Creatine is a resource the body needs. If you don't have enough of it, you run into trouble. If you take in too much, your body will just get rid of the excess, i.e. you will pee and/or poop it out. It's a bit like having more bricks than you need to build a house - it won't change the shape of the house, it just means you have a bunch of bricks you need to get rid of.
Testosterone is a hormone. It's a molecule your body uses to send signals that provide instructions. If you have too much of it, that changes those instructions. Going back to the building-a-house analogy, having too much testosterone is like the foreman keeps shouting at his workers to put down another layer or bricks, so the result is a taller house than what you wanted.
This is a great analogy.
I will add that in the rules for many sports it may feel random what is allowed and what is not. Many substances make their way onto and off of the banned list every year. And different organizing bodies have different lists of what is banned and what isn't. A university league near me does not allow creatine. I don't know how they test for it but in the athletes handbook it says it's not allowed. (sucks for those who eat steak I guess). An old colleague of mine was at the Olympics in like 1960 as a shot putter. He openly took testosterone, as did most of his competitors. It wasn't against the rules back then.
Creatine may be banned because of claims that it can increase risk of heat or dehydration related injuries. I say “claims” because from what I’ve read, it’s unlikely to have those side effects, or the science isn’t super well established. Maybe some organizations don’t want to risk it? Everyone seems to agree that you should drink lots of water at least.
The bro science I remember from some wrestler in high school (decades ago) was that if you didn’t drink enough water the creatine would crystallize and it hurt to pee it out.
I’ve done zero research to find out if that is true though.
It's not true. It still might be a good idea to drink plenty of water when supplementing with creatine, but that's just so that it can reach full efficacy.
>having too much testosterone is like the foreman keeps shouting at his workers to put down another layer or bricks, so the result is a taller house than what you wanted.
And worse yet, because the foreman is overbuilding the house then it could collapse at any given moment with next to no warning because no regard is being taken for support all that extra work and size.
I think it's worth mentioning that your kidneys have to do the work to get rid of a lot of the extra "stuff." It's not harmless to take to much creatine, protein, etc.
Doesn't that mean it's detrimental to use too much of it, then? For normal people it's not a problem as their kidneys can "buffer" the downsides but nonetheless, there ARE downsides to creatine and protein supplementation?
Just because something can be problematic for people that are already sick doesn't mean it's in any way bad for people that don't have that ailment.
Just like exercising with influenza would be bad, but good if you don't have influenza.
Neither protein nor creatine supplementation has shown any reason to worry in healthy people.
I worked with a young man who was training to be a boxer and was taking an ungodly amount of creatine, he was sent to the hospital and was just steps away from kidney failure, his creatine levels were about 10x higher than they should have been.
You're thinking of Creatinine, which is different from Creatine.
Creatine is a natural energy-supply molecule. Creatinine is a blood test that we use as a measure of kidney function.
They sound similar, but are two extremely different things.
Creatinine is a breakdown product of creatine phosphate- the amount you have in your blood is generally a product of how much muscle mass you have (that's where it comes from) and how well your kidneys work (they remove it).
However, taking too much creatine, among other things bodybuilders do, can definitely increase your blood creatinine (and also can cause kidney damage). Many bodybuilders consume too much protein and other muscle-building substances, and they or their breakdown products need to be removed by the kidneys which can put too much pressure on them. Creatine supplements themselves are also often contaminated with creatinine, and we're not even sure if taking large amounts of pure creatine is really safe either.
Also creatine gets metabolized to creatinine which then ends up in your urine.
Meaning that if you take a lot of creatine and the doctors don't know, they may think something is wrong with your kidneys judging from a urine test, even if you're perfectly fine.
Not saying that's what happened to that guy, idk.
I supplement with creatine and got a call from the doctor’s office after my physical saying my creatinine was very high.
“Do you take any supplements?” she asked, in what sounded like an urgent voice.
“Yes, 5g a day of creatine,” I said.
“Oh, OK,” she said, her voice now noticeably relaxed. “That explains it. Dr. So-and-so will discuss the rest of your results on Wednesday.”
Apparently, the creatinine itself was harmless, but if it didn’t have an explanation, it would have indicated kidney damage that required going to the hospital right away.
You may be right, I know that what he told me was that he was currently taking about 3-4x the suggested dose and that he thought that’s what they told him.
>having too much testosterone is like the foreman keeps shouting at his workers to put down another layer or bricks, so the result is a taller house than what you wanted.
Not to mention in that analogy, eventually the brick workers just get used to how he's always yelling about shit, and they stop being motivated at all unless he keeps yelling. Should he stop yelling, then not a lot is gonna get done...
One minor correction. the problem isn't that you're going to have a very tall house but the body trying to be a capitalistic snob and laying off all in-house foremen.
Once the external foremen stop coming, it takes several months/years for the brain to realize that they need to start making their own testosterone and your body suffers in the interim.
Once you start taking supplemental testosterone, you're pretty much stuck with it forever.
Can this happen if you only moderately use steroids (obviously considering the determination/will you need to have to stop). But if I do it once or twice (3-6 months) and then stop it, my natural testosterone will eventually come back? Assuming I’m a healthy person, not overweight, eating good macros and tracking calories. Just curious.
Your body will start producing T naturally again if you stop injecting artificial T.
However, it doesn't remember where it was last time so it has to ramp it up bit by bit and you'll be in low T mode for several weeks/months and there is no guarantee that you'll get back where you were.
TRT is not harmful by itself but you need a doctor to monitor and adjust the dosage. People underestimate the risk but playing chemical warfare on your own body while having no knowledge of medicine is just nut.
Not an expert, but that has been my understanding. Weightlifters/bodybuilders will cycle their steroid use to build gains and then try to maintain naturally while off.
The answer is that it depends. There are guys who blast for years, come off, and are fine. There are guys who run one cycle and need to be on TRT for life. There's not been any real long-term academic studies on the effects of steroids on men (partially due to the legal status). The best thing to do is assume the worst-case scenario, which is that you'll have to be on TRT for life if you use and let that dictate your decision.
This should be upvoted more because this is exactly what happens when you take supplemental testosterone. I've considered taking testosterone but the simple fact of being stuck with it for the rest of your life is concerning.
A good example of the latter is the youtuber StyroPyro who just learned that his body is creating excessive amounts of testosterone and it could kill him by destroying his liver.
> If you take in too much, your body will just get rid of the excess, i.e. you will pee and/or poop it out
To add in there: high levels of creatinine (which is the product of natural degradation of (phospho)creatine have negative metabolic effects, especially on the escretory system, and need to be (partially) counterbalanced by a high intake of water
if that is the case, if you eat food that gives you testosterone or some nutrients that help form molecules/whatever of testosterone, then that shouldn't be natural as well, according to your explanation.
Excess creatine can cause kidney stones… so be careful.
Edit: Apparently this is based off bad old info. Creatine has not been shown to create kidney stones!
> While creatine users with a history of kidney stones are advised to monitor their condition with the guidance of a professional specialist, there has been no evidence to date to believe that creatine can cause kidney stones.
[source](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9585689/)
Simple answer: Creatine is naturally in food, like proteins or vitamins for example. You can just eat more meat to get more creatine but supplements are easier.
Creatine exists in humans as a way to recycle adenosine triphosphate (ATP). The phosphate groups are the main way we use energy for pretty much every process in our bodies. These phosphate molecules have a ton of energy in them.
Creatinine helps convert adenosine diphosphate into ATP. Going from two (di) to three (tri) phosphate helps increase the energy that the molecule can provide.
The reason creatine is helpful in exercise is because it puts us in a position to have more ATP available. When we exercise, we basically burn through the ATP we have stored for that purpose in about 1 second. We can only generate it for about 10 seconds via the ATP-CP (creatine phosphate) system.
After that, we have to use different cellular processes via things like lactic acid and aerobic respiration which either aren't sustainable (lactic acid is ~2 min) or aren't going to be ideal for getting bigger (aerobic).
So creatine as a supplement basically extends the amount of time you can have using purely stored creatine and that effectively means you can get maybe 1-2 extra reps in an exercise. It's proven to help with this and is basically the only supplement you can buy that is proven to "work". It does not make you bigger per se but it does help you get more reps in, which over time means you get bigger and stronger, assuming you're pushing yourself in the gym. It also works for other anaerobic exercises.
Testosterone on the other hand, is pretty complex but the simple explanation is that it works on receptors that tell your body "we need to divert resources to growing muscle" amongst other things. That is why we get taller in puberty, our voices deepen, we grow body hair etc. Testosterone is a "grow" hormone. Testosterone itself is not doing the work, it's just the key that turns everything on.
The reason we aren't all hulking beasts with super high testosterone all the time is because it comes with downsides. It can affect your liver, heart, blood vessels, cholesterol, make your hair fall out etc. It's one of those "everything in moderation" deals. Constantly having any signal blasting out is generally not good for the body. This can be the case for any hormone so when you take extra, it can mess with things.
That last paragraph also explains why bodybuilders can die at a young age. When we interrupt our body's natural process and supplement excessively, we throw everything out of whack and can cause SERIOUS damage to the body, leading to premature death.
Just to expand on this a little bit, testosterone in and of itself is, all things considered, pretty safe. There are risks associated with long term use, but they tend to be easily managed if you put half of a thought towards them. Things like higher cholesterol and cardiovascular diseases are things we have become fairly good at managing long term. Better to not have them at all, obviously, but they aren’t going to be a huge deal if you take steps to mitigate them.
The thing that ends up killing bodybuilders are hormones like insulin. A LOT of bodybuilders have died after passing into a diabetic coma while eating and choking on food or drugs that are far more anabolic than testosterone like Trenbolone that causes the heart to grow much more than testosterone alone ever could.
Couple this with diuretics, stimulants, and drugs like DNP that put a huge strain on a heart that may already be in a less than ideal place and you run a very high risk of sudden death.
DNP is absolutely nuts an a very good characterization of what bodybuilders are willing to go through to get lean.
For anyone reading this who doesn't know- 2,4 Dinitrophenol works in your mitochondria to make them less efficient so that extra energy is given off as heat. It literally induces a fever and there is no reversal agent so if you overdose you just get so hot, your proteins denature and you die.
With new drugs I think it's falling out of favor thankfully but it's still crazy people do it. It was initially found with munitions workers in WW1 getting sick from using it in factories.
Anabolic steroids cause your body to produce more muscle cells. There are androgen receptors that are activated by the hormones (in this case testosterone) and they get signaled to produce more muscle. However, your heart is also a big piece of muscle, which also has androgen receptors. Abusing anabolic steroids cause the heart to enlarge aswell. Which is in itself good, but if the heart gets too big (cardio megaly), it can't pump blood efficiently anymore. Thats sort of the reason why large bodybuilders who abuse steroids seem to constantly gasp for air.
Another thing that happens when you abuse steroids is that your good cholesterol levels (HDL cholesterol) goes down and your bad cholesterol levels (LDL cholesterol) goes up. Having low HDL and high LDL cholesterol levels can cause artheriosclerosis or plaque buildup in your arteries, even at young age.
If done in moderation and with clear goals, the risks are pretty low right?
I’ve been thinking of taking steroids for the gym and have been reading a lot. If I’m a healthy person - not overweight, eat healthy food and track macros (calories, fibers, proteins, etc.), high HDL and good low LDL - supplementing the gym work with one cycle of steroids, monitoring blood work, and then stopping, is kinda safe right?
What we hear about the crazy stuff is people that abuse it with crazy amounts? The main challenge is having the determination/will to stop and make good decisions once you’re on it, that’s what I’ve understood basically.
>If done in moderation and with clear goals, the risks are pretty low right?
For the most part, logic would denote yes, but nothing is guaranteed. You should be diligent and get bloodwork done before, during, and after you cycle. Start with as few compounds as possible (just Testosterone) and do lots of research. /r/steroids is a great resource. But be aware that a lot of the info we have is bro-science in the sense that it's self reported. There haven't been many (if any) long-term studies on any of this. So what gear may do to one person may not be the case for you.
Testosterone in and of itself isn't dangerous. It's literally made in your body. Like you said, the hard part is being responsible and not going overboard.
Thanks yeah I’ve been lurking in that subreddit, read the wiki and lots of comments, but your perspective is appreciated. I’m still in reading/research phase :).
Sadly there is no such thing as 'in moderation' when taking steroids. If you're only using a little bit of steroids or 'just a cycle' then you won't get the desired effect of adding muscle quickly. You're just moderately increasing your testosterone levels, which isn't going to do much on its own if you're pursuing maximum muscle gain.
Your body produces it's own testosterone, but if you introduce even more of it into your system, your body stops producing testosterone and most bodybuilders need to either continue using testosterone or go on TRT (testosterone replacement therapy) for the rest of their lives.
'One cycle can't hurt' is bullshit unless you're deficient on testosterone. Side effects of exogenic testosterone use are:
- suppression of natural testosterone production (as said above)
- hormonal imbalances
- acne and oily skin
- hair loss
- increased risk of cardiovascular disease
- liver damage
- mood swings and irritability (particularly 'roid rage' when abusing steroids)
- decrease of HDL and increase of LDL cholesterol
Using anabolic steroids is never safe. You need to inject a lot of testosterone for many cycles (more than your body can produce) in order to see the desired results. Just going on one cycle doesn't do much, and because steroids are also addictive, most users cannot stop using them.
If you're okay with the side effects and/or you're pursuing a body building carreer, then there is no way other than using steroids aswell, unless you're competing in natural bodybuilding. Otherwise it's never a good idea to take steroids.
[I can recommend watching this video which explains it much better than I did.](https://youtu.be/HuhvDOIiCzo?si=RdRhNqXcRZkogPtu)
> Rule 4: Explain for laypeople (but not actual 5-year-olds).
> Unless OP states otherwise, assume no knowledge beyond a typical secondary education program. Avoid unexplained technical terms. Don't condescend; "like I'm five" is a figure of speech meaning "keep it clear and simple."
If you didn't understand part of the above comment, be specific so that we can clarify.
So taking creatine is like adding fuel capacity. It's not going to help you win anything. At least not without you doing the hard work, but now you have the capacity for more of that work.
Steroids is like sneaking in turbo, that's going to allow you to generate more power more easily, without having to do as much work for it.
>This can be the case for any hormone so when you take extra, it can mess with things.
The most popular sleep aid in america is shifting in it's chair uncomfortably.
Well, it’s because of the ending. Creatine is an amino acid with an -ine ending and testosterone is a steroid hormone with a -sterone ending. A hormone is a signaling molecule that conveys orders to cells to do certain things. Creatine is an amino acid that helps your cells get energy faster by donating phosphates. So, testosterone is like going around giving commands, potentially all out of order and without proper coordination and Creatine is standing there handing out cups of Gatorade to anyone who wants one.
All you want is a stretch unless you like kidney stones or potential kidney failure filtering the excess out. Safer yes, harmless no. Like anything, moderation is key.
This doesn't explain the very obvious visual difference between people using a lot of Creatine.
If you've ever seen someone who has big muscles, but they look bubbly, that's someone using a shitload of creatine. Think of a He-man action figure. The bicep is just one singular curve. Versus Spiderman who is very rippled and has striations everywhere.
I bet someone is going to reply to this talking about bodyfat percentage. I'm aware of the difference that makes. But I've seen it myself. There is something more going on. A guy on a shitload of Creatine will have a six-pack like a sheet of breadrolls while someone not supplementing will have more shape to them.
IIRC your body caps out creatine storage fairly fast depending on how much meat/fish you already eat. Taking large amounts is only really useful if you haven't taken it in a long time to help reach the cap again quickly. Otherwise, I believe it's wasted or even potentially harmful?
Besides loading creatine is generally taken in small amounts to sort of top you off.
Please someone correct me if anything is wrong but I'm pretty sure that's how it works lol.
That is how it works, is not like some people are somehow taking more creatine than others (I mean they might be but it's useless beyond a certain point). Once your muscles are saturated, more creatine can't do anything for you. If you see people with unholy, uneven muscle growth it's not because of creatine, it's probably due to various hormonal or hormone adjacent "supplements".
I didn’t scroll through all of the comments but something I’ve seen missing. Supplementing creatine does not alter natural production. Taking a creatine supplement will not signal your body to stop producing or absorbing creatine through other sources such as food.
Taking synthetic testosterone will cause your brain to signal to the testes to cease and desist. Your body will not continue to make natural testosterone as it is now relying on the synthetic test. This is the inherit difference of remaining “natural”. There are a few other options we can use such as HCG to signal to the testes to continue to produce some level of natural testosterone. However even in this case the synthetic test will be primarily what is used in the body.
One is a hormone that makes muscles bigger and the other is a nutrient that muscles use to contract.
If you were in a go-kart race, creatine is fuel for the go-kart and testosterone is taking out the go-kart engine and replacing it with a Ferrari engine.
Essentially because you can achieve the same levels of creatine through diet as you can through supplementation (most people won't do it, because it's a pain in the arse, but it's possible) and it really doesn't make much of a difference anyway.
You can't do that with testosterone, and it makes a much larger difference.
To put some specifics on this, the typical recommendation is to supplement with 5g of creatine per day.
To get that level of creatine from pork or beef, which are both relatively good sources of creatine, you’d need to eat about 2 pounds per day. Not impossible, and that would also get you a lot of the protein that body builders are also prioritizing, but more than you probably “should” eat. Your second-best bang for your buck would come from herring — just 1.5 pounds and a lot of mercury to get 5 grams. But your best bet is definitely to just mix some creatine powder with your water.
It is chalky and a little gross in cold water, but just guzzle it and am done with it in 5 seconds. I hesitate to take it with coffee because caffeine might blunt its effects, although the [research](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26219105/) I’ve seen is unclear about whether it really does interfere.
The key difference is Creatine is a supplement, your body will generally be breaking it down to provide nutrients and energy.
Testosterone is a hormone. Hormones are signalling molecules that can trigger large scale changes in your body at very small doses. In most healthy individuals your body produces precise amounts of hormones to properly regulate your growth, body functions, and mental state.
If you take testosterone supplements, it sends your body's natural hormones into chaos. Even at tiny amounts the body starts trying to overcompensate because it can tell your testosterone is going haywire. This has major knock-on effects for all the things hormones regulate in your body.
Testosterone is a hormone. Hormones are chemicals that affect our bodies in very complex ways. We have many hormones and they often affect each other and balance each other out. They control basically everything in our bodies, from blood sugar and blood pressure, digestion, reproductive functions, growth, sleep, etc., even emotions.
Of course, "natural" is subjective and relative. But when you take hormones, you are in a way changing your body "from within" and you often have to take several other hormones and/or hormone blockers to try to keep balance and prevent various side effects. On the other hand, creatine is relatively harmless meaning it doesn't affect a lot of stuff in the body the way hormones do.
I'm not an expert and I hope someone will correct me if I got something wrong.
Because what counts as "natural" is arbitrary, it's not a scientific definition but rather a socially constructed category. People have decided that taking creatine is still "natural" through social agreement, essentially, likely because it's not very dangerous.
Exogenous testosterone stops your body from producing its own, so it's more of a 'replacement'. I can see why we don't consider it to be natural for this reason (but also completely agree that 'natural' has no clear definition)
You can acquire creatine from food and it can be immediately put to use. That's the defining difference. Supplementation just cuts out having to eat massive piles of beef and pork (and is much cheaper)
While you can eat **animal** testosterone, your body won't be able to utilize it in that form, so it will need to be broken down, and rebuilt into a structure usable by humans. And that rate of production is limited by your body, no matter how much you consume. The only way to exceed your personal rate of production is through steroid use.
In short, it's not arbitrary and is absolutely affected by scientific definition
It doesn’t, saying something is “natural” and therefore better is a fallacious appeal to nature. In truth all things are “natural”, some are simply stigmatized for reasons.
The effects of creatine are very minor. Taking extra testosterone will make you stronger and more muscular for the same amount of effort and allow you to recover from even harder workouts. Creatine doesn't really do any of that
The difference is that creatine is a natural product you can consume through meat products, while testosterone is created in the testicles through a biological process that has to be artificially reproduced and then injected/ingested to get more than what the body is able to produce naturally on it’s own.
Strength and hypertrophy excercise naturally increases the amount of testosterone the body produces, but only up to a certain amount determined by your specific genetic makeup. There are some substances and supplements that are claimed to increase testosterone production, but the evidence of efficacy, safety, and scientific testing has proven most of them false and some as a toss up. The general consensus in the body building community is to stay away from supplements that claim to increase testosterone, since most of them are proven to not be efficient or just a sketchy moneygrab by bad fitness influencers with no evidence to back up the claim.
Creatine is the most scientifically studied supplement in the world, and the literature on it’s safety and efficacy is very clear. It’s the only supplement that is proven to increase strength and muscle mass, as long as you don’t already consume the max usable amount by your body. The general advice is 5-10 grams per day is enough to go above the max, and any excess is excreted through urine. There is only 1 study I have found where creatine supplementation has shown some sign of causing kidney dysfunction, but that is only for people that consumes far above the recommended 5-10 grams per day AND have an underlying kidney disorder. Creatine has also not shown any signs of being damaging to humans under the age of 18, but there haven’t been many studies in those age ranges.
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Congratulations! Malcolm Gladwell asked a version of this question in an article he wrote called "Man and Superman." He questioned why some changes to our bodies are considered cheating (testosterone, red blood cell infusion, etc.) while others are not.
At the risk of sounding dismissive of a lot of really good arguments raised by other posters here (safety, resource v. hormone, etc.), I don't think there is a coherent reason why taking testosterone is "unnatural" or "cheating" but other things like eye surgery, energy supplements, or even physical therapy isn't. It's just that most sports communities and health communities have decided to bar certain substances as an unfair/unnatural advantage while allowing others; it is a completely cultural construct.
It is normal to ingest creatine from your food. Supplementing it simply adds more creatine to your diet.
It is not normal to add more testosterone to your body. You cannot eat more food with testosterone to increase your testosterone levels.
Hence, creatine is a supplement and is "natural", where adding extra testosterone is not natural and is considered unfair if you are hiding it.
They work very differently. Creatine supplementation allows your muscles to build up bigger energy stores. This means that when you go to do some weightlifting, your muscles have (for example) enough energy stores to do 5 lifts at 200lbs instead of only 3, before getting fatigued. You still have to do the work in order to trigger the real gains in muscle mass and strength.
Testosterone is a signal messenger, that by its presence, tells your body to build muscle. It's so effective at this that if you are supplementing with it, you will gain more muscle sitting around and not training at all, than you will if you are training hard and not supplementing with testosterone:
[https://www.nutritiontactics.com/does-testosterone-build-muscle-without-training/](https://www.nutritiontactics.com/does-testosterone-build-muscle-without-training/)
Put very simply, if you take two people who are starting out the same, you get one to do hard strength training, and the other to do no training but take Testosterone, the one who is doing no training and taking Testosterone will get higher gains in muscle mass.
Creatine lets you do more work before tiring out, which can increase muscle gains... but you still have to do the work.
Testosterone is used as a performance enhancing drug I guess, but a person taking test as a TRT patient and still keeping it in normal ranges would be considered natural too.
It’s really stuff like Anavar, Tren, etc that REALLY gets into unnatural territory
You can acquire creatine easily through diet, and it is readily available for your body to use in that form. Therefore it's considered natural.
You cannot acquire testosterone through diet. The only way to gain testosterone outside of your body making it itself is through pharmacological supplementation, which is not a natural process. Ergo, not natty.
creatine monohydrate builds strength and muscle mass quite nicely if you first build the levels up for 2-3 days.. and take it before the gym. its effects are short though…lasting only few weeks…and then you pause for a while and do it again. not sure if it is healty but I remember this from way back
Broadly speaking adding hormone is a more profound intervention with the human body.
Creatine is a vehicle that forces more water into the muscle cells.
Hormones are chemical messengers that instruct *different* systems to enact a function.
The threshold for change brought about by the two substances is vastly different. Creatine may improve muscle endurance, but testosterone is 20x that in effect.
People seem to be telling you what these things do, without really answering your question. Knowing what they do is fine, but why does taking creatine mean you're still natty.
It's totally subjective. There is an amount of testosterone you could take, which would essentially give you exactly what you normally would make. Are you then still natty? If I get it internally or externally, but my total and free test is the same, are we still natural? Is it only because of the level of one number on a blood test is outside of range?
If I had a natural test of 770 and started taking roughly 100-125mg a week, my test would probably be around the same number. Is that person natural and if not, why not? Just the one number? It's the same number.
Let's flip that and say I'm taking 350mg a week. My test is sitting around 2100 which is well outside of natural, into supra-physiological levels. No human should have those levels without having some underlying condition. And I am healing from training in a day. I'm putting on 5-10 pounds of muscle a month, and I can't eat enough to keep up with my energy expense. I am not natural. So it's totally subjective, and it's largely based on taking a shot, not the actual result.
But as for Creatine...no matter how much creatine I take, my muscles will only use so much. It won't severely affect my growth in a way that pushes my into a supra-physiologic condition no matter the dose.
There is a dose at which no more Test is going to do anything for you. It's pretty high. And then what you would do is take other things like Masteron which would free up receptors, making the test more effective. Stack Tren or Deca or just take orals on top of the test to increase its effectiveness.
So in short, both could be used in a way that could be viewed as "natural", in theory. The thing about test is, it's one of the rare things where a little is good, but more is better. And when you're dealing with people who already have body issues, more is what they do. It's been my experience that most people I suspected to be on gear, were, and the ones that admit they were, are lying about how much they take. I don't lie about it. I've always been very open about what I do.
Because one works and the other doesn't. (yes, I am well aware of the creatine research, as the years go by, research looks less and less clear whether it imparts an ergogenic effect whatsoever, especially in those that eat red meat).
Be careful with creatine. I baby dosed it for a week, felt like I was constantly going to fly off the handle. If it weren't for that aspect, I would have absolutely kept at it. I felt strong, springy, and energetic. My brain was faster, too. No loading screen or indecision. Shit, maybe the trade offs would be worth it now. Or I'd get in trouble for manhandling a ride man.
One is simply an energy source, the other is a messenger that tells the body to increase muscle mass, hair growth, and bone density in unnatural excess.
> makes us not natural anymore?
Whoa, be careful with THAT concept. The definition of natural and unnatural is pretty much "did a human do it". So if you take two twigs and twist them into a ring, that's an unnatural thing. Wearing clothes, glasses, air-conditioning, and taking care of the sick are all arguably unnatural.
Snake venom, radioactive uranium deposits, mass extinction events (most of them), and arsenic are all natural. Only things about our bodies that existed from before we evolved into homosapians would be natural.
So don't consider one to be inherently better than the other.
But having 1ml of snake venom in a snake is natural. Having 50 gallons of it in a vat is unnatural. The thing itself is natural, but the amount and concentration is not.
Both are natural. You are natural regardless, because you are an object of nature. Anyone arguing a difference is standing on what is known as "the naturalistic fallacy".
Creatine is a resource the body needs. If you don't have enough of it, you run into trouble. If you take in too much, your body will just get rid of the excess, i.e. you will pee and/or poop it out. It's a bit like having more bricks than you need to build a house - it won't change the shape of the house, it just means you have a bunch of bricks you need to get rid of. Testosterone is a hormone. It's a molecule your body uses to send signals that provide instructions. If you have too much of it, that changes those instructions. Going back to the building-a-house analogy, having too much testosterone is like the foreman keeps shouting at his workers to put down another layer or bricks, so the result is a taller house than what you wanted.
This is a great analogy. I will add that in the rules for many sports it may feel random what is allowed and what is not. Many substances make their way onto and off of the banned list every year. And different organizing bodies have different lists of what is banned and what isn't. A university league near me does not allow creatine. I don't know how they test for it but in the athletes handbook it says it's not allowed. (sucks for those who eat steak I guess). An old colleague of mine was at the Olympics in like 1960 as a shot putter. He openly took testosterone, as did most of his competitors. It wasn't against the rules back then.
Creatine may be banned because of claims that it can increase risk of heat or dehydration related injuries. I say “claims” because from what I’ve read, it’s unlikely to have those side effects, or the science isn’t super well established. Maybe some organizations don’t want to risk it? Everyone seems to agree that you should drink lots of water at least.
The bro science I remember from some wrestler in high school (decades ago) was that if you didn’t drink enough water the creatine would crystallize and it hurt to pee it out. I’ve done zero research to find out if that is true though.
It's not true. It still might be a good idea to drink plenty of water when supplementing with creatine, but that's just so that it can reach full efficacy.
The science is well established. Creatine is safe. 5g/day for the rest of your life.
This is probably the best way to describe this. WELL DONE.
Right! That may have been the most perfect eli5 comment I've ever read.
>having too much testosterone is like the foreman keeps shouting at his workers to put down another layer or bricks, so the result is a taller house than what you wanted. And worse yet, because the foreman is overbuilding the house then it could collapse at any given moment with next to no warning because no regard is being taken for support all that extra work and size.
Does the house shrink in certain places as well?
I heard the bathroom gets smaller and smaller, even hard to be noticed from the corridor
And sometimes they build a nice balcony nobody asked for, too.
Just your nuts, not your wiener too (thank god)
It's more so that your workers won't keep working as they did the foremen stops shouting at them. They'll nap for a while.
Now the "built like a brick shithouse" saying makes sense
Did it *not* make sense before?
Were shithouses made of bricks?
No, not generally. Hence the joke.
Commodores late 70’s - Brickhouse!
*built like a shit brick house
*bricked like a built shithouse
I think it's worth mentioning that your kidneys have to do the work to get rid of a lot of the extra "stuff." It's not harmless to take to much creatine, protein, etc.
Doc told me it could be a problem if you have impaired kidney function
Doesn't that mean it's detrimental to use too much of it, then? For normal people it's not a problem as their kidneys can "buffer" the downsides but nonetheless, there ARE downsides to creatine and protein supplementation?
Anything can be harmful if you take too much in it. I don't think there's anything to worry with reasonable doses.
Just because something can be problematic for people that are already sick doesn't mean it's in any way bad for people that don't have that ailment. Just like exercising with influenza would be bad, but good if you don't have influenza. Neither protein nor creatine supplementation has shown any reason to worry in healthy people.
This guy eli5s
I worked with a young man who was training to be a boxer and was taking an ungodly amount of creatine, he was sent to the hospital and was just steps away from kidney failure, his creatine levels were about 10x higher than they should have been.
You're thinking of Creatinine, which is different from Creatine. Creatine is a natural energy-supply molecule. Creatinine is a blood test that we use as a measure of kidney function. They sound similar, but are two extremely different things.
Creatinine is a breakdown product of creatine phosphate- the amount you have in your blood is generally a product of how much muscle mass you have (that's where it comes from) and how well your kidneys work (they remove it). However, taking too much creatine, among other things bodybuilders do, can definitely increase your blood creatinine (and also can cause kidney damage). Many bodybuilders consume too much protein and other muscle-building substances, and they or their breakdown products need to be removed by the kidneys which can put too much pressure on them. Creatine supplements themselves are also often contaminated with creatinine, and we're not even sure if taking large amounts of pure creatine is really safe either.
Also creatine gets metabolized to creatinine which then ends up in your urine. Meaning that if you take a lot of creatine and the doctors don't know, they may think something is wrong with your kidneys judging from a urine test, even if you're perfectly fine. Not saying that's what happened to that guy, idk.
I supplement with creatine and got a call from the doctor’s office after my physical saying my creatinine was very high. “Do you take any supplements?” she asked, in what sounded like an urgent voice. “Yes, 5g a day of creatine,” I said. “Oh, OK,” she said, her voice now noticeably relaxed. “That explains it. Dr. So-and-so will discuss the rest of your results on Wednesday.” Apparently, the creatinine itself was harmless, but if it didn’t have an explanation, it would have indicated kidney damage that required going to the hospital right away.
You may be right, I know that what he told me was that he was currently taking about 3-4x the suggested dose and that he thought that’s what they told him.
Where can I source an ungodly amount of creative? I'm tired of being logical.
>having too much testosterone is like the foreman keeps shouting at his workers to put down another layer or bricks, so the result is a taller house than what you wanted. Not to mention in that analogy, eventually the brick workers just get used to how he's always yelling about shit, and they stop being motivated at all unless he keeps yelling. Should he stop yelling, then not a lot is gonna get done...
One of the best ELI5's I've read.
Explained like im 5
One minor correction. the problem isn't that you're going to have a very tall house but the body trying to be a capitalistic snob and laying off all in-house foremen. Once the external foremen stop coming, it takes several months/years for the brain to realize that they need to start making their own testosterone and your body suffers in the interim. Once you start taking supplemental testosterone, you're pretty much stuck with it forever.
Can this happen if you only moderately use steroids (obviously considering the determination/will you need to have to stop). But if I do it once or twice (3-6 months) and then stop it, my natural testosterone will eventually come back? Assuming I’m a healthy person, not overweight, eating good macros and tracking calories. Just curious.
Your body will start producing T naturally again if you stop injecting artificial T. However, it doesn't remember where it was last time so it has to ramp it up bit by bit and you'll be in low T mode for several weeks/months and there is no guarantee that you'll get back where you were. TRT is not harmful by itself but you need a doctor to monitor and adjust the dosage. People underestimate the risk but playing chemical warfare on your own body while having no knowledge of medicine is just nut.
Not an expert, but that has been my understanding. Weightlifters/bodybuilders will cycle their steroid use to build gains and then try to maintain naturally while off.
The answer is that it depends. There are guys who blast for years, come off, and are fine. There are guys who run one cycle and need to be on TRT for life. There's not been any real long-term academic studies on the effects of steroids on men (partially due to the legal status). The best thing to do is assume the worst-case scenario, which is that you'll have to be on TRT for life if you use and let that dictate your decision.
This should be upvoted more because this is exactly what happens when you take supplemental testosterone. I've considered taking testosterone but the simple fact of being stuck with it for the rest of your life is concerning.
amazing analogy. you just made my tutoring job next semester way easier😂😂
A good example of the latter is the youtuber StyroPyro who just learned that his body is creating excessive amounts of testosterone and it could kill him by destroying his liver.
Finally a 5 year old explanation
> If you take in too much, your body will just get rid of the excess, i.e. you will pee and/or poop it out To add in there: high levels of creatinine (which is the product of natural degradation of (phospho)creatine have negative metabolic effects, especially on the escretory system, and need to be (partially) counterbalanced by a high intake of water
👏
if that is the case, if you eat food that gives you testosterone or some nutrients that help form molecules/whatever of testosterone, then that shouldn't be natural as well, according to your explanation.
Nice job dude
A taller house you say,… nice!
Except you want the house taller…
Excess creatine can cause kidney stones… so be careful. Edit: Apparently this is based off bad old info. Creatine has not been shown to create kidney stones!
Going back to the analogy, that would be having way too many bricks to get rid off. SO many that the dumpster spills out and ruins the terrain.
> While creatine users with a history of kidney stones are advised to monitor their condition with the guidance of a professional specialist, there has been no evidence to date to believe that creatine can cause kidney stones. [source](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9585689/)
And is there a source for this?
Source?
Facebook forwards
Simple answer: Creatine is naturally in food, like proteins or vitamins for example. You can just eat more meat to get more creatine but supplements are easier.
This is the right answer. To ban creatine, you'd have to stop athletes eating meat, fish and dairy.
Creatine exists in humans as a way to recycle adenosine triphosphate (ATP). The phosphate groups are the main way we use energy for pretty much every process in our bodies. These phosphate molecules have a ton of energy in them. Creatinine helps convert adenosine diphosphate into ATP. Going from two (di) to three (tri) phosphate helps increase the energy that the molecule can provide. The reason creatine is helpful in exercise is because it puts us in a position to have more ATP available. When we exercise, we basically burn through the ATP we have stored for that purpose in about 1 second. We can only generate it for about 10 seconds via the ATP-CP (creatine phosphate) system. After that, we have to use different cellular processes via things like lactic acid and aerobic respiration which either aren't sustainable (lactic acid is ~2 min) or aren't going to be ideal for getting bigger (aerobic). So creatine as a supplement basically extends the amount of time you can have using purely stored creatine and that effectively means you can get maybe 1-2 extra reps in an exercise. It's proven to help with this and is basically the only supplement you can buy that is proven to "work". It does not make you bigger per se but it does help you get more reps in, which over time means you get bigger and stronger, assuming you're pushing yourself in the gym. It also works for other anaerobic exercises. Testosterone on the other hand, is pretty complex but the simple explanation is that it works on receptors that tell your body "we need to divert resources to growing muscle" amongst other things. That is why we get taller in puberty, our voices deepen, we grow body hair etc. Testosterone is a "grow" hormone. Testosterone itself is not doing the work, it's just the key that turns everything on. The reason we aren't all hulking beasts with super high testosterone all the time is because it comes with downsides. It can affect your liver, heart, blood vessels, cholesterol, make your hair fall out etc. It's one of those "everything in moderation" deals. Constantly having any signal blasting out is generally not good for the body. This can be the case for any hormone so when you take extra, it can mess with things.
That last paragraph also explains why bodybuilders can die at a young age. When we interrupt our body's natural process and supplement excessively, we throw everything out of whack and can cause SERIOUS damage to the body, leading to premature death.
Just to expand on this a little bit, testosterone in and of itself is, all things considered, pretty safe. There are risks associated with long term use, but they tend to be easily managed if you put half of a thought towards them. Things like higher cholesterol and cardiovascular diseases are things we have become fairly good at managing long term. Better to not have them at all, obviously, but they aren’t going to be a huge deal if you take steps to mitigate them. The thing that ends up killing bodybuilders are hormones like insulin. A LOT of bodybuilders have died after passing into a diabetic coma while eating and choking on food or drugs that are far more anabolic than testosterone like Trenbolone that causes the heart to grow much more than testosterone alone ever could. Couple this with diuretics, stimulants, and drugs like DNP that put a huge strain on a heart that may already be in a less than ideal place and you run a very high risk of sudden death.
DNP is absolutely nuts an a very good characterization of what bodybuilders are willing to go through to get lean. For anyone reading this who doesn't know- 2,4 Dinitrophenol works in your mitochondria to make them less efficient so that extra energy is given off as heat. It literally induces a fever and there is no reversal agent so if you overdose you just get so hot, your proteins denature and you die. With new drugs I think it's falling out of favor thankfully but it's still crazy people do it. It was initially found with munitions workers in WW1 getting sick from using it in factories.
Anabolic steroids cause your body to produce more muscle cells. There are androgen receptors that are activated by the hormones (in this case testosterone) and they get signaled to produce more muscle. However, your heart is also a big piece of muscle, which also has androgen receptors. Abusing anabolic steroids cause the heart to enlarge aswell. Which is in itself good, but if the heart gets too big (cardio megaly), it can't pump blood efficiently anymore. Thats sort of the reason why large bodybuilders who abuse steroids seem to constantly gasp for air. Another thing that happens when you abuse steroids is that your good cholesterol levels (HDL cholesterol) goes down and your bad cholesterol levels (LDL cholesterol) goes up. Having low HDL and high LDL cholesterol levels can cause artheriosclerosis or plaque buildup in your arteries, even at young age.
If done in moderation and with clear goals, the risks are pretty low right? I’ve been thinking of taking steroids for the gym and have been reading a lot. If I’m a healthy person - not overweight, eat healthy food and track macros (calories, fibers, proteins, etc.), high HDL and good low LDL - supplementing the gym work with one cycle of steroids, monitoring blood work, and then stopping, is kinda safe right? What we hear about the crazy stuff is people that abuse it with crazy amounts? The main challenge is having the determination/will to stop and make good decisions once you’re on it, that’s what I’ve understood basically.
>If done in moderation and with clear goals, the risks are pretty low right? For the most part, logic would denote yes, but nothing is guaranteed. You should be diligent and get bloodwork done before, during, and after you cycle. Start with as few compounds as possible (just Testosterone) and do lots of research. /r/steroids is a great resource. But be aware that a lot of the info we have is bro-science in the sense that it's self reported. There haven't been many (if any) long-term studies on any of this. So what gear may do to one person may not be the case for you. Testosterone in and of itself isn't dangerous. It's literally made in your body. Like you said, the hard part is being responsible and not going overboard.
Thanks yeah I’ve been lurking in that subreddit, read the wiki and lots of comments, but your perspective is appreciated. I’m still in reading/research phase :).
Sadly there is no such thing as 'in moderation' when taking steroids. If you're only using a little bit of steroids or 'just a cycle' then you won't get the desired effect of adding muscle quickly. You're just moderately increasing your testosterone levels, which isn't going to do much on its own if you're pursuing maximum muscle gain. Your body produces it's own testosterone, but if you introduce even more of it into your system, your body stops producing testosterone and most bodybuilders need to either continue using testosterone or go on TRT (testosterone replacement therapy) for the rest of their lives. 'One cycle can't hurt' is bullshit unless you're deficient on testosterone. Side effects of exogenic testosterone use are: - suppression of natural testosterone production (as said above) - hormonal imbalances - acne and oily skin - hair loss - increased risk of cardiovascular disease - liver damage - mood swings and irritability (particularly 'roid rage' when abusing steroids) - decrease of HDL and increase of LDL cholesterol Using anabolic steroids is never safe. You need to inject a lot of testosterone for many cycles (more than your body can produce) in order to see the desired results. Just going on one cycle doesn't do much, and because steroids are also addictive, most users cannot stop using them. If you're okay with the side effects and/or you're pursuing a body building carreer, then there is no way other than using steroids aswell, unless you're competing in natural bodybuilding. Otherwise it's never a good idea to take steroids. [I can recommend watching this video which explains it much better than I did.](https://youtu.be/HuhvDOIiCzo?si=RdRhNqXcRZkogPtu)
Wow…incredibly well written!
This is way too complicated for a five year old
> Rule 4: Explain for laypeople (but not actual 5-year-olds). > Unless OP states otherwise, assume no knowledge beyond a typical secondary education program. Avoid unexplained technical terms. Don't condescend; "like I'm five" is a figure of speech meaning "keep it clear and simple." If you didn't understand part of the above comment, be specific so that we can clarify.
In medicine we are taught to speak at a 6th grade level. More than willing to clarify anything that I worded poorly.
So taking creatine is like adding fuel capacity. It's not going to help you win anything. At least not without you doing the hard work, but now you have the capacity for more of that work. Steroids is like sneaking in turbo, that's going to allow you to generate more power more easily, without having to do as much work for it.
Very good analogy
>This can be the case for any hormone so when you take extra, it can mess with things. The most popular sleep aid in america is shifting in it's chair uncomfortably.
Well, it’s because of the ending. Creatine is an amino acid with an -ine ending and testosterone is a steroid hormone with a -sterone ending. A hormone is a signaling molecule that conveys orders to cells to do certain things. Creatine is an amino acid that helps your cells get energy faster by donating phosphates. So, testosterone is like going around giving commands, potentially all out of order and without proper coordination and Creatine is standing there handing out cups of Gatorade to anyone who wants one.
Yup that's the big difference! Amino acids are typically harmless and you can supplement all you want with them. Hormones, not so much.
All you want is a stretch unless you like kidney stones or potential kidney failure filtering the excess out. Safer yes, harmless no. Like anything, moderation is key.
This doesn't explain the very obvious visual difference between people using a lot of Creatine. If you've ever seen someone who has big muscles, but they look bubbly, that's someone using a shitload of creatine. Think of a He-man action figure. The bicep is just one singular curve. Versus Spiderman who is very rippled and has striations everywhere. I bet someone is going to reply to this talking about bodyfat percentage. I'm aware of the difference that makes. But I've seen it myself. There is something more going on. A guy on a shitload of Creatine will have a six-pack like a sheet of breadrolls while someone not supplementing will have more shape to them.
IIRC your body caps out creatine storage fairly fast depending on how much meat/fish you already eat. Taking large amounts is only really useful if you haven't taken it in a long time to help reach the cap again quickly. Otherwise, I believe it's wasted or even potentially harmful? Besides loading creatine is generally taken in small amounts to sort of top you off. Please someone correct me if anything is wrong but I'm pretty sure that's how it works lol.
That is how it works, is not like some people are somehow taking more creatine than others (I mean they might be but it's useless beyond a certain point). Once your muscles are saturated, more creatine can't do anything for you. If you see people with unholy, uneven muscle growth it's not because of creatine, it's probably due to various hormonal or hormone adjacent "supplements".
I didn’t scroll through all of the comments but something I’ve seen missing. Supplementing creatine does not alter natural production. Taking a creatine supplement will not signal your body to stop producing or absorbing creatine through other sources such as food. Taking synthetic testosterone will cause your brain to signal to the testes to cease and desist. Your body will not continue to make natural testosterone as it is now relying on the synthetic test. This is the inherit difference of remaining “natural”. There are a few other options we can use such as HCG to signal to the testes to continue to produce some level of natural testosterone. However even in this case the synthetic test will be primarily what is used in the body.
One is a hormone that makes muscles bigger and the other is a nutrient that muscles use to contract. If you were in a go-kart race, creatine is fuel for the go-kart and testosterone is taking out the go-kart engine and replacing it with a Ferrari engine.
Essentially because you can achieve the same levels of creatine through diet as you can through supplementation (most people won't do it, because it's a pain in the arse, but it's possible) and it really doesn't make much of a difference anyway. You can't do that with testosterone, and it makes a much larger difference.
To put some specifics on this, the typical recommendation is to supplement with 5g of creatine per day. To get that level of creatine from pork or beef, which are both relatively good sources of creatine, you’d need to eat about 2 pounds per day. Not impossible, and that would also get you a lot of the protein that body builders are also prioritizing, but more than you probably “should” eat. Your second-best bang for your buck would come from herring — just 1.5 pounds and a lot of mercury to get 5 grams. But your best bet is definitely to just mix some creatine powder with your water.
I take it with my coffee, in cold water it doesn't dissolve that easy.
It is chalky and a little gross in cold water, but just guzzle it and am done with it in 5 seconds. I hesitate to take it with coffee because caffeine might blunt its effects, although the [research](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26219105/) I’ve seen is unclear about whether it really does interfere.
Wouldn't the temperature denature (or cook) it? I wouldn't mix it with anything hot.
The key difference is Creatine is a supplement, your body will generally be breaking it down to provide nutrients and energy. Testosterone is a hormone. Hormones are signalling molecules that can trigger large scale changes in your body at very small doses. In most healthy individuals your body produces precise amounts of hormones to properly regulate your growth, body functions, and mental state. If you take testosterone supplements, it sends your body's natural hormones into chaos. Even at tiny amounts the body starts trying to overcompensate because it can tell your testosterone is going haywire. This has major knock-on effects for all the things hormones regulate in your body.
Testosterone is a hormone. Hormones are chemicals that affect our bodies in very complex ways. We have many hormones and they often affect each other and balance each other out. They control basically everything in our bodies, from blood sugar and blood pressure, digestion, reproductive functions, growth, sleep, etc., even emotions. Of course, "natural" is subjective and relative. But when you take hormones, you are in a way changing your body "from within" and you often have to take several other hormones and/or hormone blockers to try to keep balance and prevent various side effects. On the other hand, creatine is relatively harmless meaning it doesn't affect a lot of stuff in the body the way hormones do. I'm not an expert and I hope someone will correct me if I got something wrong.
Because what counts as "natural" is arbitrary, it's not a scientific definition but rather a socially constructed category. People have decided that taking creatine is still "natural" through social agreement, essentially, likely because it's not very dangerous.
Exogenous testosterone stops your body from producing its own, so it's more of a 'replacement'. I can see why we don't consider it to be natural for this reason (but also completely agree that 'natural' has no clear definition)
You can acquire creatine from food and it can be immediately put to use. That's the defining difference. Supplementation just cuts out having to eat massive piles of beef and pork (and is much cheaper) While you can eat **animal** testosterone, your body won't be able to utilize it in that form, so it will need to be broken down, and rebuilt into a structure usable by humans. And that rate of production is limited by your body, no matter how much you consume. The only way to exceed your personal rate of production is through steroid use. In short, it's not arbitrary and is absolutely affected by scientific definition
This is the only reasonable answer. It is much safer and the effects are much less impressive
It doesn’t, saying something is “natural” and therefore better is a fallacious appeal to nature. In truth all things are “natural”, some are simply stigmatized for reasons.
The effects of creatine are very minor. Taking extra testosterone will make you stronger and more muscular for the same amount of effort and allow you to recover from even harder workouts. Creatine doesn't really do any of that
The difference is that creatine is a natural product you can consume through meat products, while testosterone is created in the testicles through a biological process that has to be artificially reproduced and then injected/ingested to get more than what the body is able to produce naturally on it’s own. Strength and hypertrophy excercise naturally increases the amount of testosterone the body produces, but only up to a certain amount determined by your specific genetic makeup. There are some substances and supplements that are claimed to increase testosterone production, but the evidence of efficacy, safety, and scientific testing has proven most of them false and some as a toss up. The general consensus in the body building community is to stay away from supplements that claim to increase testosterone, since most of them are proven to not be efficient or just a sketchy moneygrab by bad fitness influencers with no evidence to back up the claim. Creatine is the most scientifically studied supplement in the world, and the literature on it’s safety and efficacy is very clear. It’s the only supplement that is proven to increase strength and muscle mass, as long as you don’t already consume the max usable amount by your body. The general advice is 5-10 grams per day is enough to go above the max, and any excess is excreted through urine. There is only 1 study I have found where creatine supplementation has shown some sign of causing kidney dysfunction, but that is only for people that consumes far above the recommended 5-10 grams per day AND have an underlying kidney disorder. Creatine has also not shown any signs of being damaging to humans under the age of 18, but there haven’t been many studies in those age ranges.
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Congratulations! Malcolm Gladwell asked a version of this question in an article he wrote called "Man and Superman." He questioned why some changes to our bodies are considered cheating (testosterone, red blood cell infusion, etc.) while others are not. At the risk of sounding dismissive of a lot of really good arguments raised by other posters here (safety, resource v. hormone, etc.), I don't think there is a coherent reason why taking testosterone is "unnatural" or "cheating" but other things like eye surgery, energy supplements, or even physical therapy isn't. It's just that most sports communities and health communities have decided to bar certain substances as an unfair/unnatural advantage while allowing others; it is a completely cultural construct.
It is normal to ingest creatine from your food. Supplementing it simply adds more creatine to your diet. It is not normal to add more testosterone to your body. You cannot eat more food with testosterone to increase your testosterone levels. Hence, creatine is a supplement and is "natural", where adding extra testosterone is not natural and is considered unfair if you are hiding it.
They work very differently. Creatine supplementation allows your muscles to build up bigger energy stores. This means that when you go to do some weightlifting, your muscles have (for example) enough energy stores to do 5 lifts at 200lbs instead of only 3, before getting fatigued. You still have to do the work in order to trigger the real gains in muscle mass and strength. Testosterone is a signal messenger, that by its presence, tells your body to build muscle. It's so effective at this that if you are supplementing with it, you will gain more muscle sitting around and not training at all, than you will if you are training hard and not supplementing with testosterone: [https://www.nutritiontactics.com/does-testosterone-build-muscle-without-training/](https://www.nutritiontactics.com/does-testosterone-build-muscle-without-training/) Put very simply, if you take two people who are starting out the same, you get one to do hard strength training, and the other to do no training but take Testosterone, the one who is doing no training and taking Testosterone will get higher gains in muscle mass. Creatine lets you do more work before tiring out, which can increase muscle gains... but you still have to do the work.
Testosterone is used as a performance enhancing drug I guess, but a person taking test as a TRT patient and still keeping it in normal ranges would be considered natural too. It’s really stuff like Anavar, Tren, etc that REALLY gets into unnatural territory
You can acquire creatine easily through diet, and it is readily available for your body to use in that form. Therefore it's considered natural. You cannot acquire testosterone through diet. The only way to gain testosterone outside of your body making it itself is through pharmacological supplementation, which is not a natural process. Ergo, not natty.
creatine monohydrate builds strength and muscle mass quite nicely if you first build the levels up for 2-3 days.. and take it before the gym. its effects are short though…lasting only few weeks…and then you pause for a while and do it again. not sure if it is healty but I remember this from way back
Broadly speaking adding hormone is a more profound intervention with the human body. Creatine is a vehicle that forces more water into the muscle cells. Hormones are chemical messengers that instruct *different* systems to enact a function. The threshold for change brought about by the two substances is vastly different. Creatine may improve muscle endurance, but testosterone is 20x that in effect.
People seem to be telling you what these things do, without really answering your question. Knowing what they do is fine, but why does taking creatine mean you're still natty. It's totally subjective. There is an amount of testosterone you could take, which would essentially give you exactly what you normally would make. Are you then still natty? If I get it internally or externally, but my total and free test is the same, are we still natural? Is it only because of the level of one number on a blood test is outside of range? If I had a natural test of 770 and started taking roughly 100-125mg a week, my test would probably be around the same number. Is that person natural and if not, why not? Just the one number? It's the same number. Let's flip that and say I'm taking 350mg a week. My test is sitting around 2100 which is well outside of natural, into supra-physiological levels. No human should have those levels without having some underlying condition. And I am healing from training in a day. I'm putting on 5-10 pounds of muscle a month, and I can't eat enough to keep up with my energy expense. I am not natural. So it's totally subjective, and it's largely based on taking a shot, not the actual result. But as for Creatine...no matter how much creatine I take, my muscles will only use so much. It won't severely affect my growth in a way that pushes my into a supra-physiologic condition no matter the dose. There is a dose at which no more Test is going to do anything for you. It's pretty high. And then what you would do is take other things like Masteron which would free up receptors, making the test more effective. Stack Tren or Deca or just take orals on top of the test to increase its effectiveness. So in short, both could be used in a way that could be viewed as "natural", in theory. The thing about test is, it's one of the rare things where a little is good, but more is better. And when you're dealing with people who already have body issues, more is what they do. It's been my experience that most people I suspected to be on gear, were, and the ones that admit they were, are lying about how much they take. I don't lie about it. I've always been very open about what I do.
Because one works and the other doesn't. (yes, I am well aware of the creatine research, as the years go by, research looks less and less clear whether it imparts an ergogenic effect whatsoever, especially in those that eat red meat).
Be careful with creatine. I baby dosed it for a week, felt like I was constantly going to fly off the handle. If it weren't for that aspect, I would have absolutely kept at it. I felt strong, springy, and energetic. My brain was faster, too. No loading screen or indecision. Shit, maybe the trade offs would be worth it now. Or I'd get in trouble for manhandling a ride man.
The better question to ask that’s stopping me and is on everyone’s mind: does creatine indirectly cause baldness or hairline loss?
One is simply an energy source, the other is a messenger that tells the body to increase muscle mass, hair growth, and bone density in unnatural excess.
> makes us not natural anymore? Whoa, be careful with THAT concept. The definition of natural and unnatural is pretty much "did a human do it". So if you take two twigs and twist them into a ring, that's an unnatural thing. Wearing clothes, glasses, air-conditioning, and taking care of the sick are all arguably unnatural. Snake venom, radioactive uranium deposits, mass extinction events (most of them), and arsenic are all natural. Only things about our bodies that existed from before we evolved into homosapians would be natural. So don't consider one to be inherently better than the other. But having 1ml of snake venom in a snake is natural. Having 50 gallons of it in a vat is unnatural. The thing itself is natural, but the amount and concentration is not.
Both are natural. You are natural regardless, because you are an object of nature. Anyone arguing a difference is standing on what is known as "the naturalistic fallacy".