Curious about the dangers of bodybuilding?

So was I. I tried to learn all I could before I started, and found there's not a lot of information readily available. But there is a small wealth of fascinating, titillating information out there. I believe in the power of learning through storytelling. So in that ancient tradition, I present to you the best stories I've found. They are darkly entertaining, completely fascinating stories you'll never forget. In 2008, the subject's definitive film was released - Christoper Bell's Bigger, Stronger, Faster. It's a great introduction to the issues of our steroid culture, providing you with the tenets for intelligent discussion and critical thinking. Then, to go deeper and get into the graphic stuff of steroids and bodybuilding, here's your reading list. The books I recommend here expose more than drug effects; they expose the wacky, absurd and often surreal subculture that is bodybuilding.

• If you're looking for books to read, check out my article the anti-steroid perspective on bookshelves. I based it on one of my graduate school research projects. It ran in Fitness & Physique magazine and appears on TheDietDoc.com. I go over all the books and give a bit more context for them, like a summer reading guide.
• For a quick article to read online right now, here's a rough firsthand account of dating a woman on steroids, by John Romano.
• For another article, here's my own story of peril, an example of how competing often goes wrong even when you're not on steroids, but your trainer diets you as if you are.
• And if you just want to get right to it, the two best books are Muscle: confessions of an unlikely bodybuilder, by Samuel W. Fussell, and Chemical Pink, the female version, by Kate Arnoldi. A close second is Bob Paris's autobiographical Gorilla Suit. Any one of these is gripping and unforgettable.

Natural, Enhanced and Making the Choice: bring the education sooner

Every strength and hypertrophy-based discipline is facing the issue of natural vs. enhanced performance. Bodybuilding, Olympic lifting, strongman, powerlifting, even fitness and figure athletes eventually have to explore the issue and make a choice. While it may seem like a simple one, the deeper a person's identity is rooted in his or her discipline, the murkier the decision can become. Lines are drawn through each sport's community, and even though a person may elect not to give mind to the controversy, he or she is still passively mired.

I have walked through the jungle and made my choice. From my settled position, I do not choose to beat the drum of "the right choice" though; instead, what I concentrate on is the issue of information. Every person who walks into the gym is going to be faced with making the choice of using substances - whatever substances, at whatever level, and the area is infinitely complex - or staying natural, and the demand for that decision can come at any time, especially before the person is educated. Every day, people live, change and die by this choice. Boys and girls, novices of any age, people converting to a different discipline...each person needs to be informed early on.

 

Finding good information resources is not easy. Sure, medical information on the effects of substances is readily available, but that scarcely begins the topic. First off, these studies generally consider people who are using large, regular dosages of sophisticated chemicals of great purity; this doesn't typically resemble the experimenter in the gym. But this issue extends far beyond the black-and-white "take this, and this happens" biology factoids. It may be helpful to look at it through a substance abuse/addiction lens; like alcohol, it changes the user's psychology, perspective on life, philosophy, spirituality, personality...his relationships, her community...career, survival, and potentially every choice in life. Information on these effects is what is so rare and elusive. The excellent few I have found I present here (even though they address bodybuilding, they would translate for any discipline to some degree). If there were only a way to require people entering the gym for the first time to read certain books, or if at least some effort would be made by gyms to educate new members on this vast, critical and unavoidable issue. But this would require a complete shift in thinking by those running the "gym" industry.