with good genetics will have decent (not elite) strength without working out. Steroids could take this to an even higher level. Low confidence but I would bet on a steroids user with 1 workout per month outperforming a non-steroids user with 3 workouts a week.

I'd believe it. You're getting pushback but it's all in the form of "trust me bro".

I'd take it more seriously if the people in question had tried tren themselves and then asked me to reconsider, but so far nobody has copped to it in public or DMs.

I'm even more perplexed that people thought I was advocating that you just take steroids and sit around, come on people, there's a use-mention distinction to be made there.

Many people with good genetics will have decent (not elite) strength without working out.

And look at the lucky bastards with myostatin knockout mutations, they're maximally buff without lifting an ounce in their lives! In the ancestral environment, that would have been a bad idea with a BMR of like 4000 calories, but a shortage of calories is not what ails the majority of humanity.

Sadly, this is about the best that can be expected, epistemic around topics like these are dubious in general.

And look at the lucky bastards with myostatin knockout mutations

This cow has never lifted a single weight in its life.

Sadly, this is about the best that can be expected, epistemic around topics like these are dubious in general.

I really want to see data now. Steroids vs training, which works better? My money is on steroids, but low confidence. All the people saying that "steroids don't work unless you train" are just making assertions with zero data and can be ignored.

That link seems to be broken for me? But yeah, those cows can get beefy, pun intended.

More comments

Look in the other comments, someone linked a paper:

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199607043350101

And indeed, steroids make you gain muscle without exercise, though you obviously make more when you combine the two.

I don't know how fruitful that comparison might be, but I do wonder if that would work at all. The effect of stimulus on muscle size and strength is really big. A totally immobilized muscle will lose size and strength at something like a rate of 1% per day (!!!). A guy sitting on the couch scratching his balls is not going to atrophy at that rate, but he will atrophy down to a fairly weak state. The role of stimulus in muscle development is really, really strong, in other words.

I think a more reasonable attempt to split the difference would be taking steroids and then just training moderately hard. Like, finding a simple 2x a week program, doing calisthenics, or even just doing some hard conditioning like WoDs or kettlebell complexes. Or if you don't want to do even that, look into just cruising on testosterone. Because I think that if you just took anabolics, you'd just be opening yourself up to very horrible side effects with very little prospect of any upside. And come on, you're supposed to be a doctor. You should know that even well-thought out attempts to control side effects don't always work. Sometimes it doesn't work, and sometimes you can end up playing whac-a-mole with using medication to control the side effects from the last medication you started. I'm interested in steroids, but I've been lifting for over five years, and I'm simply not satisfied with my results (which are very poor). And I wouldn't see them as a replacement for lifting.

I assure you I'm doing the sensible thing by asking here instead of immediately writing myself a prescription for tren, which no small number of reasonably legitimate pharmacies will fulfill.

My understanding of tren, from hanging around in places where it's occasionally discussed, is that the side effects take a while to kick in and can be ameliorated by cycling, or worst case, you taper off or stop. I have no intention of even getting to the point where my balls stop working, my hair falls out and I grow tits. I'm trying to consider the tradeoff as it ascertains to expected benefit and the dangers of side effects accounting for attempts to ameliorate them!

And I wouldn't see them as a replacement for lifting.

I appreciate your suggestions, which are to combine steroids with a reasonable intensity of exercise, my hypothetical comparison of a couch potato to a gym rat was just that, I'd certainly put in more than the bare minimum of effort, especially since the gains would be faster and more obvious. If it lets me get away with, say, two days at the gym instead of 4 or 5, then I'd see it as potentially worth it, after considering the associated risks of course!

At any rate, I have tried working out consistently for about 6 months when I was in college. Sure, I lost weight and became more toned, but I certainly didn't look very muscular. I am aware I probably did a pretty bad job of it, especially when it came to nutrition, but it's not like I've never hit the gym.

I'd guess that you did a pretty good job of it if you noticeably lost weight and became more toned after 6 months of consistent working out. Unless you're starting from a baseline of already being very fit and toned, becoming actually noticeably muscular by the standards of what counts as muscular for men with 6 months of consistent working out would require doing an outstanding job of it, not merely a good job.

I get that, and I was prioritizing losing weight over gaining muscle via my diet.

I still dislike hitting the gym, and after that 6 months of intense adherence, I've fallen off and spent who knows how much on lapsed gym membership cards.

I seek to actively tradeoff time spent in the gym for potential health hazards, but that depends on how severe and unmitigable said hazards are.

There's a probably a lot more meat on the bone to trade off workout efficiency vs optimization than there is for drugs.

I think that's highly unlikely. Given that you're in the gym, lifting hard, recovering adequately and hitting every muscle group reasonably often, I think there's very little to be gained in trying to 'optimize' your workout (even leaving aside that no two people can agree on what 'optimal' training looks like). People train and develop great physiques and strong lifts even under suboptimal conditions all the time.

Whereas taking steroids does seem to make a pretty big difference, especially coupled with that other 95% of training hard and frequently, eating and recovering well. Certainly, much more and much more easily than trying to live some kind of 100% optimal lifestyle that would probably require you to quit your job and never have kids.

My point was more that if the limiting factor is time/motivation, it's quite likely you'll get more out of using a workout plan based around efficient short "fun" workouts. For example if one just does front squat and bench press, three times a week, that is a small time commitment. The tradeoff being optimally targeting every muscle group for maximum growth, and some injury risk. But not, eg, shrinking your testicles.

Maybe. I've yet to see anyone testify on behalf of the drugs, which I suppose is weak Bayesian evidence on its own.

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