Liver Support For A Steroid Cycle

The liver is the biggest organ in the human body. At birth, it represents as much as 50% of the total body weight and will eventually be 2.5% of the total body weight in an adult. It can weigh a total of about 1.5kg, of which some 20% is blood.

The liver secretes bile in great quantities, as much as about 500 to 600 grams per day. Bile is a yellow and green liquid which has many functions, for example the function of emulsifying fats, making them more readily digestible for us. It is also tasked with stimulating intestinal movements (the peristaltic function).

Apart from forming and eliminating the bile from within the intestine, the liver carries out other important physiological functions. It performs, among others, the following main duties:

• It breaks down all amino acids until urea is formed and new proteins are re-synthesized.
• It helps in the process of blood clotting.
• It performs functions within the breakdown of hemoglobin.

Another important activity of the liver is to detoxify the human body, eliminating not only straightforward toxins but also other harmful substances. In fact, the detoxifying action is carried out by the liver simply by breaking down and neutralizing those harmful elements – as, for example, with alcohol and drugs or by simply eliminating those substances which cannot be broken down and expelled from the body, like DDT for instance.

The liver also is a true protagonist in the cholesterol’s metabolism, in the activation of vitamin D and in regulating our blood pressure. It produces substances which stimulate the erythropoiesis, has a primary role in the production of antibodies and stores fat-soluble vitamins as vitamin A,D, E, and K, and also water-soluble vitamins like vitamin C  and all the B complex vitamins, together with minerals like iron and copper. When these minerals are exceeding their normal rate in the human bloodstream.

How to Keep Your Liver Healthy

The liver, like all organs, can be attacked and its functions even heavily impaired when we do not follow some important behavioral rules. So, since it’s true most times that it’s always better to prevent rather than to cure, let’s examine a few practical indications that will definitely help to keep the liver in the most perfect state of health possible. Such indications are mostly of a just ‘down to earth’ sensible way of thinking and doing, will definitely help protect the liver:

• Live as much as possible in a healthy manner. True, it sounds obvious, but you would be surprised at the many daily events which we allow to overtake us rather easily, without almost no opposition from our side. Think, for example, about how we overwork, or how often we to sleep very little, on an almost constant basis, or even of how many times we allow ourselves to eat too much fried food, and the like. Examples can be found almost limitlessly. Of course, what is obvious in theory is often overlooked in real life, so let’s remind ourselves one more time, we MUST live in a healthy manner.
• Eat as much organic food as possible, REAL organic food, that is.
• Exercise properly and regularly.
• Manage all emotions and relationships appropriately.
• Undergo regular medical check-ups.
• Use appropriate supplements in your daily diet.
• Regarding nutrition, we must elaborate and outline some simple rules, which we however believe, together with medical experts – will keep you healthy and protect your liver at the highest level possible:
• Eat foods that are not only organic, but especially those that contain no refined sugars.
• Eat local, organically produced foods that seasonal. Fresh strawberries in January? No, thank you full of pesticides, at the very least! And forget that great fresh smell and flavor.
• Eat dairies that have been pasteurized or fermented. Your liver’s work will be much easier, and its protection safeguarded.
• Consume enough ‘good’ fats, including those from meat and fish which are full of Omega 3, 6 and 9 fatty acids that are contained also in vegetable oils.

Given its centrality, the liver may nevertheless easily become ill when our lifestyles are not as centered on the golden rules as above. When our liver becomes sick, even slightly so, then our entire organism becomes affected. Bad lifestyles are those which include smoking, drinking alcohol, using narcotics, abusing drugs excessively and improper eating habits.

The worst enemies of a healthy liver are definitely alcohol and fats, especially fats cooked at high temperatures. Caffeine and other alkaloids can in the long run also weaken our liver then, the protection and the recovery of an even slightly unhealthy liver becomes a sort of Sisyphean task.

With the above general guidelines in mind, let’s consider what happens and how to protect the liver when it comes to the administration of steroids.

Why Protecting the Liver is Important

The administration of oral steroids requires the administration of appropriate liver protections. One trait that all oral steroids share is the effect they have on the liver, causing a phenomenon called ‘hepatotoxicity’, or intoxication of the liver. By using a proper product – or combination of products – that can help you protect your liver from the side effects of all oral steroids, you will make sure that all your goals will be met the way you wish, and safeguard your livers health.

These protections of the liver, brought along by the supplementation of a hepatoprotective product include, but are in no way limited to:

1. Keeping water retention to the minimum level possible.
2. Regulating your blood pressure.
3. Maintaining cholesterol levels within healthy ranges.
4. Purifying your kidneys from steroids’ wastage and from an excessive administration of protein in your diet and/or supplementation (for example, protein-based shakes).
5. Keeping your blood safe from wastage and harmful metabolites.
6. Maintaining your reproductive system, skeletal system and digestive system – and your liver too, of course!

By implementing the correct protection at the right times during and after your cycle(s) with anabolic steroids, you will be underwriting the best insurance policy possible for your body’s overall health and protecting your liver for years to come. Should you however need to counteract some side effects that are already in place, you will still be able to protect or regenerate your liver’s functions from any mild abuse of oral anabolic steroids.

Liver protections have been used for decades by professional athletes, but also by normal gym goers from all over the world, and increasingly so. That given, we will however never underline just enough how important it is to implement an adequate protection of the liver and of all the human body when cycling on anabolic oral steroids, given that no amount of muscle mass will outweigh ever the risks, either potential or actual, that the lack of such protection will entail.

How Steroids Can Harm the Liver

Steroids, namely the 17aa types of oral steroids – can be dangerous to the liver because they impair the liver’s ability to get rid of those toxic substances that are accumulated by the body. When the user does not take any precautionary action in this case, they can experiment cirrhosis, a stage where the liver doesn’t function properly because of accumulated damage in time. And if one should administer 2 or more steroids orally at the same time, their combined effects could make the situation much worse, so it’s much more sensible to mix an oral steroid together with an injectable one. Or even more sensibly, try to mix a 17aa steroid type with a steroid that is not, and you will have a great chance at maintaining a healthy liver.

Which Steroids are the Most Toxic?

Given that steroids do not all potentially have exactly the same negative action on the liver, being that some are more toxic than others, we will list hereinafter some of the most toxic ones, and then some of the lesser toxic ones.

• The most toxic oral steroids for the liver are: DHEA, Dymethazine, Epistane, Halodrol, Superdrol and Epiandrosterone
• A lower toxicity for the liver is determined by the following other oral steroids: Trenbolone Ace , Anavar and Primobolan.

How to Protect the Liver

There are several different products on the market that have the goal to keep your liver in a healthy state when implementing or after having implemented your steroids completely. Protection varies according to whether you are cycling steroids or you have finished a cycle.

While on a cycle, you can implement the following protections, among others:

• Acetaminophen 
• Milk thistle
• LIV 52
• Samarin
• Tudca

At the end of a steroid cycle, a common mistake is to think that your liver no longer requires protection.  Instead, you have to administer liver protection in what’s called PCT (post cycle therapy) because your liver is not still back to its normal working state. Hence, this is when the so-called SERM’s (that is, selective estrogen receptor modulators) come into action. They need be implemented so that you can counteract the post-cycle androgenic activity still going on and, at the same time, help to restore your normal levels of endogenous testosterone levels.

The Symptoms of Liver Damage

There are many indications that arise to one’s attention when a liver is not working at his best, due to the usage (or abuse) of oral steroids. The following are some of the main alerts that should worry anyone when using these products: nausea and fever, skin or eyes having a yellow tone, or a strangely low appetite. Of course, these symptoms are not exclusive to the administration of oral steroids, but if you are taken them, it should be a warning, so the next best thing is to consult with your doctor, who will most probably send you to take a blood test, among those which we’ll illustrate later in this article.

What to do if Liver Damage is Suspected

Simply consult with your MD, who will enact one or several of the following actions and / or treatments:

• Stop taking steroids for as long as needed.
• Avoid taking any contributing or secondary medication that may be worsening your liver’s state.
• Monitor the ongoing state of the liver’s condition while actions are being implemented.
• Should the condition be more urgent, impart supportive means of curing this negatively impacting state.

How to Monitor Liver Health

As mentioned earlier, there are several tests than can be conducted while taking oral steroids to ensure your liver is not suffering from ant type of significant toxicity, while other tests will help to better manage negative conditions already in place.

The main tests are:

• GGT: The Gamma-Glutamyl Transferase Test: A blood test which evaluates the liver’s functionality (together with other illnesses) and is basically the relevant enzyme’s value determination which, if much higher than normal, can indicate liver damage.  Being a multi-faceted test and also a very sensitive one, it should be complemented with other tests in order to be sure that the determining cause is really the oral steroids’ supplementation.
• Bilirubin Serum: This test shows the amount of bilirubin in the blood and elevated levels of it mean the liver is not functioning properly – perhaps due to the implementation of oral steroids – hence the yellow coloration of the eyes, for example. Being that the cause sometimes be something else, such as high blood pressure, a deeper check is needed in order to be sure that the cause is oral steroids.
• ALT Test: ALT is an enzyme which the liver manufactures in order to metabolize protein. If the relevant values are higher than normal, the liver damage can be already diagnosed as of a significant level, hence one should care for the liver’s health well in advance.

But should all the above tests not be positive, then there is nothing to worry about your liver.

Hence, go to your gym, eat sensibly, train hard, sleep well, take your supplements and protections as necessary  and go on to being the athlete you want to be and getting the physique you always have dreaming of, knowing your liver is safe!