Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Steroids (1 of 3) - Ramsey Ferguson

Posted for Ramsey Ferguson

Final Blog Post (1 of 3)

I would like to use my final blog posts to reopen the discussion on steroid use/abuse. I

know the midterm reports were very long winded and even then I feel like some people may

have been tired of one group talking and not gotten possible questions answered.  I’ve read up

on it a lot (admittedly on the internet so how reliable is that), but I also heard/know of several

personal accounts of people using anabolic steroids.

The biggest issue I see with people using steroids, aside from the fact that they are

illegal, is the abuse where they do not cycle off properly. Many people use steroids with little or

no unwanted side effects when they run a reasonable length cycle, and when they come off of

them and stay clean for long enough to let their body get a break from them.  These same

people could possibly face complications down the road, but a lot of the big cases you hear

about where there are serious side effects come from years of steroid use with very little or no

cycling off.

Another serious problem with steroid use today is that the correct dosage/cycle length

really is not set in stone. This makes me pose the question  ‘If people are going to use steroids

(legally or not), and they can be used without people suffering serious side effects, then should

research be done and credible resources be available to those to help minimize the risk

associated with steroid use?’ This idea would gain a lot of opposition because if you published

something informing people of what a bad cycle consists of (dose, length, stack, specific

steroid) and warned them against it then some may take that as you promoting the “safe” use of

steroids. I do believe, however, that as steroids are gaining popularity among more common

people and not just the big bodybuilders that some type of education could be utilized and

possibly help us with healthcare costs down the road by lowering associated health risks in this

fashion.     Let me know what you think!!

Ramsey Ferguson

3 comments:

  1. Seems to me that this is an over-regulated market... The consequences are real, but not too severe, I think! Although, most of the steroids will be used for vanity. Should we ever risk health issues for vanity alone!

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  2. This topic raises some very interesting ideas I'd never considered before. It raises questions that fall outside the bounds of what we generally think of when we consider drug use / abuse. As Gregory points out, this is a drug primarily taken for aesthetic purposes, unlike most drugs, which are generally prized fro their mind-altering effects. My initial reaction is to say that, no, we should never risk our health in pursuit of vanity. But the more I considered it, the more I realize that we do this all the time. Remember Kanye West's mother? She died as a result of the anesthesia administered during the course of a cosmetic, elective surgery. We inject botulism into our faces to paralyze the muscles (botox), and we spend countless collective hours bathing in harmful levels of UV light (sun bathing and, especially, tanning beds.) I still don't agree with the use of steroids, I'm just not sure it is all that different from the myriad ways we already jeopardize our health in the pursuit of beauty.

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  3. I can attest that steroids have a powerful appeal. The times I've had them prescribed, such as to treat poison ivy (to which I'm highly susceptible, their affect on my psychological state (as well as physiological) was palpable, and irresistible. I could imagine becoming an abuser.

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