Atian_1
1d ago
Oof. Point taken...I already have osteoporosis so it would suck to deteriorate bone quality. I figured up to now that because my growth was stunted I'd be particularly suited for HGH, but with low bone density I think it might be that I'm particularly not suited for HGH.
They are finally confirmed to be getting denser now that I'm maintaining a middle-range-normal BMI instead of a borderline normal BMI, and if I manage to naturally get to a density Z-score of 0 maybe there will be some natural thickening that occurs, who knows. I'm not hugely optimistic about the prospect of noticeable natural thickening at my age but I don't think anyone has studied whether bones only recover density versus recovering both density and some thickness in recovery from malnutrition as an adult.
At least my search turned up no results on recovery of bone thickness. "Catch up" growth obviously doesn't work for height after growth plate closure, but nobody out there seems to be even asking the question about catch-up growth of bone thickness. I hope the phenomenon exists and doesn't depend as much on growth plate status, but haven't had any measurable thickening in myself yet. I guess I'll be a case study if my ankles and wrists circumference somehow grow to what they should be genetically (around 20-25th percentile most likely, currently sitting somewhere off the chart below the 1st percentile).
Atian_1
1d ago
That's an interesting observation. But I believe at some point you would get to a small enough region that the term stops being used altogether, IOW at some point it doesn't regress any further, because it's a term outsiders use to represent a group that differs from them along the "Yankee" axis, but eventually if you zoom in geographically you get a group too coherent in the "Yankee" sense that they wouldn't want to stratify themselves further along "Yankee" lines, if that makes sense. I guess you could call that the origin of the Yankee axis. Like "New Yorker" might regress to mean a dweller of New York City once you're inside NY state, but it can't regress any further...at that point you're at the origin of the NewYorker axis, even though the "origin point" has been expanded beyond a single geographical point to include an entire city of hundreds of square miles. This feels like a conversation from Seinfeld.
Atian_1
1d ago
Hey man thanks a lot, this is very informative. Looks like there are some serious risks of long-term use...so most likely would only do this for a year and see what happens while eating a surplus. Yeah, the neanderthal look would be an unwelcome side effect. Figured there could be a dose somewhere in between that would do what I want without fucking up my face completely, but perhaps this magical goldilocks dose doesn't exist. I will look around and see if I can find one of those powerlifting physicians you speak of.
Atian_1
1d ago
How safe is HGH? What's the highest possible safe dose? Is there a highest possible safe dose? Will a high dose do anything (thicken bones like your feet, hands, wrists, ankles, vertebrae) that a low dose won't? I'm actually trying to thicken my ankles and wrists to see if thicker bones allow for a larger tendon CSA which allows me to do more in the gym without overuse pain, because my growth was stunted. It seems like acromegaly patients do get significant thickening of the bones I care about, however, do you need a mega-dose to achieve that thickening or not?
Atian_1
1d ago
Anybody here know if mostly-but-not-completely torn ACLs can recover on their own well enough for someone to play pro soccer again? I have a relative that mostly tore his a few months ago, it has now healed over with scar tissue but is still lacking the proper thickness and orientation of fibers. He has no pain now (after months of rehab) and jogs everyday now, does some weight vest workouts and is squatting more weight than he did before he got injured.
He injured some other stuff that has healed somewhat too. Surgeons want him to get surgery and said ACLs can't heal on their own, yet my relative literally has imaging evidence that it has healed to some extent already in just a few months, but the surgeons chalked it up to just being scar tissue and not falling under their definition of healing. There are studies that say athletes do just as well conservative management as surgery for that injury. Anybody here have experience with this stuff? Thanks.
Not commenting on the political aspects, but it seems like they covered way more benefits of estrogen than they did benefits of testosterone. This irks me because it reminds me of all those nutrition articles that praise one food's benefits, like how uniquely special quinoa is because it has magnesium, this, that, etc. When you could write the same exact article replacing "quinoa" for some other food, because there's tons of foods with identical or better nutrient profiles. Anyway:
You can't just list the cellular and global benefits of estrogen and not list the same benefits of testosterone. Testosterone has to be just as if not more muscle-sparing than estrogen. It is interesting and probably true that estrogen would shift fuel source more to fat, which does sound useful for very long-distance events, but just like women have more estrogen receptors and all the benefits that come with it, men have more testosterone receptors and all the benefits that come along with it, benefits that I could imagine would be relevant to hunting as well. The article doesn't seem to be doing a fair comparison.
For one, male-levels of testosterone uniquely allow tendon and ligament CSA to increase from exercise, which is injury-protective. Bone and muscle CSA will be larger, and fast-twitch muscles and power will be useful for certain game. I think it depends on what kind of game you are chasing, and whether you're going to run 100+ miles or maybe just a marathon or maybe just a short distance, idk.
Atian_1
3mo ago
Agreed re: "I think the human body is capable of far more than modern scientific reductionism allowed for." And very interesting that you were able to grow by releasing stored tension.
Atian_1
3mo ago
Interesting thoughts, thanks for the response. To your last point, ironically, it was on gender affirmation subreddits that I found the most accurate information on possible ways to boost height, including mentions that growth plates don't generally close until the early 20s, and that it's partially from lower HGH levels that people don't grow much in their early 20s, or that sometimes postural and hormonal changes can indeed increase height a bit through cartilaginous growth, etc. And even discussion on future possibilities of growth plate implantation/restoration. It was only in those subreddits that the discussion was taken seriously and practical advice given.
Atian_1
3mo ago
Good points, XY problem is exactly the term to describe what I'm talking about, I did not know about that term before. I agree the research is unclear, that's what I hope will change someday. Somewhat agree there are better things one could do with their time in most cases, well actually fully agree there are better things to do with ones time, but my point would be that height optimization doesn't have to exclude those other things necessarily.
I am arguing to build a pretty big umbrella and cover a bunch of cases, for me in particular I have definitely not maxxed out everything else in my life to the point where height is the only thing left to optimize. However, it is a pretty foundational thing, height and frame size that is, in that you can't lose it once you have it for the most part. It matters more for social success at the extremes of short stature. Also medically, larger frame size (by this I mean bone diameters, like wrist/ankle thickness) pays dividends into old age, promoting greater bone strength in a way that muscle gain alone does not. So it's a bit different from other things we can optimize, height/skeletal optimization would be a more secure investment if it pays off, although it might not pay at all. Although like you said, the research is kind of unclear on how to optimize height...my post discussed using common sense (and the few studies/info we do have) to optimize it, but yeah maybe that's not really enough to justify the effort for most people.
Interesting response, thanks. I agree it's not a bad thing and there's nothing wrong with wanting to make oneself more attractive to women, and that one doesn't need to hide that intention. I think that's a change I could make based on what you said, I could be more clear about my intentions not just in this matter but in all arguments I make. It's definitely one of my intentions, I don't just want to optimize for optimization sake, I want to optimize things I care about, attraction being one, overall strength potential being another, business being another, other health reasons and bone strength later in life being another, etc. Yet only one of those, the attraction one, would create tension if you voiced it in a place not as "free" as this one. I think you make a good point re: I am trying to depoliticize the matter of increasing height. That is true. Perhaps because I want more research or at least inquiry on this front, and when things get political in a way that goes against the mainstream, maybe the research won't get done. Also, I think it matters that there are multiple reasons that increased height and overall size is beneficial.
For example, enough people agree on the many benefits of weightlifting that if a guy is asking how to get stronger (even if he's asking for a reason that disagrees with someone's politics), nobody is going to withhold advice and all would speak freely. Most everyone recognizes the benefit of being stronger. So I suppose I'm trying to get at something like that but for height, although maybe the two are not ever going to be treated similarly. Height is indeed very valued by women, but short stature and frame size also increases cardiometabolic risks later in life, bone strength later in life, a bunch of things really. I started caring about height because of attraction, and caring about frame size for health reasons, but honestly I see so many benefits to both at this point (social benefits and health benefits) that the only reason it isn't treated like weightlifting is because it's really only something you can do if you're a kid, in your teens or in your early 20s, so it's not something most people who need to improve their health (who would likely be older) can do to improve their health, unless research into reopening/inserting natural growth plates comes around, unlike weightlifting which is something anyone can do effectively at any age. That and maybe side effects of HGH.
I've been reading up a bit on skeletal growth, and I wanted to make an observation about the discussion around skeletal growth that I see online.
I consistently see a negative attitude across mainstream sites like reddit towards anyone inquiring whether they have growth left, or asking about advice on how to grow more. I think this might play into Culture War because there's obviously a battle between the different "pills" on the role of male height in sexual attraction, and perhaps this battle has reached the general public. It seems commenters on these posts want to distance themselves from the "black pillers" who place extreme importance on height. They're so scared of being lumped in with the outgroup that they will avoid giving any practical advice.
Basically, it seems that commenters assume there's some motive around confidence or sexual attraction involved whenever a guy is asking about how to grow taller, and because of that assumption, they try to address the "deeper issue" instead of addressing the guy's practical concern around actually getting taller. People can have a multitude of reasons for wanting to increase not just height but frame size. Frame size governs the maximum amount of strength and muscle you'll be able to build. Average stature is probably the ideal for overall health. Then you have the idea that height can be useful (but not necessary of course) for business endeavors, etc. Commenters immediately assume that "growth/height" posts are the result of low confidence and some kind of issue with women, but overall stature (not just height) does seem to have benefits, and while nobody should beat themselves up for their stature, why not optimize it?
People consistently say that "it's mostly genetics", and while it may indeed be "mostly genetics" that explains deviations from normal height at a population level (?, because what about the theory of increasing height with current generations due to better nutrition), you have no way of knowing whether a particular person's deviation from normal height is explained mostly by genetics.
It could be that a particular individual's deviation from normal height is mostly explained by non-genetic factors. Things like low birth weight, malnutrition, hypothyroidism or other glandular conditions, and even childhood trauma can result in stunted growth. Now, these subsets of the population may not be very common, but they exist and it's not fair to tell them they wouldn't be able to significantly change their stature with the right medical treatment at the right time (perhaps involving HGH or other hormonal treatment to stimulate catch-up growth).
Also, even for people without some preexisting cause of short stature, do we really know that their parents achieved their genetic potential? What if the child has the potential for greater growth than they are experiencing? Couldn't there be a relatively safe way and time to take HGH to boost height in such a case? And aside from taking HGH, the things that optimize growth tend to be good for your overall health anyway: right sleeping habits, diet, active lifestyle, and maybe some protein supplementation. Yet most people don't even give these suggestions to people asking for help on reddit (to be charitable, a decent number of commenters on "growth" discussions do give these suggestions, but why would anyone not give these suggestions?)
Then you have all the people who say "your growth plates are closed at your age", sometimes to men who are freaking 18 years old. It does seem that many people (especially women) do not grow past 18, I certainly did not, but it doesn't seem responsible to make such a blanket statement. For most people, growth plates close at different times and often not completely until your early 20s. There's tons of research on this. Also, not that many people really "try" to get taller for a significant amount of time, at least not once they are 18. A lot of people seem to accept the "100% genetics" shtick. Do we really know what could be possible? Who are we to say that a well-timed calorie surplus and right sleeping habits/diet/exercise/stress management and relaxation in someone's late teens and early 20s, combined with some HGH and something to keep growth plates open, would not measurably change their final height, assuming the person was not optimizing these factors before? It may not always work, but who is to say it wouldn't have an effect for a given individual?
It shouldn't be taboo for someone to try to optimize their own body.
Then there's all the people who say they had crappy lifestyle habits and still grew tall, or had great lifestyle habits and had short stature. And to that I say, indeed genetics has a big role to play. Some people will be big and tall no matter almost anything, others could be small no matter what (although HGH might have some effect anyway if started at the right times?). My main point is that there's probably a subset of the population that is underachieving relative to their genetic potential, so why shouldn't those people try to reach their genetic limit? Why does that point elude so many people on mainstream sites? I have provided some reasons at the start of the post but perhaps there are others.
Now, I don't believe in giving people false expectations, so I understand if that's why people are often dismissive. But, while you should not "expect" height or other skeletal growth from any intervention, it's not right to entirely and often smugly dismiss it like so many commenters on these kinds of posts do. It really does not seem impossible. In so far as my common sense is accurate, there are things people can do to optimize growth and maybe make a difference, HGH being the most significant of those things but healthy lifestyle habits being not insignificant. Perhaps I am wrong about much of this, I am still forming my opinions on this matter but this post shows where I stand at this time.
Atian_1
3mo ago
I think you're onto something personally. I also have a slight lean toward esotericism, not a very hot take incoming but I feel we are missing much regarding consciousness and the capabilities of the mind. Perhaps that even relates to your discussion of UFOs as well.
I used to be very materialist, but I'm a lot more open-minded now because I think there's freedom of choice at the most fundamental level when we are building our models, and there's nothing wrong with constructing a theory of reality that allows for immaterial phenomenon. I don't believe we should shove so much stuff under the Occam's Razor rug. We don't have to choose some subjective "simplest" explanation, we can choose whatever explanation and mental model/theory that happens to be useful at the time, and experiment with and construct different models, we can be creative with our mental models of reality just because we can. And also, because we might just live in a crazy/esotericist world where being willing to change your model of reality is what allows you to maintain maximum utility across different times and circumstances. I don't know if I explained that well, maybe it sounds like crazy rambling.
Anyway, I agree it seems like we're heading for some kind of event horizon. One point I'd disagree with is birth rate collapse being "spooky": it seems to be more first-world countries experiencing this, with cultural causes that have been discussed on this site a decent amount, no? Although to your point, I suppose it is unusual how successful the spread of those behavioral shifts that decrease birth rate was.
Regardless of growth plate status, can HGH still make your bones thicker/wider at any age? For example, can your vertebrae and femur, and wrist bones all get thicker from HGH treatment? If you had growth stunted would this still work to at least thicken bones after your growth plates fuse?
Atian_1
3mo ago
Mix of 2, 4, 5 in my opinion. The way I see it: First secure maximum "least suffering"-ness for yourself and those close to you, then devote the rest of your energy to reducing general suffering in whatever way appeals most to you.
Atian_1
4mo ago
Thanks, I really appreciate the advice. I think you've answered it better than anyone I've asked, in that I should probably be putting more focus on how I'm thinking about this (and NOT thinking about it too much) versus trying to figure out every little detail that explains everything. I have been trying to do some breathwork lately, so we'll see how that goes. Good point on the present moment awareness...I have tended to suck at that, so that's something to work on for sure.
Atian_1
4mo ago
Huh, just read through the Wikipedia page for it, actually sounds like a very interesting voting system. Problem is, I hardly hear anyone talking about voting system reform, just in a few places online, so public sentiment still has to come a long way before we get any kind of changes like that. Plus the two big parties probably don't want that to happen.
Anyone have advice on tendon recovery from exercise? Something's clearly wrong with me but I don't know what. I'm a male, ever since I was 15 or so (I'm 22 now) when I push any set of any exercise to failure, I get tendinitis from it. I assume that's not normal? For example, my muscles are not tired at the end of a set of max rep pushups, it's one of my tendons (tricep, or sometimes pec) that hurts instead, I feel like my muscles could keep going. This is the same for all exercises, been this way for years, and briefly by course of good luck and planning and pushing almost to failure but not quite, I have managed to do things like weighted dips, weighted pullups, etc. before developing tendinopathy from those and having to scale back.
If I workout even further away from failure, like legitimately easy intensity, I'm fine painwise but don't make any progress in muscle or strength. I've tried dialing back volume, I just regress to being able to handle less volume and the same problems pop up.
At age 15, when this started, I did have a bunch of weird issues pop up: I had a growth spurt where my scoliosis went from mild to severe, then I got a really bad flu, then I went from sleeping 8+ hours a night every night at age 14 and prior, to sleeping 5 hours in broken intervals at age 15.5, unable to sleep more no matter what I do (I'd just keep waking up too frequently). Ever since then, I have slept the exact same way, once a year I sleep 7 hours and feel a difference, but I don't know what I did to sleep that long so I go right back to the pattern.
When this started, I felt very unrefreshed with a lot of brain fog at age 15.5, this is also when I had a relapse of anorexia (which was on/off from ages 9-20, mostly on from age 9-12 and 15.5-20 however). Then somehow my brain adapted to this amount of sleep, the brain fog and tiredness went away, and I actually started doing better in school than I had before all this despite no sleep improvement. But I was left with these exercise issues. Part of me thinks I am sleeping enough for my brain, but not enough for my body, yet the brain is what has a drive to sleep, so if my brain has figured out how to get it done on less, it just isn't going to have the sleep drive to match my body's needs. So I need a way to force deep sleep.
Nobody has been able to tell me exactly what caused these issues; was it the sleep? Was it the anorexia? I will say since recovering from anorexia, I was able to get way stronger than before recovery. But "way stronger" is still weak by human male standards. I had a brief period when I first recovered weight quickly at age 19.5-20 or so, that all my joints actually felt amazing, and I was sleeping 5.5-6 hours. But after that it went away (maybe in part due to a legit episode of bad insomnia at age 20.5, happened to coincide with onset of some GI issues that have only recently resolved) and now I'm stuck feeling almost the same way I did before recovery, but just at a much higher strength level than before and more overall capacity for exercise than before, but still the same feelings now of not being able to push to failure without pain, anywhere in the body. Somehow, at age 21.5-22, I pushed heavy weight for the first time with really low reps and low intensity (reps in reserve), and made a ton of progress again despite not feeling like I could recover from a serious workout with less reps in reserve. But then I got pain from it and had to regress again, I think I got up to a 100lb split squat, 50 lb weighted pullup, and what's probably the equivalent of 160-180 lb bench press (dips at 125 lbs bodyweight with 70 added pounds) for low reps before needing to regress.
I know my wrist size is only 5.2"/1st percentile for men, ankle size is only 7"/1st percentile for men, and limb lengths are 1st percentile for men despite 10-15th percentile height, and despite 50th percentile height parents and everyone in my generation of the family is at the 75th percentile in height. I also have osteoporosis from the anoreixa.
The one thing that grew normally is my shoulder width and pelvic width and that's largely post-recovery from anorexia that it started growing again from below average to average/even 60th percentile. I have a feeling all of this points to growth stunting from anorexia; is a 1st percentile frame size somehow mean I already reached my genetic natty limit at 100 lb split squats and 180 lb bench press? Can't be right, there are people who are much shorter than me who can build more muscle than I have so far, right?
Some question I have too that could help others with my problems (and myself obviously):
Are there any binaural beat or breathwork techniques for inducing delta wave states consciously, to mimic deep sleep and release HGH? Does anorexia stunt your tendon development as much as it stunts bone development? Does HGH help you build up your tendon tissue? Does this sound like anything you've heard of? How much does psychological stress affect your tendon recovery independent of other bodily systems?
How much does mindset matter in this? I feel like when I was making progress last time at age 21.5-22.0, I really believed I could get stronger, and then I saw some videos of people hurting their tendons and got kind of scared, and at this same time was when I seemed to get tendinopathy again. Could be a coincidence, but it was kind of spooky how that happened. Now I'm falling back into some old beliefs I had about something being fundamentally wrong with my body (part of why I justified my eating disorder to myself, after the joint pain started at age 15, my eating disorder worsened because I justified it to myself as I was genetically inferior, which ended up not being very true because I had some really good periods of strenthening post-anorexia as I described above, and I'm still way stronger than I ever imagined I would be at age 15, but it's still a beginner strength level and I want more if at all possible).
I wonder, if as a result of that limited mindset, I'm not making much progress? Even though I'm equally motivated to exercise, something about the mindset must be changing the fundamental quality of my muscular contractions (more apprehension perhaps) and this develops tendinopathy in those places? See a video of someone hurting themselves, get apprehensive, area gets strained due to less-coordinated contractions, you get hurt? Is that even a thing?
I know my testosterone level is at 500 on the nose. I have osteoporosis from the anorexia too, but it seems largely due to small bone diameter (stunted appositional growth) and only slightly due to low volumetric bone density, that is the bone quality itself seems to be good now (post-recovery) but the bones are small enough that the 2-dimensional "areal" density is very low. I still am about 0.5 to 1 standard deviation less in "true 3-D density" than normal, but not as bad as my DXA scan makes it look. Actually, if someone knows of a way to boost appositional growth of bones at this age, that'd be interesting to hear. I assume HGH could do it? And I assume I should keep gaining to BMI of 21 or 22 just to see if that would help (I'm at BMI 20 now).
Sorry for the long rambling post, thanks if anyone read through it or has any advice.
Atian_1
4mo ago
As far as I know, I've heard he's got a decent chunk of people willing to vote for him as an independent candidate, so if half or so switch to Trump and the other half don't vote, Trump gets an additional 1-2% in the vote, something like that. Haven't been following it too closely.
Atian_1
4mo ago
Guess I'm not a power user, I didn't know it supported vertical tabs! But agreed on the built-in adblocker.
Atian_1
4mo ago
Man I've only seen it once, but it was insane. Honestly a part of me legit thought it was the beginning of a UFO first contact, my parents came to the windows to check it out too, then I looked it up on Google and it turns out it was Starlink, for some reason it never occurred to me that you could see Starlink with the naked eye early in its launch, I never heard that they looked like a line of stars in the sky either.
Damn that's crazy.
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