My show prep put my hormones in the toilet

I'll be straight with you. I prepped for a bodybuilding show with absolutely no regard for my biology.

Dieting hard, training like a maniac, and not thinking once about what it was doing to me.

And it wasn't just my testosterone that got cooked. Nearly every hormone marker I had was in the toilet.

My total testosterone came back at 5.6 nmol/L. My specialist put the bottom of the normal range at 9.2. I wasn't even in it. A natural bodybuilder, under the floor.

I felt rubbish and completely lost control of my eating

Anabolic Gabe@anabolic_gabe

"Life absolutely sucked."

After the show I swung the other way. Overeating, yo-yo dieting, cravings I literally couldn't control.

I felt bloated and inflamed all the time. And my body image got really bad.

I'd built my whole life around training and performance, and my body just wasn't responding anymore. That messes with your head.

More effort wasn't the answer. My body was already under stress.

I'd spent years training hard and weighing my food. If effort alone fixed testosterone, mine would've been through the roof.

It wasn't. And my instinct was to do more. Train harder, diet harder, chuck another tub on the shelf.

But training hard, dieting hard, then overeating just kept the stress cycle going.

My body was reading all of it as one more threat, and a body under threat doesn't prioritise making testosterone.

Overtraining won't raise it. Neither will chasing hacks, or a cupboard full of supplements you can't explain.

So I stopped guessing and got my blood tested.

My blood test showed me exactly what to fix

I treated my hormones like any other part of training. Measure the starting point, fix the weak links, test again. Same thing I tell every client I coach.

For six months I locked in on the stuff that gives your body a reason, and the raw materials, to make testosterone:

• Better sleep and more deep sleep
• Enough food, healthy fats and key nutrients
• Lower stress and cortisol
• Sunlight and vitamin D
• Strength training without excessive volume
• Correcting deficiencies such as magnesium and zinc

I wasn't trying to force one number up. I was giving my body what it needed to make testosterone on its own again.

I'd fixed the basics. Now I wanted a testosterone formula that made sense.

Sleep, food, training, recovery, all dialled in. But every test booster I looked at was the same slop. Weak doses, cheap ingredients, nothing I'd take every single day.

So I built my own stack off iHerb. It was costing me around $400 a month, and I was still piecing it all together myself.

Then I found the NattyPLUS Ultimate Testosterone Booster

Everything I'd been hunting down separately, in one daily formula. Done.

I've read every test booster label out there. This is the best one.

First thing I tell every client I coach: read the label yourself. So I did. Ten ingredients, and every single dose is right there on the bottle:

• Anacyclus Pyrethrum400mg
• Tongkat Ali300mg
• Fadogia Agrestis300mg
• Shilajit250mg
• Coleus Forskohlii250mg
• Horny Goat Weed (Icariin)200mg
• Magnesium Bisglycinate50mg
• Zinc15mg
• Boron6mg
• Vitamin D330mcg

Tongkat ali was the big one for me. It's one of the most effective natural testosterone-supporting ingredients I know of, and research has shown increases of up to 33%.

Then you've got fadogia, shilajit, anacyclus, coleus and horny goat weed stacked on top.

Plus the zinc, magnesium, boron and D3 I was already chasing to fix my own numbers. Everything I was paying around $400 a month to stack separately, in one bottle.

But a label full of the right names means nothing if the doses are garbage. What sold me was the ingredient breakdown, clinical dosing, sourcing and bioavailability.

It's the best testosterone formula I've ever seen, and nothing else I've found comes close. Most of what's sitting in your local supp shop is underdosed slop next to it.

I took it every day for months. The benefits kept me going.

First thing I tell anyone: give a supplement at least 30 days. A few capsules and one good session won't tell you anything.

So I put the Testosterone Booster in my daily stack and locked in. Every single morning, while I kept working on my food, sleep, training and recovery.

By 90 days it was just part of the routine. I wasn't chasing an overnight miracle. I was giving it time.

Along the way I felt it in the gym. More energy. Better recovery. That's what kept me taking it every morning.

Nearly a year in, I still hadn't missed a single day. I've been on it more than 12 months now.

My testosterone went from 5.6 to 38.1 nmol/L

After my show, my total testosterone was sitting at 5.6 nmol/L. Cooked.

So I spent the next months getting the basics right. Eating enough, sleeping properly, training without running myself into the ground, and taking my stack every single morning.

Then I tested again. 38.1 nmol/L. The highest I've ever recorded.

And the Ultimate Testosterone Booster massively helped get me there. Every morning, every capsule, the whole way through.

I'm not stopping now.