Steroids - My Take & Post Comp Progress

Is it weird to interview yourself and ask all of the hard questions?? Haha - very weird. But here it is - my interview with Me!

Have I ever thought about using steroids?

Asking anyone who dabbles in bodybuilding if they have ever thought about steroids is like asking any woman over the age of 35 (or any age if they have had children), if they have ever considered buying new boobs. Let's face it - all have thought of it. Some are at one end of the spectrum ("No way!! Wouldn't EVER!! What a load of superficial crap!!), others at the other end ("Who cares about debt, Centrelink will help me out if I get stuck  - just fit me with a pair of Double D's!!") and many hover in the middle ("I'll do a little research and a little saving and a little more research and see if they are for me"). The main point is that everyone has an opinion and a standpoint.

Back to steroids. Of course I have. I have thought about it. I have asked questions. I have read research. I have looked at the pictures. I have wondered what it would be like to grow in muscularity relatively quickly in comparison to how long it takes when doing it au-natural.

The steroid regimes that I imagined are not, apparently, the reality. I've heard it is much more designer these days and a lot easier to administer and conceal. I won't even try to explain the little I know, least I sound like an uneducated idiot, but I'm safe to comment that they make the world of difference to training - that is clearly apparent from the pictures.

Have I ever tried steroids?

No.

Why Not?

I want to rabble on about health and honesty and fulfilment and being-true-to-self etc etc etc .... but I'm not going to. I try (and fail sometimes) to avoid the self-righteous path because it generally backfires. You know the one ..... wouldn't DARE eat a straight-from-the-devil protein bar but I'll chow down on a sticky date pudding .... mhmmm ... the difference is hard to find really. So I'd rather just say that it doesn't interest me to take them.

Maybe if I thought I could get to a pro status and I had sponsorship and a future that relied heavily on my physique, just maybe then I would take my  mere-thinking to the next level. But, very happily, I can say that my physique is truly my own and I can add or detract anything I like from it at no expense or interest to pretty much anyone other than myself. I'm never going to win any professional competitions and so I have no need to act like I am.

Do I agree with steroid use?

Does my opinion matter to anyone but myself? No. I admire physiques from all training styles. Natural. Enhanced. Whatever. I just like looking at physiques. Some are better than others - that's for sure. And I'm certain that a basic body shape cannot be fixed by anything injectable. Eg. I have a square torso - short of removing the bottom couple of ribs, compressing the ones that are left and shortening my pelvis, I'm left with a square torso. I can manipulate lat and shoulder width, increase quad size and work on my twisting pose, but I'm always going to have a square-ish torso. Nothing I could inject will fix that.

Is health an angle at all for me?

Of course it is. But, as previously stated, it is not the reason for all decisions. There are so few people that preach health that can, hand on heart, stand there and tell me that all decisions are made for health. Because they undo themselves the minute they selfie a sugar-coma meal or their 'cheat' easter chocolate. That's not to say that there is anything wrong with either of those - in fact I indulge more now than I have in years - but I tend to think that if they really and truly and honestly believed their own teachings, they simply wouldn't choose to eat satan's own sugar.

 

So better just to say that my standpoint is striving for health the best I can, while maintaining balance and enjoying life's pleasures (which often come in the form of beautiful sugary treats), is more my focus.

Steroids definitely don't fit into life's pleasures for me. I don't actually 'get' why any amateur bodybuilder would bother. The trade-off of facebook comments and/or random "wow - you look fantastic!" comments from strangers just wouldn't make it worth my while. I could not bear the thought of future health issues, or my children actually knowing that I administered drugs, simply to grow a couple of muscles in order to impress at a local amateur show. That's just not on my radar.

 

Do I think steroids make a noticeable difference?

LOL - you'd better hope so or the risk and effort is completely friggin useless!! Haha. Of course it is. Check out some of those girls with muscles that look too good to be true.

 

How do I feel about steroid users competing in 'natural' bodybuilding shows?

Have to admit that this sort of shits me. If you say you're natural - be natural. I've won quite a few shows to date and I've won plenty of lovely trophies and some pretty darn cool prizes - PT sessions, a beautiful Dana Carmont bikini, protein buckets - and the one my son loves the most ... a blender!! (he cannot understand why I've not won another blender! Every prize is measured against this blender and none have measured up to date!). I love winning - yep, I do! But not one of these prizes or trophies is worth cheating for.

 

Do I think there are female bodybuilders, famous or not, that tell fibs about whether they use?

I was naïve enough to think this didn't happen. I've since become a little more street-wise. Yes. They do fib. I have no doubt about it. Let me ask you this - would you trust a protein brand as much if you knew the famous face promoting it was a steroid user? Nope. Didn't think so. Chew on that for a while.

 

 

 

Ok - enough of that for now. Time for an update. It's been 10 weeks since my last competition. It's no secret that I haven't had what I'd call totally successful post-comp experiences, though they have been better each time. The scene was set this time around to be one of the most trying ever - here's why;

 

Following my competition, we had a wonderful week in Coolangatta with dinners out and days at theme parks. On our arrival home at Katherine, we had a few days and then it was time to pack up our house for the big move north to Darwin. Moving a 5 bedroom, 3 bathroom house into a 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom 'cottage' was going to present problems. On top of that, I was informed that my job would remain in Katherine until around June 2015 while Rob started at his in Darwin in mid Novermber 2014. The thought of being apart from my family for another 7 months was devastating - really and truly devastating. So we started packing with an incredibly heavy heart and I was continuing with full-time shift work (plenty of rotten nightshifts thrown in) and in my 'spare time' I packed, organised and tried not to think of what was to come. Plenty of tears were shed.

 

I will concede that, once we get focused on something, Rob and I are a pretty intense team and we focused on nothing but my job. We believed that I could change what seemed unchangeable. We spoke about it as if I had already won the battle and we continued to push the boundaries in working towards our goal. It worked. We did it. An opening came up for a job in Darwin and, against all odds (and I mean all odds!), I got it. The relief was huge. More tears. The weight of the world lifted off my shoulders and life got all perspective back again.

 

So Rob moved to Darwin. I stayed in Katherine and continued shiftwork while the kids pretty much looked after themselves. They slept in a line in a little unit while I worked nightshift. I would then come 'home' and sleep on a swag on the floor. They went to school, I did a HIIT in the unit and got to the gym when I could. I lined up their dinner in the fridge and left instructions on how to heat it up, then I'd be back at work. It was quite possibly one of the more trying times I can remember but I also grew some fierce pride in the adaptability and capabilities of my children.

 

We moved into another unit for another week and organised some really 'fun' things - like when Rob had to leave Darwin at midday and travel 3 hours to attend their end-of-year concert and then return to start work by 8am the following morning - with a quick sleep on a tiled floor in between car trips. That was pretty special.

 

Just before Christmas the kids moved north for good and I bunked down at a friends' house for a few weeks while I finished up at work. I drove back and forth from Darwin to Katherine more than I'd like but the feeling of pulling into our new driveway and seeing my family was worth every long kilometre. What got me through the drives was my amazing podcasts and I learned tons over those hours.

 

At midnight on December 31st, I finished my last shift at Katherine. I got in my car, and in the pouring rain I drove 300kms in the pitch black to Darwin, pulling in to our new house at 3am. I climbed into bed and slept like a little baby, finally resting in the knowledge that it was over. We had made it. And here I am 5 days later, ready to start my new job tomorrow. I'm very excited and the fight to get here has made it all the more of a total triumph - bring it on!

 

So I guess what I'm saying is, I've moved house, continued with full-time shiftwork, continued to be a mother to three gorgeous but sometimes-naughty children, changed work roles and organised all of those things that need organising when you rent out one house and buy another. I've made sure my food and training has been a priority the whole way through yet the less I focus on it, the better it works.

 

A simple observation - when you focus too much on something, ever noticed how you can start sabotaging the thing you are focusing on? Ever heard of peaceful protestors eventually killing someone in the name of peace? Too much focus, too much research, too much talk, too much navel-gazing .. it can all end in disaster. The key may be to get the focus off the issue for a while. Get a new hobby. And as for using facebook as some sort of accountability tool - it wouldn't be my choice of valid tools. There are better ways in my humble opinion.

 

I was candid that I have absolutely no intention of piling on weight this off-season. I would like to maintain a physique that eludes to the training I do. I want to increase in size and strength, in that order. I am following my own program and it is periodized into volume and hypertrophy within a week. I am working on my main trouble spots - quads, lats, shoulders, glutes. I am onto my second set of 8 weeks and I'm continuing with the same framework because it's working! I'm completely stoked with the results so far.

 

Food. I'm following a macro-counting regime and I have never had so much success. I didn't feel the need to blow-out at Christmas because I had treats the whole way through. And continue to do so. I track myself but quite casually as I don't want to be a scale watcher any more than to just keep an eye on what's going on. I've put on about 2.5kgs from stage weight. Could it be argued that I"m too lean to put on muscle? Argue away. I don't care for that argument because no one has been able to convince me that a pile of fat gain does anymore for growing muscle than a strategic gain over a longer period does. Remembering...I tried it that way last time and spent my whole bloody prep trying to lose it, succeeding in shedding some of that precious muscle that I worked so camn hard to form, in a desperate quest to shed that easily gained fat. Only an idiot would do the same thing again and expect a different outcome...

My diet is much, much, MUCH more varied. I still eat mainly great foods - I wouldn't be stupid enough to neglect this - but I factor in different things that I once deemed 'no-no's'. Now they are 'yes-yeses'. Knowing I can have them regularly means I eat them less. It works.

 

Cardio? Yep. Unashamedly. I am happy as Larry with my 2 hiits. No more. No less. 25mins each and they not only give me some variety, they also keep those treats in check and leave me feeling like I've got some 'zap'. I wouldn't give them up for anyone. If I"m too lean - easily fixed - eat more!! What a dream scenario!!

 

I feel more balanced than I have in years. I feel just as focused as ever - more so if that is possible - yet I don't labour over the simple decisions as much. Family are happy with this and tell me so often.

 

So that's me in a nutshell. And the questions are being asked - what comp next? Haha - I have a cunning plan. But I'm not ready to share it ... yet.

 

This is a 'today' pic.