If you’re looking to gain an edge by using muscle building steroids it’s important to understand all of the risks associated with them.
It’s important to know how they work and how they can affect your health.
Competition among athletes can be fierce, especially among professional athletes that make a living through their skill and power.
Personal achievement such as winning a medal, setting a record or even just making the team can be a huge motivational factor for using muscle building steroids.
In these situations steroids have become all too common, although most of the people who take them know very little about the potential risks.
Anabolic Steroids for Muscle Building
Anabolic-androgen steroids, also known as anabolic steroids, are the most common form of steroids used to build muscle and gain strength.
Your body actually produces its own steroid in the form of the hormone testosterone.
Testosterone, like steroids, has two main effects on the body.
The anabolic effects promote muscle building while the androgenic effects are the reason why men grow facial hair and have a deeper voice.
Some people may take pure testosterone to help improve their performance while others use synthetic muscle building steroids which are similar to testosterone with a few modifications.
While synthetic steroids that are able to build muscle do have approved medical benefits, building muscle isn’t one of them.
These synthetic steroids are available as pills, liquid injections as well as some topical treatments that are applied directly to the skin.
Risks of Muscle Building Steroids
The main reason why there are so many risks associated with muscle building steroids is the fact that athletes will take them at much higher doses than is normally prescribed for other medical conditions.
There have been no medical studies conducted to clinically prove the side effects as giving people such high doses of steroids would be unethical, however, there is much empirical evidence to suggest serious health side effects associate with taking large doses of steroids.
Risks for men include:
- Breast Growth
- Going Bald
- Shrinking Testicles
- Infertility
Risks for women include:
- Deeper Voice
- Clitoris Growth
- More Body Hair
- Hair Loss or Thinning Hair
Risks for Both Men and Women Include:
- Acne Outbreaks
- Tendonitis or Tendon Rupture
- Liver Disease
- High Cholesterol
- Heart Disease
- Aggression, Rage and Violence
- Mental Disorders & Depression
- Addiction
Legality of Muscle Building Stereoids
Not only are muscle building steroids against the rules in most athletic organizations, they can also be illegal.
Law enforcement has pushed muscle building steroids into the black market over the last 20 years.
This has actually increased the risks associated with steroids as many of them are now produced in other countries or illegal labs, making the quality of the steroids available highly questionable.
They aren’t subject to any sort of supervision of safety standards like other medications are which means they could easily be impure or even mislabeled which can be extremely dangerous.