Four Score and Seven Years Ago

There was a time when I used to shoot steroids, affectionately known as, “the juice,” in my ass. There were times when I would shoot it in my stomach, my back and my shoulders. The worst was when I shot it in my legs. I sat on the toilet seat with my pants and underwear around my ankles, and stabbed myself with a ½ inch diabetic needle. I raised my arm high into the air and brought it down hard on my leg. I had to do it repeatedly because the needle would just pop back out as quickly as it went in. I had very little fat for the needle to absorb. My legs were my best feature. They were where I had the most muscle. After the stabbing incident, I woke up the next morning with black and yellow bruises on the inside of each of my thighs. They were matching in color and were both bigger than my hands.

My experience with steroids began with pills four weeks before my first bodybuilding competition. I purchased a bottle of Anavar and my dealer, Ed, suggested I start with 10: five in the morning and five at night. The paper insert in the box that contained the bottle indicated that the proper dosage for someone taking Anavar—under a doctor’s supervision—was one to two pills a day. I listened to Ed. I was sixteen; he was 43. I was in high school; he had a job working construction. I lived with my parents; he had his own apartment. I was a novice; he was taking and selling steroids for the better part of fifteen years. I listened to Ed.
The shift from oral steroids to injectable was done without thought. I had placed seventh out of eight in the 1986 Teenage Mr. Chicagoland contest, which was a huge disappointment. I wanted to do better. My lifting partner Chuck, who was in his mid-twenties with several cycles of steroid use behind him, suggested that the only way to place higher the next time was to take the leap.
I purchased an eight-week cycle of Deca-Durabolin and a supply of hypodermic needles for my friend, Gregg and myself. He was over 250 pounds and was muscle, without the steroids, but he wanted to go on them with me to see what would happen. He was living with me in my parents’ house after he graduated high school in Florida. His parents were divorced and his alcoholic/bartender father lived on the other side of town with his sister, so he didn’t have enough room for Gregg.

Our cycle consisted of a 1cc shot of Deca each week for eight weeks. At first, I wasn’t very comfortable with the whole extracting liquid from a vial and stabbing a very sharp needle in the ass of another person, but I eventually overcame my concern. The biggest issue we always had was making sure there were no air holes in the syringe. When Ed gave me our first round of supplies, he handed everything to me in a brown paper lunch bag. I handed him $150 in cash and after he counted it, he grabbed my shoulder and firmly pressed his fingers inward. “Tap those fucking air bubbles good before you shoot yourself. I don’t need to be no accessory to a fucking crime when the cops find you dead from a heart attack because you shot yourself with air.” Ed freaked me out so much that I paid his paranoia forward and passed it along to Gregg. Sometimes we would spend hours tapping and tapping.

We used to get up early in the morning and cook breakfast for each other: eggs (hard boiled, whites, beaters) and oatmeal. Gregg made the best oatmeal with just enough water and salt. I liked how quiet it was in the house when we cooked and ate our breakfast. In the mornings, we didn’t have much to say to one another and would listen to the sound of the crickets and clock, which often sounded the same. We were friends and were engaged in illegal and harmful activity. The absence of words encouraged contemplation of our actions.

I took various forms of steroids for two years. When I was 18, just before I received my high school diploma, I felt a lump on my testicle. It was only on one of the balls, the right one. I worked out on my legs that day and I had squatted 540 pounds for six reps and leg pressed 1250 for 12 reps. I figured the pain I was experiencing had something to do with my workout. My father thought the pain was a hernia, so he sent me to his doctor.

At the doctor’s office, the conversation was quick:

ME: I have been taking steroids on an off for two years and if you tell my father, I will sue you. I know my rights. I am legally able to tell you not to say anything, right?

HIM: You have a nubbin on your testicle and that nubbin needs to be removed. The nubbin is a direct result of the steroids you said you took. I cannot say anything to your parents.

I have a scar right below my navel that looks like the profile of Abraham Lincoln. The doctor removed my nubbin. There is not much use for a nubbin and the scar is not that bad. Sometimes I draw a top hat on the scar with a black felt tip pen and use the hole on the tip of my penis to recite the Gettysburg Address.