Body Image

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Steroids and Their Affects On The Human Body


Drugs have been used in sports almost as long as sports themselves have
been around. The ancient Incas discovered that the ashes from burned leaves of
the Coca tree gave the people great stores of energy, and made sleep unnecessary
for hours or even days, it was later discovered to be the stimulant cocaine.
They would take it before long hunts, battles, and even found it useful in
ancient sport competitions. It wasn't until 1886 that the first drug-related
death in sports occurred. A bicyclist took a mixture of cocaine and heroine,
called the "speedball," and died from it. Little were the doctors aware the
epidemic that would follow in the next century.
Anabolic steroids, developed in the 1930's in Europe, are drugs that
help to build new body tissue quickly, but with drastic side effects. Anabolic
means the ability to promote body growth and repair body tissue. It comes from
the Greek word anabolikos meaning "constructive." Steroids are basically made
up of hormones.
Picture: One woman training to make the 1984 US women's basketball team
used them, her muscles started to bulge, her voice grew deeper, and she even had
the beginnings of a mustache. These are all the usual symptoms of anabolic
steroids.
Steroids were not always used for sports, they started out the same way
most drugs did, medicinal purposes. Victims of starvation and severe injury
profited from it's ability to build new tissue quickly. They also helped
prevent muscle tissue from withering in patients who had just had surgery.
Steroids are used to treat Addison's disease.
Anabolic steroids are drugs that come from hormones or from combinations
of chemicals that achieve the same result as hormones. Hormones may be given to
an individual in their natural state, or in a synthetic one. The synthetic
state is sometimes more potent than the natural one. Testosterone and
progesterone a...