Tamoxifen for dieting...MS has a rethink

[MS]

Like Cornholio, I've been thinking!

Tamoxifen use in bodybuilding females is controversial to say the least. There are plenty of women that get no noticeable benefit from using it to reduce estrogenic fat deposits, and I can assure you that it is basically useless for this since the butt and thighs, unlike breast tissue, do not have enough of the right receptors or enough of the necessary enzyme to convert tamoxifen to it's most active metabolite

Even worse, many women being treated with tamoxifen for breast cancer experience an INCREASE in fat!!! Bummer.

But I am no longer so quick to dismiss tamoxifen use for certain dieting situations Not only do some competitive female BBs rave about it, but I have also used it with good success. Here's how and why I think this drug should be used, based on recent research into tamoxifen's potent ability to increase leptin levels.

Take your typical overweight postmeopausal breast cancer victim. They already have sky-high leptin levels and their body has basically become leptin resistant. Same goes to a lesser degree for you average (20-25% fat) younger female. Leptin levels are already pretty high, and raising them more (by taking tamoxifen) just makes the whole leptin/insulin resistance go up, making it harder than ever to shed fat. BUT if you take this drug 4-6 weeks out from a competition when you're bodyfat is already well below 15%, your leptin levels have plummeted, and your diet is in danger of stalling on you, you get an instant leptin boost which allows you to diet harder, longer and get leaner than if your leptin levels stayed low. You feel less hunger. It's just a theory, and it would be interesting for some of you women to play around with this drug and share your thoughts too. Just remember you don't want to start the tamoxifen too early. Wait until you've hit the wall in your fat loss and you're already pretty lean. And remember to continue taking the tamoxifen post diet for a while to (hopefully) minimze diet rebound bingeing.

I'm working on another theory involving tamoxifen AND Prozac combined. I'll let you know how that pans out.

 

[NubianBeauty]

Wow!! Thanks MS! Can't wait for your next "thought"

 

[JJFigure]

What kind of dosage are you talking about?

 

[MS]

10-20mg per day is plenty. The health risks associated with running tamoxifen for a short course like we're talking here (6-8 weeks) are minimal.

 

[The Shadow]

I was talking with someone about this about 2 weeks ago


Great post

 

[JJFigure]

I've been reading up on Nolvadex - I may have to give this a try. I'm trying to push the level of leaness for my next comp...

I also noticed you can't use OC when on Nolvadex, but I was planning on dropping OC use 8 weeks out from comp, so that's not a problem.

 

[velvett]

Great post.



..... I want to come back as a man.

 

[MS]

Oh yeah, that reminds me JJ,anyone who tries this should double up on alternative contraceptives because tamoxifen can increase your chances of getting pregnant even though it will paradoxically also dramtically increase chances of birth defects if you DO get pregos.

What's the gossip Corn? Have you got any additional info/thoughts, or second hand experiences with women using this drug for dieting?

 

[Temple]

MS - you mentioned Prozac...can you give us a brief version of what you are thinking. I lose fat when I take prozac but my sex drive also goes south so for me it isn't worth it but I am curious as to what direction you are going with that.

 

[MS]

I'm interested in trialing the Prozac by bringing it in at the start of a contest diet. The reason for this is several fold. Most noteably is that Prozac actually reduces leptin, and there is some evidence that it does this by acting in a manner similar to leptin. This may be part of the reason why obese people are more likely to notice weight loss with Prozac than non-obese folks.......it may rapidly reduce leptin resistance while giving them a signal that their body can recognize as leptin. It is not yet clear to me if tamoxifen will compete with/block this effect or work synergistically with the Prozac, but my suspiscion (given that weight loss from Prozac is usually temporary and short term) is that adding in the tamoxifen as fatloss plateaus will work well. Basically your using the Prozac to shorten the amount of time needed to reduce leptin resistance enough for the tamox to work. Beyond that, you continue using the Prozac as a leptin 'substitute', and also because Prozac may minimize sub-Q fluid retention.

This is all highly theoretical. I have tried the tamoxifen. I haven't tried the Prozac or the combo.

 

[wilson6]

Prozac + Tamoxifen for dieting.......

I remain skeptical.

I would think that OX in low doses would work much better for nutrient repartitioning and it would probably reduce leptin/unit fat as test does.

W6

 

[The Shadow]

Oh yeah, that reminds me JJ,anyone who tries this should double up on alternative contraceptives because tamoxifen can increase your chances of getting pregnant even though it will paradoxically also dramtically increase chances of birth defects if you DO get pregos.

What's the gossip Corn? Have you got any additional info/thoughts, or second hand experiences with women using this drug for dieting?

Nothing eatrhshattering in terms of being scientific......but.....I have always believed that Nolvadex is a "weaker" estrogen that Estradiol.

That's why men, of course, use Nolvadex as an anti-estro.....lower estrogen especially in men, tended to really lean out the lower ab down to the knee region, typucally referred to as sticky fat....the same should apply to women...in addition to less water retention, I would think that the lowered estrogen would have to affect the Test/Estrogen ratio.....so muscle mass gain couls possible be greater in addtion to great fat burning(from the boost in other hormones - test).

I had really good results from a mix of bengay and crushed t-3, yohimbine and nolvadex in 2 women.

 

[The Shadow]

another thought on the Prozac/Leptin response - I have noticed that those who are lean/relatively lean when they begin the Prozac tend to gain weight rapidly.....whether it is due to the Prozac itself or a side such as lethargy I do not know.,

 

[MS]

Yes, without a doubt leaner folks (less insulin/leptin resistant) are more likely to gain fat rather than lose it on Prozac compared to overweight/insulin/leptin resistant folks.

Given the known pharmacolgy of Nolvadex, I am pretty skeptical (as Wilson6 would say) that the effects Cornholio has seen with women was due to direct antiestrogenic effects in a target specific manner. More likely the yohimbine may have been the major contributor. It's possible (I really don't know) that men have a different lower body responsivness to Nolvadex than women, but I can assure you that Nolvadex has very little affinity/activity in subcutaneous estrogen sensitive adipose stores compared to tissue like breast where it is a potent estrogen receptor blocker in men AND women.

I agree for the most part with Wilson6 in terms of a drug like Anavar being a much better bet for dieting men and women. However I was approaching this topic from the ever practical angle of stuff you could relatively easily either convince your doc to prescribe, or safely buy in from blackmarket sources, and that wasn't tested for or even considered in so-called 'natty' events. Anyway, I'll bet Anavar PLUS tamoxifen PLUS Prozac would work even better! Any takers for that experiment??????

 

[JJFigure]

I, for one, appreciate MS's attempt to look at practical/relatively safe approaches to dieting. Not that I'm necessarily getting drug tested; just want to continue to travel down the AAS free avenue.

 

[wilson6]

Moral rant here.

To say that combining Prozac and Tamoxifen is more practical and safer than 5 - 10 mg of OX is like saying that Pu239 is safer than U235 because Pu239 has a half-life of 24,000 years whereas U235 has a half-life of 703,000,000 years.

How is AAS free different from Prozac and Nolvadex free? Either way you are manipulating endogenous hormones/neurotransmitters and both can produce side effects that are equal to or worse than low doses of OX. I'm not suggesting that you should use OX, but the AAS free avenue ought to be a drug free avenue if that is your moral quest and quite frankly, the potential gains (fat loss) of taking Tamoxifen and Prozac vs the side effects of either drug alone or combined will be far outweighed by the sides.

BUT, I am curious so keep us updated; and I'm not a big advocate of mixing psychotropic drugs and AAS. AAS alone are potent antidepressants.

Regarding looks, given what Brickgirl has been able to achieve with minimal intervention and solid diet and training, I don't know why anyone should be thinking "polypharmacy" instead of more conservative/proven approaches.

W6

 

[MS]

I understand your moral rant, and it is a common one. However I did not set the morality (or immorality as it were) of AAS in sports, and I provide these thoughts as just that. And it's not just about AAS. In many tested sports they also ask about/test for other comonly used (and effective) drugs such as ephedrine.

The potential of both Prozac and/ot tamoxifen to basically act as anorectics/thermogenics during a diet should also not be discounted. They act completely differently from ox. Ox is an anabolic/anticatabolic agent. I have not heard that it makes it any easier to stick to a pre-contest diet, which is the basic application I'm suggesting here. From my perspective they should be synergistic. Admittedly it does cause a change in bodyfat distribution that I think is much more beneficial than tamoxifen (which I've already pointed out is not gonna specifiaclly target thigh and butt fat like ox will).

And talking about the morality of polypharmacy on an anabolic discussion board is comical IMHO. Not because I think people NEED to take lots of drugs to achieve a good bod, but because I recognize that people already do take lots of drugs, and will continue to do so. Providing info to make it as safe and succesful as possible is just good practice. For the record, I think the vast majority of drugs currently available for prescription (so-called morally acceptable) don't do anything that a person with some nouse of diet, exercise and knowledge of their own body couldn't do without the drugs. The pharmaceutical industry is truly immoral.

Anyway, 1 in 5 Americans adults has already taken a course of Prozac at least once, and the number of people expected to take anti-depressants is going to soar over the next 10 years. THIS IS IMMORAL prescribing practice. As an antidepressant it only works for 30-40% of people anyway, and there are dozens of lifestyle changes/pychotherapy approaches which are no longer being used to treat and prevent recurrent episodes of depression. Just give them a pill......Prozac has also been approved for treatment of PMS, binge eating disorder, SAD, and similar drugs with neurological targets (such as silbutramine and busiprion) are already used to treat obesity. A precontest diet using no more than 3 months of these drugs is not extreme, especially if you compete infrequently. I don't think I can say much more on the potential benefits versus side effects of this drug combo until me and some other women have tried it. I think the benefits versus sides of completing a contest diet is pretty appalling. If you look at it that way, there really is no good reason to compete. 3-4 months of suffering, screwing up your hormones and brain chemistry from diet alone, all for a few seconds on stage is really stupid. The tamoxifen/Prozac are really just attempts to negate some of the hormonal/neurological suffering of people that choose this path. I guess I see a contest diet as a pathological condition which can be ameliorated with judicious drug therapy!

And men with normal free T levels also get depression, though less frequently than females. I hardly consider androgens alone to be a first course of treatment in depression in otherwise hormonally healthy adults, though that is really OT.

Anyway, someone else's turn for a rant.

 

[JJFigure]

I was really only looking at the Nolvadex, and I'll be doing more research before I consider it. Mine isn't a moral case against AAS - just a decision to not supplement testosterone in a body that really doesn't need anymore than it makes naturally. You're right, surpressing estrogen is hormonal manipulation, but considering Nolvadex is a drug designed for women, I'm more open to researching it. That doesn't necessarily mean I'll try it; just that I'll consider it.

The sides of Nolvadex are significantly different from the sides of something like Winny - I've never paid attention to Ox, so I'm not sure what it's sides are. Plus, the sides for Nolvadex come into play with long term use - MS is only talking about a very short usage period.

And I'm considered high risk for breast cancer since I'm adopted - if risk is unknown, they just class you as high risk - so I could probably even get a prescription if I went down that route. Then, it's not even a legal issue.

I left my morals at the door the minute I started using ECA - I figure that's due to be banned any minute now by the FDA, and there's no way in hell I'm going to quit using it for dieting - I'll get it however I need to get it. Kind of hard to have a moral conscience when you're fully prepared to break the law if you need to.

 

[wilson6]

We're all f***ed up (according to mainstream society) otherwise we wouldn't be here. That's what makes this board so interesting. Just wanted to get some non-scientific debate going

Anyhow, is there anyone out there that has been both on and off an SSRI (Prozac, Zoloft, etc.) and has dieted for a show in both cases? i.e., did the addition of the SSRI make the whole process easier or more difficult, both psychologically and physiologically?

W6

 

[Iron Queen]

<<MS said:

Oh yeah, that reminds me JJ,anyone who tries this should double up on alternative contraceptives because tamoxifen can increase your chances of getting pregnant even though it will paradoxically also dramtically increase chances of birth defects if you DO get pregos. >>

OK I've read that you could get pregnant if you're using tamoxifen BUT if you're using nolvadex your bodyfat should be low enough to where you're not getting your period anymore, which in turn would mean you *shouldn't* be ovulating. Of course you cant guarantee that you wont ovulate but if you're that lean you wont get your period. Nevermind the fact that if you're dieting for a show its not like you can use any REAL hormonal birth control methods bc that would just defeat the whole purpose of dieting.

What do you think the chances of becoming pregnant are if you're doing the nolva say... starting 8 weeks out from a contest prep all the way to a show even if you havent gotten your period in a couple years? he he. (seriously)

IQ

 

[wilson6]

No period doesn't equal no ovulation.

Trannys on test can still ovulate until their ovaries are removed even though they don't have a period per se.

IQ, you should monitor your morning body temp for an entire month. See if it changes.

W6

 

[spatts]

I rarely have a period, but ovulate like clockwork. I used to use sympto thermic charting as birth control, and I would have a spike on the 19th day of every month and sometimes again on the 24th day. After watching this for almost 3 years, I was able to figure out that I have a 34 days cycle, ovulate twice a cycle sometimes, even without having a "period." I was also able to figure out that when my temperature makes that steep drop (progesterone levels dropping...I believe) I'm my weakest in the gym. Like W6 said, I just took my basal temp every morning at the same time, before ever even rolling out of bed. It's interesting the things you can learn about yourself in terms of strength, water retention, moods, mental clarity, etc...all by seeing how they coincide with basal temp charting, over time.