The Laypersons Guide To Growth Hormone
THE LAYPERSONS GUIDE TO GROWTH HORMONE
by Zachary Mason
Believe it or not, the human body actually makes it own hormones. Even though the vast majority of us at AE choose to save our bodies that effort the fact remains that it is crucial to us to understand some of these processes just in case we decided to take “time off” or even in case we need to make an informed decision (we can only hope that day never comes). This article will discuss one of the most mystic hormones of all, growth hormone.
Despite Jason’s adamant stance that 99% of the guys who use GH are misusing it, it is indeed a very important hormone (especially early in life) and will be discussed here at length. Growth hormone is produced by the somatotropic (or somatotropes) of the anterior lobe [of the brain]. Of course we are all familiar with growth hormones role in causing bone growth at the epiphyseal plates during childhood and adolescence, but it also acts directly on skeletal muscles, causing them to become larger especially during adolescence. Although GH can also trigger the majority of the body’s tissues to divide it really, really likes to exert its affect on the bones and skeletal muscles.
GH is an anabolic hormone which makes it pretty well useless when taken without some sort of androgenic accompaniment. The extreme popularity of the hormone probably arises from a couple of things. First in the list is that GH is really, really ****ed expensive. This creates a magical aura around it because anything that costs that much must be really fantastic (for what you pay for GH it had better be ****ING fantastic). Unfortunately it is not so. Secondly, the pros use it and reportedly at copious amounts. That’s great. If they want to spend $20,000 a year on GH, it’s their prerogative. However, to look like a pro you have to have pro-like genetics and if you don’t no amount of pharmaceutical assistance is going to get you to that point. It never ceases to amaze me that smart, educated guys will post about how they added 8 ius ED of GH to this cycle and gained 20 lbs. When they describe the rest of their stack it is usually entails something around 1.5 grams of Testosterone a week along with 75 mg dbol ed and 100mg trenbolone acetate ED. This is like taking 10mg of oxandrolone a day combined with 100mg oxymetholone a day and saying, “****, this ****ing anavar is making me ****ing blow up! Yeah!”.
Most, if not all, of the anabolic activities performed by GH are linked, either directly or indirectly, to insulin-like growth factors (IGFs) which are a closely knit group of proteins produced by the liver, bones, skeletal muscles and various assorted other tissues throughout the body. As a result bodybuilders the world over have tried to gain access to IGFs. In few instances in which they succeed the gains are a little better than those of GH, but the cost of the compound is absolutely phenomenal. There is no way in hell IGF is worth the current asking prices.
With that little tirade out of the way, IGFs carry out their wonderful functions in the following ways: 1) IGF initiates a process by which those pesky little amino acids that are floating around in the blood stream and really not doing anything are taken up and incorporated into cellular proteins throughout the body. As you can see this is of paramount importance because amino acids are the building blocks of muscles so the more amino acid in a muscle, the better. 2) It causes sulfur to magically be deposited into the cartilage matrix. If you will remember your advanced, upper level biochemistry classes you will recall that sulfur is absolutely necessary in the formation of chondroitin sulfate a major player in joint health. Happy cartilage means happy joints. 3) GH itself (read: not mediated by IGFs) possess the rather intriguing property of exerting a very unique effect on adipose tissue. GH will remove those nasty, unappealing fats from your fatty deposits. As it does this the fats are released into the bloodstream where their fate depends on a variety of other process. Simultaneously GH decrease the rate of glucose metabolism whilst very strongly encouraging the liver to break down the glycogen stored there and release it into the bloodstream. The result of an impeded glucose metabolism and increased glucose expulsion from the liver results in what is called the diabetogenic effect. It is so named because on paper it looks striking similar to the blood profiles of those afflicted with diabetes mellitus.
In my humble opinion, this is more than just cause for the use of insulin with GH. Let’s take a look at what we know: GH causes an increase in overall blood glucose. Insulin drives glucose into cells preferentially, meaning that it first seeks to deposit it as glycogen where it is most desperately need, in the skeletal muscles. After the skeletal muscles are topped of it fills the liver where very large stores of glycogen are continually maintained. Only after, these two venues are filled does any appreciable amount of that glucose contribute to adipose stores.
So, we have an elevated level of blood sugar and enough insulin to drive it into cells. There are a couple of concerns about this. First, the increased glucose levels in your blood are probably not sufficient to justify not taking in additional carbs with your insulin application. In fact, it is very, very dangerous. It is better to have too many carbs and be conscious than have not enough and be in a coma.
Secondly, we all know that glucose (and the various other assorted very high glycemic index sugars) can make you fat, quick, fast, and in a hurry. Most of us probably know this from personal experience which is very, very unfortunate indeed. In any event, your skeletal muscles and liver can only store so much glucose. After they are swollen and full the glucose goes to adipose and since one of the mechanisms of action of GH is a reduction in speed of glucose metabolism that means that there is potentially more glucose to be stored as adipose.
This is where the GH comes into play, sort of correcting a problem it caused. You see, once the glucose is driven into the adipose tissue it undergoes a series of changes so that it convert to fat. Remember that GH liberates fats from adipose tissue to be used as energy and is therefore able to spare glucose. So, the very fat that it was responsible for depositing is summarily removed by its own actions. You will notice that there are no dosage recommendations anywhere in the above blurb. This is because 1) I really think GH is waste of money for most people and 2) I do not feel comfortable advising anyone about a drug that cost too much **** money and a drug that could be potentially fatal.
For our purposes GH is usually secreted by a tiny ass syringe and a half inch 29 gauge pin. However, in the human body the secretion is not so covert and easily discernable. In the human animal there are two other hormones principally responsible for the regulation of the release of GH. The first is growth hormone-releasing hormone (or, for those of you who don’t like typing, GHRH) and the second is growth hormone-inhibiting hormone (or GHIH). Does anyone care to take a guess at what these two hormones do? As fate would have it, GH production is controlled by the negative feedback loop (like most other mammalian hormonal processes), or at least that’s the concensus within the scientific community at this time. However, GH is a bit more fickle than just that. GH levels can be affected by a number of factors. Chief amongst them are amount of sleep, stress, and nutrition. To further complicate the situation GH seems to daily cycle with various peaks and such at set time intervals (gee, this sure does sound a lot like testosterone production doesn’t it?).
