"These kids are 18, and I'm not going to preach to them," says Craig Costa (left, recently, three years after getting off steroids). "My attitude is, if you want to do it, knock yourself out – but it's going to take over your life." Photo by: Margaret Lampert |
It's true that steroids – which are often prescribed to treat men who produce inadequate amounts of testosterone and had been used for certain growth disorders in teens – aren't chemically addictive. But plenty of users are so thrilled by the results they see that they become dependent on them anyway. Craig Costa, a student at Bristol Community College in Fall River, Mass., began taking steroids five years ago, purely to boost his self-esteem. "My whole priority was that I wanted people to say, 'That guy's huge,'" says Costa, 27. "I've always needed to be the top dog, to look the best." He started modestly enough but soon began going to extremes. Although steroid users typically cycle off the drug to give their body a chance to recover, Costa decided not to take a break. He also began combining multiple injections and pills each day, a technique known as "stacking" that increases the medical risks. In any event his foray into the world of steroids produced mixed results. The exhilaration he got from bulking up became "my high," he says. But no matter how big he got, he recalls, "it wasn't big enough."
Soon he was spending up to $1,000 a month for the drugs, money that he made working with special-needs kids while living at home. He would do grueling two-hour workouts at the gym seven days a week. "The only thing I had control of was my body," says Costa. "I didn't have the greatest self-esteem in the world, but I thought, 'I'm the strongest guy in the gym.' " As Dr. Wadler points out, that desire for absolute control is similar to the distorted mind-set typical of anorexics. "Both are obsessed with the mirror," Wadler says, "with how they look."
But while the steroids enabled Costa to increase his bench-pressing from 225 to 450 lbs., his body started to fall apart. He suffered serious chest pains, the result of his heart's working too hard. He also developed an explosive temper. At bars, he says, "I'd be dying for someone to say something to me. I was a friggin' train wreck." He and his wife, with whom he had a son, Jacob, now 3, soon split. He eventually stopped taking steroids in 2001, with the help of a psychiatrist. "You get the results you love, and it takes over," says Costa. "I haven't heard of anyone who does this in moderation."
