I think part of the reason why I get so annoyed at the casual "ACK! STEROIDS!" accusations is because back during the course of 2004 when I lost 80lbs, a couple of morons said the same thing. The truth of the matter was worlds removed from that, i've never even been to a gym, and at that point, I had NO personal income, could NOT control the food of the household, and only had protein powder when I was lucky enough to get some or some friends would get some for me.
I had to be very creative in how I could eat and it was a lot of hard goddamn work to get motivated, stay motivated, and workout, especially under those restrictions, starting with about a month and a half of just changing my diet, and then incorporating weight training and cardio. So to hear anyone say "Oh, you took steriods" is not only insulting to me and my hard work, but just ignorant in how the human body works. It was literally mind over body...sometimes i'd have a blister on my foot but i didn't care, i kept on with my cardio...sometimes my wrist/forearms would be strained, but i didn't care, i still did my bicep workouts. I was a bit obsessive and probably overtrained a bit, but for the first time in my life I was actively losing weight and I had a goal in mind and I wanted to prove to myself I could get there, in spite of a list of "no gym/no money" excuses
Now I did have
some foundation...during my teens I worked out off and on, and on the weekends my dad made me jog with him. I was about 240-250lbs stocky-muscular for most of the latter part of high school('98-'99). But in 2003 I got really indulgent and neglectful and balloned up to a fatty 280lbs, and that's when i decided to lose the weight.
In these pics there's about a 50-60lb difference...I started losing weight in January, by march/april when the "before" shots were taken, I had already lost between 16-26lbs(just speaking pure numbers, not taking into account the relative fat/muscle ratios).
Arms Comparison
Back Comparison
Legs Comparison
Torso Comparison
Yet people kept saying "Wow, you're getting HUGE", "You're bulking up nicely!", etc. People really just muscle definition is not tied to "size/bulk" but just how low your bodyfat percentage is to allow your muscles to show through your skin. Anywho, i never quite got the "sixpack" i was hoping for, and i put some of the weight back on since then. After 11 months of constant weight loss, I got physically and mentally drained. But i'm working on getting lean again, in fact, lost 3 lbs last week.