What would you do in my shoes?

[NEMSZ]

So guys, just wanting to hear some opinions on what you would do if you were me trying to get to my goals with some limitations I put on myself as health is the #1 most important thing to me, I’m not willing to do any crazy blasts or mix compounds etc just to look a certain way anymore (haven’t done so in about 8 years)

So a little background about myself;

Im 31, 5’8 and 1/2” (yes the half matters to me lol) and 180lbs (ish) but I seem to hover realistically around 14% bodyfat..

I train INTENSELY 5x a week doing CrossFit, I love the workouts, I don’t have to think about it, they’re intense, I get plenty of cardio from it and weight lifting as my gym/coach does a strength workout for the first half of every class then an intense CrossFit style workout afterwards..

So, I’m prescribed 200mg TRT but I was only taking 140mg (20mg per day) and I was taking 2iu Black Tops as well, I was in better shape at the beginning of the year til about April but not where I wanted to be, I was just leaner (visible abs) but around 170-175lbs.. I did let myself go from around April til now a bit, I wasn’t dieting or getting anywhere near enough protein and eating junk with the girlfriend and I had stopped GH and lowered my Test to 70mg per week (10mg per day)..

I have been dieting the last 2 weeks getting at least 180g-200g protein per day and only eating healthy carbs like sweet potatoes, fruits, veggies, some rice, lowered my fats to trace fats from protein sources and raised my TRT back to 20mg per day and started again on GH 1iu per day and raising this week to 2iu per day... Now my girl told me the other day and I can see it when I first wake up that I’m already looking leaner, my abs are coming in to view again, in the mornings I can see them easier as I’m fasted..

BUUUUTTT I’m having a real self conscious dilemma where yesterday during the workout one of my friends was recording herself and I had my shirt off and I came out in the video and I DID NOT LIKE WHAT I SAW lol.. I’m no where near where I want to be, not even close.. Ideally my goal is to be around 180-185lbs and hold 9%-10% year round, so it’s lean and athletic but not where I have to kill myself to maintain it..

So there’s 2 things I’m dealing with, first off is the diet part;

Should I diet hard, like what Bboy said in another post, higher protein to energy ratio until I get real lean (probably have to get down to like 165lbs to be single digits) then grow?

Or do I just have around maintenance calories and just move macros around focusing on protein of course and try to recomp? (Never done this before)

2nd part is the AAS/GH part; as I said, I’m only willing to risk so much to get to my goals;

So I’m thinking that staying at 140mg Test and 2IU GH is going to take me significantly longer than if I just up the dose a tiny bit, so I’m thinking going to the full 200mg dose then POSSIBLY going to 300mg and raising the GH to 3iu per day then coming back down to TRT for a few months and working my ass off to maintain what I’ve gotten over 3-4 months... Is it pretty realistic to say that I’m gona have to “up the ante” so to speak for a little bit to get to where I want?? I know it’s not a crazy goal compared to the guys on here who want to be 280lbs on stage but just picture some of these CrossFit guys at the games and that’s pretty much what I want to look like lol.. I think Rich Froning for example has the perfect kind of body/build..

I’m very health conscious and I get bloods done OFTEN.. At least every 6 months I’ll do Full Cardio IQ, BNP test, Fasting insulin, CBC, thyroid, etc and I’ll be getting a cancer prevention test from privateMD now in a couple weeks along with all of those things again so obviously if all those things come back good I’ll be open to taking a bit of a calculated risk for a little bit..

Sorry for the long winded post, but just thought I’d thoroughly explain lol...

Thanks guys..

 

[machomadness22]

I think the maximum amount of the dosages your concerned about will be fine and I don’t think it’s anything to be very concerned with….personally anyways I would still consider those dosages in the healthy range considering what many people dose at including myself. That being said to get as lean as possible as fast as possible that in combination with a PSMF or something of the sorts is what I would do. Or if no rush cut cals slowly replace fats and carbs with protein keeping macros the same obviously takes longer but yields the best results IMO. Best of luck bro I

 

[D-NUTZ]

Man, I may be in the minority here but for what you want, I think just taking your full TRT dose of 200, dosing 2iu gh first thing in the morning and then fasting for a bit (if that’s an option) and maybe doing some fasted cardio after fasting about 45min-hour, then following what you and bboy talked about. A higher protein, lower carb/fat diet. You can get pretty extreme with low carbs/fats for 6-8 weeks and probably get to where you wanna be fairly quickly.

This is something I’d do, no need to run crazy supraphysiological doses of PEDs for what you want. I almost always cut down on just TRT and 2iu gh unless I’m prepping.

 

[TedDansen]

If you just made some changes and they appear to be working, I would just hold what you got for a couple months and see how much recomp you can get out of it. If you want to stay the same size and drop 4-5%, you're looking at replacing 7-9 lbs of fat with muscle, which is a pretty significant amount. Hopefully the changes you made can get that number down a little bit, and then you can reach your final goal with one reasonable bulk and cut.

 

[Knight9]

I think there is a pretty good chance that you would be better off just making the jump rather than inching up. It's not a large jump and I believe that it can get you to where you want to be a bit faster and you can then scale it back a little and likely maintain it.

I'd bet on 300mg+3iu and then scale back to 200mg+2iu rather than vice versa/scaling up. I only advise this because it's not a large jump.

 

[Fit2Serve]

DONT do extremem diet and get down to 165 bls etc. imo u wont like it.
get ur macros fine tuned
and
up dose
nothing crazy but imo ur kinda wanting an ehanced look yet u arent really enhanced at all. you r on true trt so not supraphys levels and that gh dose aint gonna do much either.
ATLEAST take a supraphys dose of test and let that be ur "blast" and it will def aid in speeding up the recomp
im doing test prop and primo cuz i too am super health concious now. doing @300mg test p a week and 400mg primo.
this is my "recomp blast" lol
-F

 

[xpoc]

DONT do extremem diet and get down to 165 bls etc. imo u wont like it.
get ur macros fine tuned
and
up dose
nothing crazy but imo ur kinda wanting an ehanced look yet u arent really enhanced at all. you r on true trt so not supraphys levels and that gh dose aint gonna do much either.
ATLEAST take a supraphys dose of test and let that be ur "blast" and it will def aid in speeding up the recomp
im doing test prop and primo cuz i too am super health concious now. doing @300mg test p a week and 400mg primo.
this is my "recomp blast" lol
-F

Hey I dont want to hijack this thread, but you mention being super health conscious. And then mention 300 T and 400 Primo per week. I am researching the risk/reward of primo. When you have a moment please check the thread I am linking up and perhaps you have some input on the comments made about primo and impact on lipids. https://www.professionalmuscle.com/...rol-and-compounds-that-are-safe.168648/page-3

 

[Fit2Serve]

Hey I dont want to hijack this thread, but you mention being super health conscious. And then mention 300 T and 400 Primo per week. I am researching the risk/reward of primo. When you have a moment please check the thread I am linking up and perhaps you have some input on the comments made about primo and impact on lipids. https://www.professionalmuscle.com/...rol-and-compounds-that-are-safe.168648/page-3

ive never run primo before and tbh its just been on my bucket list lol
i cant run deca, eq, tren, npp etc cuz of the anxiety issues.
bout all thats left is primo

OP, should def up test dose if not anything else.
-F

 

[SouthernMuscle]

do the unhealthy part now, while youre relatively young

at a minimum up the test dose, gain the muscle tissue and maintain it long enough to create a “set point”

you can always fine tune and diet later on trt

 

[Kindtrap]

Sounds like you just need to stick to the diet

 

[Matsuo Munefusa]

Sounds like you just need to stick to the diet

I agree. You fail with consistency. Stick to it and you’ll get where you’re wanting to be.

That said going up to 200mg isn’t a terrible idea just watch lipids and estradiol and BP.

Full support bro

 

[b-boy]

1. Use what your doctor prescribed, you should have done this the whole time and let him adjust through bloodwork.
2. Find out what your maintenance is without crossfit training, and eat there and let the training be your deficit. Try that out first and see what your weight does, you will probably end up having to add calories in if your weight starts dropping to fast (my guess, if your truly training hard)

 

[NEMSZ]

DONT do extremem diet and get down to 165 bls etc. imo u wont like it.
get ur macros fine tuned
and
up dose
nothing crazy but imo ur kinda wanting an ehanced look yet u arent really enhanced at all. you r on true trt so not supraphys levels and that gh dose aint gonna do much either.
ATLEAST take a supraphys dose of test and let that be ur "blast" and it will def aid in speeding up the recomp
im doing test prop and primo cuz i too am super health concious now. doing @300mg test p a week and 400mg primo.
this is my "recomp blast" lol
-F

You kinda hit the nail on the head with this one, wanting to look enhanced but not being enhanced lmao

That’s pretty true and I’ve come to realize that it’s probably not going to happen that way for me lol I’ll probably need to up the dose a little bit.. I know I don’t need 10iu of GH and 1g of Test for what I want, that’s for sure. But I know I’m probably not getting there on 140mg of Test and a clean diet and training hard.. So upping the Test seems like the safest thing to do..

 

[NEMSZ]

I agree. You fail with consistency. Stick to it and you’ll get where you’re wanting to be.

That said going up to 200mg isn’t a terrible idea just watch lipids and estradiol and BP.

Full support bro

My lipids and all other health markers were always good when I’ve gone up to 200mg the couple times I did it since I got prescribed 2 years ago. And I definitely agree with consistency with the FOOD, the training is the easy/fun part, but I love to eat freely, so that’s my problem. What I’ve been doing the past 3 weeks is I’ll diet strictly from Monday-Saturday and Saturday night and Sunday I let myself eat what I want within reason and still focus on protein..

It sure helps that my girl is doing it with me so it’s not like she wants to go out to eat every night and I’m the asshole in “prep” mode lol

 

[gungalunga]

In the video you saw of yourself where you are about 14% at 180lbs......maybe you were just a little carb depleted that day and looked a little flat. Maybe your first step is giving yourself a break. You aren't that far away from your goals. And for Christ sake....stop over-thinking things. I've read some of your posts.....you know your stuff. Choose a plan and then make it happen. Adjust the details as needed.

 

[Kindtrap]

My lipids and all other health markers were always good when I’ve gone up to 200mg the couple times I did it since I got prescribed 2 years ago. And I definitely agree with consistency with the FOOD, the training is the easy/fun part, but I love to eat freely, so that’s my problem. What I’ve been doing the past 3 weeks is I’ll diet strictly from Monday-Saturday and Saturday night and Sunday I let myself eat what I want within reason and still focus on protein..

It sure helps that my girl is doing it with me so it’s not like she wants to go out to eat every night and I’m the asshole in “prep” mode lol

If you aren’t willing to do the basics(diet) then no one can help you.

abs aren’t made in the gym..they are made in the kitchen.

only way your going to get where you want to be without diet is to blast the shit out of tren

 

[NEMSZ]

1. Use what your doctor prescribed, you should have done this the whole time and let him adjust through bloodwork.
2. Find out what your maintenance is without crossfit training, and eat there and let the training be your deficit. Try that out first and see what your weight does, you will probably end up having to add calories in if your weight starts dropping to fast (my guess, if your truly training hard)

1. My doctor is VERY conservative, he wants my Test levels around 500-600 MAX despite all health markers being in range and I honestly feel best around 900-950.. So what I do is I take around 80mg Test to be in that 600 range for the blood test and then I go back to 140mg which puts me in the 950 range, and he thinks it’s the 200mg he prescribed me.. So needless to say I also have a bunch of left over Test I haven’t used because I’ve always taken less than prescribed.. lol

2. So essentially you’d recommend getting lean first then adding the food in to grow?? And I haven’t calculated my maintenance without CrossFit but I do know that eating literally whatever I want, not necessarily unhealthy and all the time but just not counting calories and when I wanted ice cream I’d have it or pizza I’d have it, my weight never went above 180-182 and since the diet about 3 weeks ago I’m down to 177-178..

 

[NEMSZ]

In the video you saw of yourself where you are about 14% at 180lbs......maybe you were just a little carb depleted that day and looked a little flat. Maybe your first step is giving yourself a break. You aren't that far away from your goals. And for Christ sake....stop over-thinking things. I've read some of your posts.....you know your stuff. Choose a plan and then make it happen. Adjust the details as needed.

Thanks bro lol I am a little hard on myself, I went home that night telling my girl “That’s it! I’m doing AAAAALLLLL the steroids, every single one.” Lmao we both laughed but it’s just how I see myself...

 

[NEMSZ]

If you aren’t willing to do the basics(diet) then no one can help you.

abs aren’t made in the gym..they are made in the kitchen.

only way your going to get where you want to be without diet is to blast the shit out of tren

I will absolutely never take Tren again lol but I hear you, I used to think I can still “out train my diet” because when I was young, in my teen years I did a lot of kickboxing/Muay Thai and I had buddies that STRUGGLED HARD to make weight and I would eat BK and Wendys and Pizza all the time and had full blown abs without trying lol

Those days are LONG GONE... But I’m on the diet now, so I’ll keep it consistent and watch how it plays out and adjust as needed.. That one day break I give myself also helps a lot. I’m not competing so being on a fish and veggie diet for 16 weeks does not appeal to me lol

 

[heavyhitter]

You kinda hit the nail on the head with this one, wanting to look enhanced but not being enhanced lmao

That’s pretty true and I’ve come to realize that it’s probably not going to happen that way for me lol I’ll probably need to up the dose a little bit.. I know I don’t need 10iu of GH and 1g of Test for what I want, that’s for sure. But I know I’m probably not getting there on 140mg of Test and a clean diet and training hard.. So upping the Test seems like the safest thing to do..

It is. And 2-250 mg of test is a pretty moderate-low dose. I’ve seen docs prescribe 250. But you’ll be amazed at the changes you’ll make by increasing it, and I doubt very much you’ll notice any negative sides. If it were me, I’d bump the dose up a touch and get there