From bodybuilding to addiction

Published on : 23 November 20183 min reading time

Bodybuilding has developed since the 70’s thanks to the star Arnold Schwarzenegger. Being an actor, he popularized bodybuilding and continues to influence young people around the world.

Schwarzenegger began lifting weights at the age of 15. The Arnold Sports Festival considered one of the best professional bodybuilding competitions in recent years, is named after him. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest bodybuilders of all-time as well as that sport’s most charismatic ambassador.

Bodybuilding is a particular sport: it is an anaerobic activity. It takes place without an oxygen supply. In the opposite case, we talk about an aerobic activity. Like all sports, bodybuilding is beneficial for health, provided of course to be practised in a healthy way (no doping) and without excess.

Despite some suffering during training, bodybuilders want to take more and more muscle. Lift heavy weights could cause micro muscle tears. This is what bodybuilders are looking for because muscle growth results from the repair of these lesions by the body.

During sessions, the body releases many hormones, including endorphin, a pleasure hormone that promotes addiction. This addiction is called bigorexia.

Bodybuilding is a very demanding sport, but can also be very addictive. The addict practitioner is obsessed with the belief that the human body must be thin and muscular to excess. He can spend a lot of his time training or refining his feeding plan to gain muscle. Furthermore, his mind is so focused on his bodybuilding training that he can sacrifice a part of his social and professional life.

A word from Dr. Dan Véléa (Psychiatrist specializing in sports addiction):

“THE ORGANIZATION IS CAPABLE OF SECRETING ITSELF. These are endogenous opioids secreted at the end of a certain effort (30 to 40 minutes of physical exercise). THIS TYPE OF MOLECULE, IN SPORTS, BUT ALSO IN HERONOMANE OR OPIACEOUS TOXICOS, WILL ATTACH TO OPIACEOUS RECEPTORS, BY A PAROXYSM OF ENDORPHINE FEELING, A SENSE OF HAPPINESS AND WELL-BEING IS INSTALLED. THIS IS WHY MANY SPORTS PRACTITIONERS EXPRESS THAT THEIR SPORT MAKES THEM ACCROCTED, GIVES THEM MORE, ETC., AND SEEK THIS DISCHARGE OF ENDORPHINE WITHOUT CONSTANTLY”.

This is also why when some practitioners, addicts, do not train, have the feeling that something is missing, have trouble falling asleep on days off the sport. In fact, the gym could be their second home.

The bigorexia is rather recent, since 1990, and comes from the social pressure and the images that the company demands daily. These images are about thin and very muscular bodies that help build an image of the “perfect BODY“.

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