Hi,
Male
29 years old
185 lbs
5'9
17-19% body fat.
Over the past 2 years I have been going thru a constant battle with my body. I have been trying to sculpt it and not getting the results I am looking for. My main goal is to just get real lean and flatten my stomach. My biggest issue I have is that I have a hard time creating and maintaining muscle. Another concern I have is my visceral fat. I have very little fat on my arms, legs and back. When I have body fat tests done, the person taking measurements has a hard time pinching fat in those areas. I have a small beer belly(even tho I do not drink) that I think is hereditary as my father had it also. When I set my goals, I try my hardest to accomplish them. I can tighten my stomach right now and feel a six pack thru a thin layer of fat but you can't see it because of the obvious fat in the way. I think you can compare my body to someone like Chuck liddell if anyone is familiar with his body type and MMA. He looks like he is a beer drinker with his beer gut. Anyways, I have been trying many different ways of accomplishing this over the past 2 years, I am running out of ideas...
Methods I have tried so far...
~I have done things like adjusting my diet. I dont think my problem is diet as I assume most people will tell me that immediately. It was my first conclusion as well and it helped but didn't help me achieve my goal. I know all about carb reduction, carb cycling, calorie counting, paleo dieting, and eating healthy whole foods. I take a multi- vitamin and an Omega 3 fish oil every day also.
~Signed up in MMA and signed up for an MMA fight. I figured this would be a great way to be improve discipline, get coached along the way and help me trim fat. My weight before I took fight was 175 and I agreed to fight at 155. In 8 weeks I was able to get my body down to 164 before shedding down the last 8 lbs the week before fight to make weight. I know for sure when I walked in to cage that my weight was at around 165. Even at that point, my body did not change one bit. Still had firm muscle tones but had a small beer gut!
~I started to take LEGAL supplements. I took a LEGAL oral anabolic called Halovar. I had some muscle gains from it that only lasted 1 week past my cycle after that my body started converting back its old self. Also messed up my liver in process so I wont be doing something like that again. I also took cycles from HGHup, Primal Male, AHD, LIPOblack6 and even TongKat Ali. All these cycles weren't done together. I did them one after another with 3-4 week break in between. However, I didn't get results from any of them. My conclusion on all these LEGAL supplements I took from local Nutritional store is that they aren't as effective as i wanted them to be. I wouldn't get back on them until I figure out what I could really do for myself to see improvements. This is still all relatively new to me and still am ignorant to many things out there available.
~ Adjusted my workouts. During the cycles I would work out 3 days a week. Each workout would be based around supersets. I did 6 exercises by 4 sets x 10 reps that were all push-pull-push-pull-push-pull. I thought this was a great workout as it really helped with cardio and I was able to do it all in a matter of 45 minutes. After each work out I would take in a casein protein(insupro). Running 3 miles at a time with goals of 17 miles a week on treadmill. During the day I would take Whey proteins in between small meals. Overall i would try and achieve 180 grams of protein per day. Ate lots of chicken, turkey, greens and almonds.
~I started to take ILLEGAL supplements. I got my hands on a liquid anavar. I really didn't wanna go the route of another oral anabolic but I have heard from many people that it was very easy on liver as the Halovar really messed me up. Anavar made me feel different through out day but I didn't really see the results I was looking for. In fact I may have seen better results with Halovar. When on Anavar I was taking 60ml a day for 5 weeks and tried upping my protein to about 220 - 250 grams per day. One thing it did for me was up my cardio. I never seen my cardio as good as it was while on any thing else.
~ Went to doctor. I started reading into signs of low test and I could honestly say that I have all signs associated with the symptoms of Low Test EXCEPT for E.D. With constant struggles of improving my body type I went to see a doctor to get my testosterone checked out. Anyways, it turns out that I was right and my test was a low 265. Doctor said is was called ''low-average'' but not low enough to put me on testosterone. (wtf, right?) I did some research in to it and they were telling me that average male is between 250 and 800. IMO that is a pretty wide scale and I think that some of today's doctors aren't entirely unaware of what low-test is and what it can potentially do to someone.
I think with the information I have gathered that my low testosterone is the culprit to my struggles on improving my body. I have concluded to 3 options so far on how to proceed fix that....
1. Get doctor to prescribe me testosterone. I told him that I was on some supplements that may have increased my body's natural testosterone when I took my first blood test and he is allowing me to take the blood test again. Before I do that I will try and find some sort of supplement that will drop my test temporarily just to get me the low score. I know of other methods like getting real drunk the night before and getting barely any sleep which I may try to do too. Hopefully the test score will come back low-enough where he will say "yes, I think we can put you on test" Btw, I did tell my urologist all my low-test symptoms and he believes that low-test isn't a problem because I don't have ED....
2. Self medicate. I know there are better supplements out there that will help me improve my testosterone production with out getting prescribed. I do not know what is out there and its hard to find good opinions online because most of them are an opinion followed by their link to sell you a test-boost. So thats not really an opinion, just a cheap ad. I also think getting back on another anavar cycle and stack it with OTC test boosters combined with hitting weights may get different results. Will I get better results if I stack anavar with a test boost? Should I stay away from it?
3. Lipo. I know this is cheating and frowned upon. I do not want to do it at all but if my body wont respond to anything that I'm doing to it, I think I may have no choice. My visceral fat isn't my only problem but it would certainly help a battle that I am always dealing with.
I am not too worried about the cost as I know this will improve my over all health and well being which I think is very important to me. My father died at a heart attack at 56 years old. I, like any other man, do not fear much in life other than death. I have 2 kids and I wife that I do not want to leave behind at a young age.
I posted today to just gather opinions from people who i know are capable of giving me smart and respectable answers. Please try not to be harsh on my methods or in the manner I have tried to reach my goals. I do not claim to be a professional at this as I wouldn't be coming to this forum to help me get answers. I also want to apologize if I posted in wrong thread. Moderators can move it if they like but I didn't know where to put this.....
Thoughts? Concerns? Advice?
I'm open to anything....
-Jon
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