hormones discussion

So, I was waiting for an opportune moment, because hormones and stuff seem kinda random, but I guess there's no better time than the present, so why not?

Also, please note that most of this stuff is for your info, so no excuses that you didn't know that oxytosin was for increased oxygen levels when you got it from your "doctor," when you thought you were taking it for acne. And also, if you're planning on doing kines, medicine, pharmacy, this is mostly organic chemistry, so if you plan to do drugs (please don't) or catch the people who do (either way - its controversial stuff), just make sure you know what you're getting yourself into, its a lot more complicated than it sounds.

So first step - how do hormones work - there's a hormone (either a protein or a steroid) that targets specific receptors. In the case of hormones for sports, they tend to be steroids, meaning that they have a cholesterol skeleton (not all cholesterol is bad). These hormones attach to a receptor which can be found on a cell. This in turn acts as a signal to start a pathway causing physiological changes. Changes can occur on the tissue level, such as increasing muscle strength or emotional or something like increasing your red blood cell count.

The changes are usually part of a large cycle that involves more hormones than you could count. And more is being discovered all the time. So if you're functioning right now - breathing and eating and living - be thankful that all your hormones and hormone pathways are functioning at a reasonable rate. Also, note as the warning i said earlier, small changes in these pathways can have huge effects, so be careful if you're going to mess with hormones.

One of the major things that athletes want is improved oxygen intake. So one thing that you can do (illegal of course) is blood doping. You basically end up giving blood to yourself. (more on the blood pitch later). Instead of physically giving yourself blood, you can stimulate yourself to make more red blood cells - more hemoglobin to grab oxygen, more ATP to your muscles.

So what can you do to stimulate oxytosin and more red blood cells? Basically - run and train. When your tissues do not receive enough oxygen - running 50 second repeats, 500 breakdowns, your body makes oxytosin. Oxytosin makes more red blood cells so that the next time you run 50 second repeats, you don't get booty lock.

You can also give blood, because now you'll have less blood cells so you need to make more. Kinda contradictory, but you save three lives and who wouldn't want great athlete red blood cells and platelets! So, give blood, you make more blood cells and you help save some lives =D

As a fun fact (if you can call it that) - red blood cells have no nucleus, so they have to be broken down by your thymus and more red blood cells are made from multipotent (can make limited types of new cells) stem cells in your bone marrow.

Other hormone interactions that are crazy include testosterone pathways. Testosterone is a negative feedback system, so in reality, the more you take, the less you make. Which seems weird right? But by mixing in other stuff, you can actually stimulate more testosterone to be made by making it look like you have less.

And the weird thing is if girls take more testosterone, they can actually end up more moody and more crazy than they normally are. Why? Because testosterone is a precursor to estrogen!

So that seems long enough on hormones. tried to hit the ones relevant to track, but there are also ones for dehyrdation. maybe get to that laters.