Peptide Critic Community

I've seen a lot of confusion on using these. A lot of Youtube influencers will tell you not to because they don't actually understand the pharmacology, so I figured I would layout a rough outline of my protocol (remember N=1).

Can I use a GH Secretagogue(Tesa/Ipa/CJC) and HGH (Somatropin) simultaneously?
Yes
Why would I do so?
It is theoretically less expensive to reach a higher IGF-1 and after peaking your IGF-1 for a set amount of time, gently cycle it back down with full normal function.

Fundamentally, this is a PK timing issue. CJC with DAC will not work with this protocol.

So lets look at HGH first. It's absorption rate is about 13 hours. It works well in two different ways, mobilizing visceral fat if you are fasted, or converting to muscle growth(minor) and repair(major) once you eat.

Tesa has about a 45 minute peak pulse, it's good to produce one long solid pulse.
Ipamorelin has about a 30 minute peak pulse, it's good to produce one solid pulse.
CJC no Dac has abouta 30 minute peak pulse, it's good to produce one solid pulse.

My Goal: ~400-450 IGF-1 to support a major recomp from fat and out of shape to 6 days a week zone 2 cardio and 3-4 days a week resistance training.

How I layered it:
Up at 0430 and take my HGH dose (2iu)
5:15 fasted Zone 2 for 40 minutes
Breakfast (no carbs)around 8am
Resistance training days Lunch around 12 of Cottage Cheese and a little granola 20 mins preworkout.
17:00 Dinner: 2-3 Protein Shakes.
19:30 L-Arginine (5grams) + Alpha GPC (600mg)
21:30 2mg Tesa/ .75mg Ipa

Results:
Baseline IGF-1 99
6 weeks on Tesa/Ipa IGF-1 274
6 weeks on Tesa/Ipa + HGH 2iu IGF-1 453

Supporting this is Reta 4mg a week split into 2 doses. This is important as it's going to help your body regulate Glucose and Insulin with such a high IGF-1.

I used a Stelo CGM to dial in my HGH dose. At 2iu my morning fasted glucose was about 92 and average daily glucose 100. 2.5iu pushed me to 105 so I backed off. I also used a finger prick to check my morning fasted glucose every other day. At the end of this run my morning fasted glucose actually dropped to 87 on the lab result.

I've also switched to no sugars and very low salt. My hands are not swelling and I am not getting the carpal tunnel symptoms related to supraphysiological levels of IGF-1.

Risks: Running very high IGF-1 has an explicit cancer risk measured over years. I've given myself 6 months to finish my recomp and then pull back down slowly, HGH first, then IPA, then Tesa. This should give me a soft landing where I am back to normal IGF-1 production and don't ruin my recomp waiting in a slump for my natural production to come back.

Important notes. GLP slows down your gut emptying. So I switched from a solid dinner to protein shakes to make the "fasted" state easier to achieve. The L-Arginine and Alpha GPC are there as Somatostatin down regulators before the Tesa/Ipa. My body will be making lots of Somatostatin from the long HGH dose life, so down regulation is important here if you want the Tesa/Ipa to work at their full potential.

I feel I've created a pretty good system. If you head over to eroids, you'll see users of HGH alone quoting IGF numbers from 150-250, some guys get up to 300. I feel I've tuned out a way to get very high IGF numbers, while under good glycemic control by amplifying the bodies natural pulse at bed and using the daytime for the longer duration HGH.

So the next time a youtube expert tells you that taking HGH + Secretagogue isn't efficacious, you will know they haven't actually done the reading.

@derekg1 The issue is that HGH doesn't increase IGF-1 linearly, so you would end up around 8-10 iu a day to hit that 450 number, which is kind of elite body builder territory and budget. The other downside is you are shutting down your natural pulse which can interrupt sleep and make coming back off once you've hit your goal more difficult, you'll hit a GH trough which can wreck your energy, recover and fat distribution. Now lots of old school body builders do run 10iu every day for years to make the gains they are after. I am not a bodybuilder, just trying to go from over a decade of startup / kids life to getting my body recomped and fit enough to live a long time. So this is all goal dependent.

On costs. I used an ER HGH 10iu x 10 vial kit that was $240 (Kits4less would have been cheaper), and Nexaph Tesamorelin 10mg x 10vial $288, Nexaph Ipamorelin 10mg x 10vial $178, Alpha GPC 60 caps 300mg $23.85, L-Arginine 1gram, 120 caps $17

$24 / 5 = $4.8 day HGH
$28.8 / 5 = $ 5.8 day Tesa
$17.8 / 10 (highside it) = $1.78 day IPA
$0.40 x 2 = $0.80 Alpha GPC
$0.14 x 5 = $0.70 L-Arginine

Total Daily = $13.88

If I used that ER HGH kit that would be $19 - $24 a day running between 8-10iu to hit that target. Some people might hyper respond and hit that at a lower dose, but I haven't read anyone getting there at just 4iu of HGH. You could go direct to grey market and pay for your own COA on the HGH, where you might come out ahead but that is highly variable.

Blood work: My cost is $325 to get this ran. you should do this either way, Labs will tell you SO much and it's a fast way to unlock better health

IGF-1 (LC/MS)
Amylase
Lipase
Fasting Insulin
Hemoglobin A1C
C-Peptide
Testosterone Free and Total (LC/MS)
Estradiol, Ultrasensitive (LC/MS)
SHBG
LH & FSH
DHEA-S
ApoB
PSA
hs-CRP (high sensitivity)
Ferritin
CMP
CBC

The ultimate cost saving approach may be switching over to CJC no Dac from Tesa, but I wanted to maximize my night time pulse, so I'm paying a premium for the extra 15-20mins of pulsatile activity. It's all goal dependent, and I'll likely end up on CJC no DAC as a cruising dose.

@brandenscheidecker I don't have a dosing for CJC, but for my wife she is dosing 100mcg at 120lbs. I need to research what my dose will be.

IPA at .75 because that's about where it tops out, probably lower. IPA also desensitizes over time, so I'm not sure pushing a higher dose is good as increasing IGF-1 is a time exposure game vs just taking a dose and feeling great the next day.

@vpeptides Elite Research, just the vendor

@EXTROPIAN that ninja creamy protein shake looks like a good replacement if you need something before bed!

For other people just using the GH Secretagogues, possibly adding just Alpha-GPC and L-Arginine might give you a boost in IGF-1.

Get stable on a glp (reta) first. It takes the longest to titrate up the dose. Get your a1c and fasting insulin/glucose now before starting. You are going to want to track this as the glp takes effect and get you ready to start the Tesa/Ipa. In good enough health with an appropriate dose of GLP you can mitigate the glucose issues caused by raising IGF.

there's also no reason to stagger BPC/TB500 and Reta except for test dosing to watch for an allergic reaction. Get an epipen and a Primatene inhaler to use incase of a reaction and of course call emergency services in the event. (extremely unlikely but cheap insurance).

Ask AI what labs to get done and track, you can order labs yourself now.

Add on some GH/HGH. That will help to stabilize everything. Especially Ipamorelin in the morning, 90 min fast, then eat.

danny2 food is great. You shouldn't try to go too fast on weight loss.
there's no reason to "days on / days off" gh. That's just something bodybuilders did when it was $6/iu.

@brandenscheidecker I take the Tesa/Ipa just before I lay down. Get it prepared then once I'm just about ready to lay down I take it. It has a nice sedative effect. One of the big things I'm fighting right now is sleep duration and cortisol, I get woken up at 04:30 as a stress habit from getting up for my kids. So some melatonin and magnesium and the Tesa puts me to sleep pretty quickly. Probably more important is the time between the Alpha/L-Arginine and the Tesa, I try to shoot for 90mins. I've seen some people say 30 mins, but I feel that is too short, especially on a GLP where gastric emptying is already slowed.

@brandenscheidecker make sure you do the precaution stuff like a finger prick meter and a Stelo CGM. Listen to your body, GH is a marathon, not a sprint, both in pushing the level up and it's results.

@gym.rat My wife gets flush in the face from CJC. Tesa has it's own sting burn which is uncomfortable at first but after a while I enjoy it.

HGH is deceptively smooth.