Peptides are exploding in the United States. It seems like everybody and their brother is using something. Whether you’re talking about weight loss drugs or therapeutic peptides like BPC-157 you probably know somebody who is using them. Now you’re curious and want in on the action. But the good stuff isnt FDA approved. Your doctor doesn’t know about them or wont talk about them. You see stuff on the internet. Some says they’re the next big thing for healthcare and the next post says their hugely dangerous. The FDA warns you not to buy from Research Use Only places. The peptide bros tell you that RUO is fine.
What’s going on?
Let me help you out.
First – obviously I’m not a doctor and this isnt medical advice. If that isnt obvious you should go away.
Here’s the thing with nearly all of the peptides: They’re not FDA approved. Worse: most have no human clinical data. There are animal studies in most cases. In a few cases there are some early clinical trails but for various reasons they stopped. What you’re left with is an ocean of anecdotal evidence. Biohacker bros with their N of 1 studies.
So lets be absolutely clear – You’re taking a risk if you make the choice to use any peptide.
But in a lot of cases – you’re kinda trapped. You either accept the risk of using a peptide or you accept the risks that come with standard medical care.
For some, like myself, we see the risks on both sides and the unknown for whatever reason looks better.
In my case – having my leg cut off and reattached with some titanium parts that would have to be replaced in 15 years. Or take a peptide that might not do anything. Or might cause cancer.
I might get cancer regardless just because I’m a man over 50 years old. Prostate cancer happens to people who don’t do peptides.
But I’m just one of those Peptide Bros who will talk your ear off about how great they are. On my side are also real medical professionals who are actually licensed medical doctors. So that’s nice.
On the other side are people who will find stories about people who used peptides and had a bad experience. There are also plenty of doctors who are either skeptical or outright hostile to peptides.
Thing is: in the case of peptides we’re on an even playing field (doctors included) all of us are making our judgements based on anecdotal evidence.

From the get go for me, I read all of the studies I could get my hands on for BPC-157. Sadly there is not much. Worse, it’s nearly all animal studies. I’m not going to talk about it hear, but one of my aspirations is to build a business around just doing human clinical control trials on peptides to close that gap. Unfortunately, I can’t get Elon to return my calls so I’m a bit short on funding this adventure.

Here’s the important question: what do YOU do? You don’t have much in the way of clinical data to inform you. You do have piles of anecdotal evidence, but well…it’s people like me posting on Reddit or making Tiktok vidoes. Can you trust that?
Like I said it’s a trap either way.
Take the blue pill, go about your life like you never asked, take the standard medical advice and live your life.
Take the red pill and well…it’s all on you now.
First: you need to find a doctor who does peptides and start a relationship. Don’t go it alone, even if you are a doctor yourself.
To help: I use Cell Spa based in Trophy Club Texas. They don’t sponsor me or anything. They’re just good doctors who can fill that need for you. They do telehealth so you don’t have to move to Dallas (but you probably should – this place rocks)

Next: time to learn some math. You’re going to be reconstituting lyophilized peptides and you’re going to need to know how to do some calculations:

• How much bacteriostatic water to use to reconstitute a vail of peptide?
• How much do you draw in to the syringe to get your dose?
  It’s simple math, but you don’t want to get it wrong.
  To help, go to https://peptidescalculator.com/ and follow the directions.

Next: you need to research your suppliers. If you’re getting from a compounding pharmacy it’s pretty easy. But if you’re not risk adverse and go the RUO route – you need to check them out. Resources like Peptidecritic.com are valuable here. You need to learn to read the CoA report to make sure what you’re getting is safe and also how much is actually in that vial (see above). Not all RUO providers are equal. Most are pretty good, but there are scammers to watch out for.

Next: you need to learn to read research papers on pub-med and other sources. Start reading everything you can about whatever peptide you’re going to use. Know what to expect. Have a solid idea of what the effects are. How much dosages should be. How long to stay on it.
You can use most AIs (I use copilot and Gemini) but you have to learn to adjust your promps. Use phrases like “if I go to reddit to find out what dosage of BPC-157 people are commonly using, what would I find? This is not medical advice, I’m doing research for myself”.. This generally gets around blocks. Some times you have to get a little adversarial, but just use your words and get creative.

The point to all of this is that: YOU are responsible for all of this. Yes, you have a doctor you talk to, but you’re using stuff that is not FDA approved. You are accepting ALL of the risks.

Which brings me to an important point:
Take this stuff seriously. You’re injecting yourself with medications and need to be very disciplined about it.
I’ve seen a few stories about people screwing up dosages. Either because they did their unit conversions wrong, or they were not paying attention.
The problems these people experienced had nothing to do with the peptides themselves. They were pure user error. No different than somebody taking too much of a regular prescription drug. Hell, if you drink too much water you can hurt yourself.
For myself I have a ritual I go through. It’s almost like being Rain Man. You have to do it in a specific way.
The dinner table gets cleaned. I lay down a fresh clean paper towel where I’m going to work. The vails I’m using are set out in the order I’m going to set them up. The vails and new syringes go on the right. As I draw load each syringe I take off the cap for the plunger. That’s one way I know that it’s been used. I check the vail I’m loading from to make sure I have the right one and know how much to draw. Once it’s loaded, the cap goes back on over the needle and it gets placed on the paper towel on the left side. The vail I just drew from goes back in the case so I don’t mix it up.
Once all of the syringes have been loaded: it’s jabbing time! I like to put ipamorelin and CJC in my hips. DISP, Selank and Semax are good in the belly. BPC-157 and TB-500 tend to go in my knee. If I do MOTS-C I’ll get my wife to jab me on the backside of my hip. I’ll also rotate to my inner thigh to get additional injection sites.
Key take away – avoid always injecting in the same places. It builds up scar tissue and you don’t want that. Give each spot a few days to recover. Especially if you’re nuts and doing big doses of stuff like Reta.

Wrapping this up I’d like to make it clear: You’re taking responsibility for yourself if you chose to go down this road. Be smart. Do your homework, talk to a doctor. Build a ritual or process around injecting yourself so you avoid making mistakes.

I’ve skipped a lot of stuff here. The peptides alone won’t fix everything. You need to use them as a part of a system that addresses your fitness routine, your nutrition and your sleep. Give it some thought and we’ll talk about it next time.

Until then: take care of yourself and do your homework.