Bodybuilding is a really competitive field where rigorous dieting and many hours of exercising need to be pursued but which do not constantly assure you the success you are searching for; numerous bodybuilders go to far with their workouts or search for ways to cheat in this sports by utilizing enhancing supplements such as anabolic steroids.
How Does Bodybuilding And Steroids Affect The Human Body?
Anabolic steroids is what some bodybuilders use to enhance the accelerated growth of muscle tissue; steroids contain the hormone testosterone, it is present both in men and in women only in larger quantities in males. Testosterone has two primary influences on the human body and they are androgenic, which heightens the sex drive and anabolic processes, which step-ups the tissue muscle.
Bodybuilding and steroids were closely linked for building the muscle tissue in the shortest lengths of time even so, in due time the scientists also recognized the negative side effects that were caused such as, sterility and other fatal effects as well. Steroids are prohibited from being utilized as a supplementation in all sports and anybody discovered employing it would be automatically disqualified from any competition.
Additional Adverse Side Effects Of Bodybuilding And Steroids
Other side effects that will happen from bodybuilding and steroids consumption are: increase of hair in women and loss of hair in men, mood swings from extremely furious to sad and depressive, delusions, psychosis, sleep disorder, nausea, shakiness of the ligaments, hurting joints, hypertension that can contribute or lead to heart attack when used in combination with bodybuilding training and exercise, vertigo, which can result in accidental injury during exercising with heavy weight and increased odds of the development of cancer.
Useful Tip
Although bodybuilding and steroids might work in concert to supply responsive effects and sometimes even contribute to temporary celebrity, it is not worth running a risk on your long-term health and even your life in some instances.
Bodybuilding is chiefly a sport and means to improve your health at the same time allowing for glamorous appearances that are reached by hard work and put in extensive hours of conditioning and rigorous diets; while diet supplements will assist in preserving your health by supplying vitamins and the nutrients you lack in your day-to-day diet, steroids will end up being a certain way to undermine your system and you could possibly face fatal diseases in the long term. Enjoy bodybuilding for what it is, a sport that calls for determination and extensive exercise in order to become the best; shortcuts will be short lived and most instances regretted.
The baseball season is about to begin, and once again, steroid use is dominating the sports news in the print media and in the electronic media. I have counseled many athletes who have used steroids or performance enhancing substances and I have helped a number of them to end this destructive and illegal behavior.
In my view, there are a number of psychological, sociological, financial and cultural forces which are driving steroid use:
1. Some athletes are quite frightened and insecure. They are afraid of performing poorly, letting others down and embarrassing themselves.They feel that steroids will give them the edge they need to perform at a very high level.
2. Some athletes are very invested in the size of their muscles as well as the shape and appearance of their bodies. If they don’t look big and powerful, they can feel unsafe and weak. Also, in their minds, if they are bigger, they are somehow better than the persons they are competing against.
3. The huge financial rewards can encourage people to cheat with performance enhancing drugs. Some athletes feel the rewards make the risks worthwhile.
4. Coaches, owners, league officials and teammates have looked the other way where steroid use is concerned. And, in some instances, they have encouraged players to engage in this drug use. A football player who was a patient of mine what told that he needed to gain twenty pounds of muscle during the summer. His coach winked at him and said, “You need to do it, no matter what it takes, if you want to play on my team.” If there were stricter rules and more severe penalties, steroid use would decline.
5. We live in a culture where people are always looking for short cuts and quick fixes. Steroids are an example of another of the appeal of immediate solutions to life problems.
6 .Some athletes enjoy living on the edge and pushing themselves to the limit. Engaging in risky steroid use and the possibility of being caught create a kind of adventure which some people seem to enjoy.
7. In some cases, athletes who have been on top in their sport can not seem to tolerate losing or being out of the number one position. Steroids can help them to remain on top and avoid the bad feelings they experience when they perform poorly. They feel they will keep their star status as long as they perform well. If they perform poorly, they are fearful that they will no longer be loved and admired.
8. The people who develop these substances are getting very sophisticated and it is getting harder to detect practices like blood doping and some performance enhancing substances.
9. Some athletes who I have counseled are addicted to steroids, alcohol, and other drugs. They are relying on these substances to manage their feelings, their problems and their stress. Athletes who are using all of these substance are in danger and need professional help.
10. There is a widespread and prevalent culture of cheating which is prevalent in sports, business and relationships. I am not sure if this is new or if cheating has been widespread throughout history. Some would say that man has looked for advantages and edges since the beginning of time.
For many individuals, the data they have has been formed by the media, from papers to the screen items, with the steroid news being an one way traffic, of athletes abusing them for that much desired competitive advantage, of bodybuilders with large muscles bulging of their chest and hands, abusing them for bulking purposes. In all these examples it has been extraordinarily hard for the layman to come up with the internal picture of the common steroid user.
But for people that among us have made the media their source of what’s right and true, there has been a depiction of a picture of a normal steroid abuser: a unblemished top-notch bodybuilder or sportsman, perhaps a home kind of hitter who is trying truly had to gain that competitive edge in the game, or perhaps a high school teenager who is frantic to dig into the world of professional athletes.
But as this sort of individuals continue to cause ripples in the headlines, the sort of insinuated stereotype is then curved off base a little bit, according to the newest study done in the sports sphere. The study has brought in the proven fact that the typical anabolic steroid user cannot be imagined in a competitive platform at all. He’s not even a sporting hero or bodybuilder in any way. The standard steroid user is now an executive, a professional who is highly educated and around the age of thirty, a male who has never participated in any organized sport in the slightest, and doesn’t plan to. Briefly they can be called gym addicts. In practical terms however, many of those steroid rats as sometimes called, do not reveal their steroid habit to any of their personal physicians or doctors.
The steroid abusers also have a tendency to begin learning of the hazardous side of steroids such as liver damage, cardio problems and changes in behavior. This is the reason as to why these abusers inject themselves with steroids, instead of orally take them up, in order that they can reduce chances of liver damage amidst controlling their blood levels.
Most of the authors of these types of study do not in any way approve the steroids non-medical uses, though they believe that the reduction of steroids harmful nature hasn’t and will never be simple, more so if nobody has an inkling on whom the real user is.
For some athletes, winning is everything – and they’ll do anything to be the strongest, the fastest, and the best. Instead of old-fashioned hard work and training, some athletes are turning to the use of steroids (performance enhancing substances) to boost athletic performance, fight off fatigue, and enhance their physical performance. Performance enhancing substances are taken to increase muscle mass and strength, reduce weight, and hide the use of other illegal substances.
Stories about athletes and steroids seem to pop up regularly in the news. Some professional baseball players, cyclists, football players and track stars have been accused of – and in some cases have admitted to using steroids to give them an edge competitively. And steroid use has trickled down to younger athletes too, who face fierce pressure to be stronger and faster, and to make it to college and professional leagues. Research has shown that 5% of teen boys and 2.5% of teen girls have used some form of steroids. For all levels of sports, this is unfair to the rest of the competitors who take the time to put in the long hours of hard work and perspiration. The use of steroids clearly takes away from the glory of the sports. It’s a discrimination, and the distribution of steroids should be illegal. Athletes should use their God given talents, and perform them to the best of their ability to achieve their athletic goals and dreams in life.
There are many side effects to the use of steroids. The minor side effects of steroid use include acne, oily skin, excess hair growth, and deepening of the voice. The major side effects steroid use include an increased risk of cancer, increased risk of heart and liver disease, jaundice, fluid retention, reduction in good cholesterol, high blood pressure, and changes in blood coagulation. Some possible side effects for men include: shrinking of the testicles, reduced sperm count, impotence, sterility, difficulty or pain while urinating, and the development of breasts. For women associated with steroids include: facial hair growth, deepening of the voice, breast reduction, and menstrual cycle changes. Teens who abuse steroids are at a significant risk of suffering irreversible side effects, including stunted growth, accelerated puberty changes and abnormal sexual development. Although steroids may increase lean muscle mass, strength, and the ability to train longer and harder, the serious side effects of steroids are many and may not be reversible. Not only do steroids have long lasting side effects, but the use of steroids is prohibited in all major sport leagues.
Today, while there are so many natural supplements you can take, why are there athletes on steroids? It really boils down to the fact that they believe that the steroids will give them the results they can’t get any other way. Unfortunately they turn a blind eye to the potentially serious side effects you can get from steroid use.
We have Russia at least partially to thank for the use of steroids today. In the 1950′s Russian athletes were given testosterone and starting dominating the international arena of sports events. If you kept track of the development of things, you’ll know that the Russian men were given so much testosterone that many developed large prostrates. This meant they needed to use catheters to be able to urinate. You could hardly tell some of the women were females and they even had to have chromosome tests!
For awhile in the United States bodybuilders were looked at as being kind of weird. When they started becoming popular was after Arnold Schwarzenegger’s movie, “Pumping Iron”. All of a sudden, weight lifting became the newest rage and people started heading to the gyms and health clubs to work out. That’s where a lot of them got introduced to steroid use. The “bigger, the better” was the motto and steroids seemed to be the answer as the quickest way to get there. Steroid use by young people spread from college to high school, and even junior high school.
Athletes in other sports used steroids because they wanted to build muscle to enhance their performance in their chosen sport. Steroid use became common in track, football, baseball and other sports other than weight lifting. There’s been lots of news about athletes on steroids, possibly most notably among football players. Unfortunately penalties and fines and disqualifications haven’t been enough to deter some athletes from continuing to use the illegal drug.
Perhaps the greatest tragedy is young people who use steroids without fully understanding the serious side effects associated with them. They may suffer irreversible and unwanted changes to their bodies as well as other health problems. Parents should be aware of the widespread use of steroids and educate their children about the damage they can do to their bodies by using them. Certainly many young people idolize athletes on steroids and may seek to imitate them to their harm.
