by Karen Lirio
Yes steroids work, and yes steroids have very serious side effects. Here is what they can do for you, and what they can do to you.
The first thing that you should know is that just as there is no miracle weight loss pill, there is no miracle muscle growth pill. Steroids work by allowing you to train longer and harder, they don’t make you grow just by taking them!

Synthetic steroids were developed in the 1930s to help men who did not produce enough testosterone naturally. Testosterone is the hormone responsible for deepening the voice and growing body hair at the onset of puberty. Its muscle building effect comes from its ability to retain protein, which is the building block of muscle.

What steroids can do for you is to help you recover from your workouts quicker than a natural bodybuilder can. While natural bodybuilders need 48 hours to recover before training again, and can’t afford to train for more than an hour at a time for fear of overtraining, steroid users need just a few hours recovery and can easily train for 2 hours at a time.

The inference therefore is that if you are going to use steroids you are going to train 6 times per week, morning and afternoon, for hours at a time. Because without huge quantities of food and hours spent in the gym, no amount of steroids is going to give you an advantage over a natural body builder.

The amount of training required to realise the benefits of steroid use is enough to exclude most people from seriously considering them as a training tool, but for those prepared to go the extra mile there are also some serious side effects to consider. The major side effects of steroid use include liver tumors, jaundice, fluid retention, enlargement of the heart, high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, elevated cholesterol levels, heart palpitations, heart attack, kidney stones, and kidney disease.

Additional side effects include severe acne, trembling, bad breath, aggressive behavior, mood swings, manic episodes, and depression. Males can also suffer from shrinkage of the testicles, reduced sperm count, infertility, baldness, and the development of breasts. Women can suffer from the growth of facial hair, cessation of the menstrual cycle, enlargement of the clitoris, and deepening of the voice. Adolescents can suffer from premature skeletal maturation resulting in halted growth, and accelerated pubertal changes.

The bottom line of course, when considering steroid use, is that not only are steroids banned in competitive sport but it is illegal to use and possess anabolic steroids in NSW. If you are found to possess, supply or administer anabolic steroids to another person penalties include substantial fines and/or imprisonment.