20 year old - Important question need advice on please!

[LUKE555]

Ok so im new to the forum and would really appreciate some information on some issues which have been bothering me for a while.

Firstly, im not an idiot im actually pretty well educated on steroids and know that it is a higher risk for taking steroids at a young age, e.g HPTA shut down. I've researched and found that the majority of people who take steroids and take part in a succesfull PCT programme usually recover the natural HPTA, what im wondering is what the rough % of the people who actually near or fully 100% recover, obviously everybody is different just wondering how many actual cases there are where a person around my age takes all the nessecary measures to ensure recovery but still ends up really messing up their system compared to succesful cycles.

So a bit of information about myself.. I've been training since i turned 16, I was a pretty skinny guy at just 125 lbs and 5"9/10. I managed to bulk up quite a lot with a very good diet (which i maintain to this day) and got myself to around 160 now with similar body fat (around 7%) at 5" 10.5. The first few years i piled on the weight but the last year i only added like 3-4 lbs (drinking like once every 2 weeks) which is ok but I'm looking to gain another 20 lbs or so and don't fancy waiting like 5 years to do so, because my lifestyle im a student so drink quite a bit (2-3 times a week can happen often) but the drinking only seems to affect how much I am adding and i never lose muscle mass i just maintain, add very little so am pretty confident that if i add say 15-20 lbs from an 8 week cycle for example (I will not drink at all in this time)that i will manage to maintain the majority of it so that i do not need to do another cycle till at least 23-25.

So yeah basically I am kinda a risk-taker in life and lets say theres a very good chance that i fully/mostly recover hpta wise I'm probably willing to take the risk and run with it as the pros are kinda balancing the cons in the mind atm. So cut a long story short i'd like to know a rough guess at what the chances are that my hpta levels will be messed up for life resulting in TRT etc. I don't want posts saying to work out and eat well because i have loads of nat test running around my system at my age anyway but I'm already doing this now apart from the going out drinking etc. but im not prepared to sacrifice fun while im so young to compensate, i like to balance the two. I would rather skip the 4-5 years wait and enjoy the benefits for longer in my prime.

Cheers guys would really appreciate any feedback

[songdog]

come back in 5 yrs we dont give cycle advice to anyone under 25.

[LUKE555]

Im not asking for cycle advice, i mean thats the thing, I'd like to know why you dont give advice to people under 25, what are the significant risks to a 20 year old compared to a 25 year old other than 20 year olds have high nat test anyway? Just want to know how big the actual risk is to my hormonal system etc

[BFM]

Im not asking for cycle advice, i mean thats the thing, I'd like to know why you dont give advice to people under 25, what are the significant risks to a 20 year old compared to a 25 year old other than 20 year olds have high nat test anyway? Just want to know how big the actual risk is to my hormonal system etc

Because you make stupid decisions at 20 that affect the rest of your life? Go natural...read the board, and get better educated. Best of luck in your decisions.

[Flacco]

Everyone is different. You may fully recover, you may not. What I'd be worried about is after that first cycle... once you see it didn't have many/any side effects. Gains were easy, no sides. You think "Wow AAS are great and don't do all those nasty things everyone was talking about. I can cycle again with no reprocutions." And the vishish cycle starts. Its very easy to become dependent on AAS. Especially, when you start too young and get the "easy gains with little to no reprocutions" in your head. Not everyone that starts too young will have this happen to them. But at 18,21, and sometimes alot older than that... many people are really too stubborn and hardhead to think anything bad will ever happen to them. Nothing can hurt you when your 18,21. You think, "It won't happen to me." Maybe it won't, but maybe it will. Its your body, do what you want.

[LUKE555]

Everyone is different. You may fully recover, you may not. What I'd be worried about is after that first cycle... once you see it didn't have many/any side effects. Gains were easy, no sides. You think "Wow AAS are great and don't do all those nasty things everyone was talking about. I can cycle again with no reprocutions." And the vishish cycle starts. Its very easy to become dependent on AAS. Especially, when you start too young and get the "easy gains with little to no reprocutions" in your head. Not everyone that starts too young will have this happen to them. But at 18,21, and sometimes alot older than that... many people are really too stubborn and hardhead to think anything bad will ever happen to them. Nothing can hurt you when your 18,21. You think, "It won't happen to me." Maybe it won't, but maybe it will. Its your body, do what you want.

I'm level headed, if this fails for whatever reason i'm not going to rely on them, i don't want to be a an absolute beast anyway im just looking to gain an extra 15-20 lbs, if this fails i won't go back to them ill just stay at what i'm at now

Because you make stupid decisions at 20 that affect the rest of your life? Go natural...read the board, and get better educated. Best of luck in your decisions.

Ive taken lots of advice of these boards regarding diet, regime which has helped me etc but i feel im at a point where i just want that push/acceleration, hey its not for definite that i'm going to go down this road im just wondering in general maybe some statistics of history comparing young people who have messed up their body compared with successes, of course including the fact that they have done the cycle correctly and ensured adequate PCT. Cheers for responses though

[Flacco]

I'm level headed, if this fails for whatever reason i'm not going to rely on them, i don't want to be a an absolute beast anyway im just looking to gain an extra 15-20 lbs, if this fails i won't go back to them ill just stay at what i'm at now

Exactly what I said when I was 18/19. Listen, I'm no knockin you, and I'm not saying you won't. I'm just saying... Who do you think actually says, "I'm gonna get hooked on the easy gains of steroids and end up abusing them after I do this first cycle." ? I doubt anyone has ever made that prediction.

Statistically, its probably really high... but you don't read about it because no one is coming on these boards after they've really messed themselves up (unless they continue to use aas). You only read posts from first timers saying "I did it and everything worked out ok." Statistically you can't really say because, alot probably don't go to doctors and admit why they're fcked up. So I'd say that there is no way of really knowing the number, but I'd say the rate at which 18-23/24 year olds mess up their bodys from early AAS use, is probably really high.

[MickeyKnox]

Ok so im new to the forum and would really appreciate some information on some issues which have been bothering me for a while.

Firstly, im not an idiot im actually pretty well educated on steroids and know that it is a higher risk for taking steroids at a young age, e.g HPTA shut down. I've researched and found that the majority of people who take steroids and take part in a succesfull PCT programme usually recover the natural HPTA, what im wondering is what the rough % of the people who actually near or fully 100% recover, obviously everybody is different just wondering how many actual cases there are where a person around my age takes all the nessecary measures to ensure recovery but still ends up really messing up their system compared to succesful cycles.

So a bit of information about myself.. I've been training since i turned 16, I was a pretty skinny guy at just 125 lbs and 5"9/10. I managed to bulk up quite a lot with a very good diet (which i maintain to this day) and got myself to around 160 now with similar body fat (around 7%) at 5" 10.5. The first few years i piled on the weight but the last year i only added like 3-4 lbs (drinking like once every 2 weeks) which is ok but I'm looking to gain another 20 lbs or so and don't fancy waiting like 5 years to do so, because my lifestyle im a student so drink quite a bit (2-3 times a week can happen often) but the drinking only seems to affect how much I am adding and i never lose muscle mass i just maintain, add very little so am pretty confident that if i add say 15-20 lbs from an 8 week cycle for example (I will not drink at all in this time)that i will manage to maintain the majority of it so that i do not need to do another cycle till at least 23-25.

So yeah basically I am kinda a risk-taker in life and lets say theres a very good chance that i fully/mostly recover hpta wise I'm probably willing to take the risk and run with it as the pros are kinda balancing the cons in the mind atm. So cut a long story short i'd like to know a rough guess at what the chances are that my hpta levels will be messed up for life resulting in TRT etc. I don't want posts saying to work out and eat well because i have loads of nat test running around my system at my age anyway but I'm already doing this now apart from the going out drinking etc. but im not prepared to sacrifice fun while im so young to compensate, i like to balance the two. I would rather skip the 4-5 years wait and enjoy the benefits for longer in my prime.

Cheers guys would really appreciate any feedback

Im not asking for cycle advice, i mean thats the thing, I'd like to know why you dont give advice to people under 25, what are the significant risks to a 20 year old compared to a 25 year old other than 20 year olds have high nat test anyway? Just want to know how big the actual risk is to my hormonal system etc

yes you are. and i echo songdogs advice....

come back in 5 yrs we dont give cycle advice to anyone under 25.

[Bigherm21]

Go read why. There's tons and tons of info on the net about being young and aas.

[aportinastorm]

Aas under 25 is just a bad idea man, the possible sides are bad and not all that uncommon. Im with you in the risk taker life style to some degree and if the odds were 1/1000 or even 1/100 i probably would have given it a shot if i were in your shoes at that age. However those arnt your odds, its a fairly good chance of you suffering some issue later in life because of it and the possible issues would all really suck to have. Other than the being to young, i would have a huge problem with your drinking. Your young, obviously very common and i did it myself a lot at that age but it does show that you not really all that serious about gaining muscle. If you cut out the drinking or atleast heavily dialed it back in your everyday life you would be able to add a lot more weight naturally. At your age its not as much about the added calories that the drinking adds it the fact that it dehydrates you, makes ýou lathargic, screws up your eating schedule the day of/day after. Theres no reason that with proper working out, diet, and less alcohol consumption you couldnt easily be in the high 180-190 lb range naturally.

Just my two cents

[songdog]

We get 100s of guys just like YOU every week asking the same question.Your endo system isnt fully developed yet.Thats why you are at a greater risk.But guys like you want numbers on your chances of hurting yourself.Well your not going to get any.I personally dont care if you cycle.But I wont like many others wont advise you on it.Beacuse in the end thats wat you want.But if you do and a couple years down the road just when you think your going to get laid.And your dick dont work remember wat you were told.Beacuse thats when it will happen a yr or 2 down the road long after you thought you beat the odds.

[LUKE555]

Alright cheers marcus, helped a lot. Gonna try stick at it naturally bulking up.. just hate having no muscle definition etc for a full year due to calorie surplus all year round, oh well guess pros outweigh cons big time on this one. Cheers

[gixxerboy1]

Alright cheers marcus, helped a lot. Gonna try stick at it naturally bulking up.. just hate having no muscle definition etc for a full year due to calorie surplus all year round, oh well guess pros outweigh cons big time on this one. Cheers

getting your diet right can fix that. You need to learn how much and what to eat. There is a science behind it. Start counting calories and figure out your tdee.

and 15-20lbs of MUSCLE isnt realistic from a cycle

[marcus300]

Alright cheers marcus, helped a lot. Gonna try stick at it naturally bulking up.. just hate having no muscle definition etc for a full year due to calorie surplus all year round, oh well guess pros outweigh cons big time on this one. Cheers

You need to learn how to eat to grow and use what you have naturally which is a high level of testosterone .
Don't shut your test down use it and take advantage of it. Steroids aren't some magic pill because even if you was ready for aas you wouldn't gain anything anyway because your diet is good enough to support new muscle tissue. Forget steroids and research diets and how to eat to grow.
Best of luck and wise decision

getting your diet right can fix that. You need to learn how much and what to eat. There is a science behind it. Start counting calories and figure out your tdee.

and 15-20lbs of MUSCLE isnt realistic from a cycle

Agreed ^^

[brettpaterson]

in my opinion...it's better to try and educate young guys in their early 20's as much as you can. i'm not saying give them advice on the best cycles and how much to take and when to take it, but to tell them the sides. im pretty sure that if you tell someone to f off and come back in 5 years....they're just going to create a new profile, say they're 26 or 27 or 30. we were all young and know that we like to do whatever we want and think we're bulletproof. or they will look at other members cycles and pick between one. i guarantee that it has and will happen. but i agree in saying that anyone under 25 should stay away and go natural till late 20's at least. not meaning to offend anyone but it's going to happen

[MikeZ91]

You were better off just reading and not starting a thread.. listen to what these guys have to say and research, hit the gym have a diet and plan and make as many gains as you can...

[marcus300]

AGE

In humans your Endocrine system is not fully functional until an average age of 25yrs, although the main development is up to around 21yrs it still fluctuates a little bit up to its fully functional age. There is a risk of permanently damaging your HPTA if you take AAS to young and you could end up with symptoms of andropause and HRT for life. Symptoms could be Limp dick, low libido, depression, low energy, low endurance, erection problems and many more but.......are these the types of symptoms you want to have in your 20's?. Believe me its hard to cope with these in your 40's yet alone in your prime of your life.


Around this age your Testosterone levels are the highest they going to be in your life naturally, so use what you have and don't take the risk of damage, I am passionate about this because ive seen it many times with young kids wanting to looking like their heroes and they think the answer is in an injection /tablet.


Taking AAS to young can also cause problems with development, one other main problem is premature sealing of your epiphyeal bone and the consequences mean that you wont grow as big as your genetics could allow you to, there is a test which can be done to see if your growth plates have sealed yet but the average age is around 21yrs old.



TRAINING

You need a few years of hard training under your belt before even considering taking any kind of anabolic support, people who jump on a cycle to soon without having some quality years under their belt usually results in injuries, it takes time to develop your connective tissue, tendons and nervous system to heavy overload training. Slowly getting your own system use to these kinds of extreme's will only help in muscle growth later on when you do decide to start taking AAS.


Build a solid foundation for muscle tissue to grow and maintaining and development will be far greater than without it. Many younger guys will start cycling before they have reached their genetic potential which is crazy when a good solid diet and training program will be far beneficial and productive to muscle building.


Workouts should be mainly focused on basic movements with a priority of over loading the muscle each and ever time you train, increasing your strength and ability to lift in proper form will help with building the foundation for future development


DIET

A lot of younger bodybuilders don't know how to eat. Researching and understanding how your own body responds will help you get to your natural limit, the right food at the right time and a full understanding of proteins,carbs, and fats will only help you succeed in achieving your natural goals. Keeping a diet diary will also help you understand the importance of macro, nutrients, calories and should help you see in which areas you could be going wrong in adding lean muscle tissue.


No matter how much anabolic support you have it will be worthless without proper nutrition, food will help build and maintain your valued muscle weather its natural, cycling or in PCT . Adjusting your food intake and consuming muscle building foods coupled with a solid training program will help you achieve your natural limit and foundation before you start AAS use.


This area is a huge problem with the younger guys and I can't express enough how important diet/food is when first starting out, post and pre training nutrition are very important and understanding how to load and feed the body will help push growth and create a very natural anabolic environment.

[marcus300]

There isn't an exact age were we all stop developing and growing because this is determined by our genes and DNA, we are all genetically programmed individually and we inherit our genes from our parents. To give an exact age we stop growing would be incorrect because everyone's genetic blueprint is different.The main development of our bodies is up to the age of 21yrs of age but this can vary between individuals. There are parts of our bodies what carry on developing and adjusting slowly up until the age of 25yrs old, an example of this is the brain. The Endocrine system is a part of the brain what is very complex and keeps our bodies in a homeostasis state. Our testosterone levels start raising and roughly peak around 25yrs old and then start to slowly decline, so even though some of us may have stopped growing at the age of 21yrs old, others may still be developing up until the age of 25yrs old.


I have recently spoken to my Endo regarding this matter and he tells me that the HPTA is very sensitive and as many pathways how it regulates the human body, he states steroids disrupt the normal balance of hormones in the body which can cause reversible and irreversible changes at any age but risks are far more if you administrate exogenous androgens during development, this will put you in a very unnatural environment at a crucial time and your hormones should be treated with care especially in the early stages of maturity. The adverse effects can be erratic behaviour of the HPTA and potentially therapy when your older.


I did ask him what age he would think would be the safest as far as risk to damages and he said many endocrinologist suggest full maturation is reached by 25 years of age and this would also give the HPTA time to be established with your natural hormone balance and patterns. I personally feel 24-25yrs old would also be ideal starting point to get bloodwrok drawn to see exact what your natural levels are before starting any kind of cycles and waiting till you have reach your testosterone peak would be a good starting point, for me there is to much evidence over the forums and what I've seen personally over the last 25yrs I've been bodybuilding. Obviously it isn't going to be all 19- 21yr old bodybuilders who suffer side effects what are irreversible but I am edging on the side of caution what age I advice to the newbies.

Marcus

[oscarjones]

I'd say train naturally until you're 25-26 then cycle. If you train and eat right you'll be bigger than most guys your age anyway.

[gonzo6183]

Ok so im new to the forum and would really appreciate some information on some issues which have been bothering me for a while.

Firstly, im not an idiot im actually pretty well educated on steroids and know that it is a higher risk for taking steroids at a young age, e.g HPTA shut down. I've researched and found that the majority of people who take steroids and take part in a succesfull PCT programme usually recover the natural HPTA, what im wondering is what the rough % of the people who actually near or fully 100% recover, obviously everybody is different just wondering how many actual cases there are where a person around my age takes all the nessecary measures to ensure recovery but still ends up really messing up their system compared to succesful cycles.

So a bit of information about myself.. I've been training since i turned 16, I was a pretty skinny guy at just 125 lbs and 5"9/10. I managed to bulk up quite a lot with a very good diet (which i maintain to this day) and got myself to around 160 now with similar body fat (around 7%) at 5" 10.5. The first few years i piled on the weight but the last year i only added like 3-4 lbs (drinking like once every 2 weeks) which is ok but I'm looking to gain another 20 lbs or so and don't fancy waiting like 5 years to do so, because my lifestyle im a student so drink quite a bit (2-3 times a week can happen often) but the drinking only seems to affect how much I am adding and i never lose muscle mass i just maintain, add very little so am pretty confident that if i add say 15-20 lbs from an 8 week cycle for example (I will not drink at all in this time)that i will manage to maintain the majority of it so that i do not need to do another cycle till at least 23-25.

So yeah basically I am kinda a risk-taker in life and lets say theres a very good chance that i fully/mostly recover hpta wise I'm probably willing to take the risk and run with it as the pros are kinda balancing the cons in the mind atm. So cut a long story short i'd like to know a rough guess at what the chances are that my hpta levels will be messed up for life resulting in TRT etc. I don't want posts saying to work out and eat well because i have loads of nat test running around my system at my age anyway but I'm already doing this now apart from the going out drinking etc. but im not prepared to sacrifice fun while im so young to compensate, i like to balance the two. I would rather skip the 4-5 years wait and enjoy the benefits for longer in my prime.

Cheers guys would really appreciate any feedback

Its actually quite the opposite, there is a very good chance that you wont fully recover, so you have all of your information wrong mate

[musclekid88]

i have an idea stop drinking 2-3 times a week and see if it makes a difference i guarantee it will.......secondly keep putting in the hard work and in the end it will be more beneficial.

[Times Roman]

just a thought

when I lived in afghanistan, i only drank water, plus diet and exercise. I dropped over 5% bf in twelve months. three exceptions when I drank alchohol (when i first got there, thanksgiving and xmas)

other than that, i was pure. amazing what only water can do

[DanB]

drinking or lack of drinking makes biggest difference to my phsique, it totally throws your diet out the window,

op I agree that you must find a balance between training and life, but do you realise that to be built like a tank and lean all year round while partying and eating crap you have to either be a genetic freak, or stay on most the year and utilise the likes of thermogenics etc

you can easily intake 5000k cals on a night of drinking, thats 15k a week extra, add some shitty food, missed training from hangovers and it just dosnt work

you either need to reassess your lifestyle or reassess your goals i.m.o and i.m.e

[bigga4068]

Just like everyone has been saying even if we could give you numbers it wouldnt mean anything because everyones different. Yes I understand your looking for odds so heres some odds for ya and its not a lie. The odds are stacked against you and favor the result of having problems. Infact they greatly favor the negative side. Where the difference come in is at what kind of problems you will suffer. Plus dude you can always change back to the plan to start cycling but not take it back once you have. So the logical thing would be to try all the advice you csn get here before cycling right?

[rows4hoes]

I highly doubt you'll get any help on this forum, I'm in the exact situation as you with exactly the same story going on, I asked for help and got flamed by all the pricks on this forum.
Save yourself the time and look for information elsewhere, I've found the people on this forum to be unnecessarily hostile.

[BFM]

I highly doubt you'll get any help on this forum, I'm in the exact situation as you with exactly the same story going on, I asked for help and got flamed by all the pricks on this forum.
Save yourself the time and look for information elsewhere, I've found the people on this forum to be unnecessarily hostile.

I find that people who come here with attitudes and dont want to research anything on there own get the reception they deserve. All the info you could possibly want is already posted on this site somewhere, get off your dead ass and find it. There are dozens of people helping every day on these forums, they just wont spoon feed you what you should already know by READING whats been posted.

[marcus300]

I highly doubt you'll get any help on this forum, I'm in the exact situation as you with exactly the same story going on, I asked for help and got flamed by all the pricks on this forum.
Save yourself the time and look for information elsewhere, I've found the people on this forum to be unnecessarily hostile.

Once you educate yourself and mature you will understand we are trying to help and point you in the right direction. You will learn the hard way and believe me not being able to get an erection at you age will be the hard way.

I would also read the rules regarding flaming, otherwise your time here may be short but seeing that you don't like it here I guess that won't bother you to much.

You need to read and listen to people who know and have experience in strtiodd, and don't just look for what you want to hear.

[jokr]

dont do it. im 24 now and started at 19. enjoy battling lebido and potentially fvucking urself long term.. i had to go thro a lot of shit to get myself back to normal. if i had the option.. i woulda waited