You did it. You told yourself you weren’t going to, but you did it. I even explicitly told you not you, but “screw me,” you did it anyways. You cashed the paycheck, told the spouse you were heading out because they were having a “2-for-1” sale on sweet potatoes at the local grocer, and instead went and paid a trip to Chino the back-alley Pergolide dealer. After all, you told yourself, the weather is getting warmer, and I should be out and about in it, showing up all my buddies with some new freaky striations on my left latissimus dorsi. I’ve got my DNP-dopaminergic, now I’ll just down a dozen a day, and I’ll be swole in no time...

Reality check: you now have in your possession the most potent pharmaceutical DA receptor-stimulator that modern science has been able to whip out from under its perennial sleeve. Used smartly and properly, Pergolide is one of the best nutrient partitioning-enhancing, signal-augmenting compounds you will ever get your hands on. Abused or misused, Pergolide can nuke your body’s natural hormonal rhythm, sink your testosterone levels, make you feel like utter shit (assuming at that point you still have a good sense of who ‘you’ are), or just send you packing for the hospital. Usually I jest. This however, has officially been deemed a “jest-free” paragraph.

Seriously though, it truly is this potent, and care should really be taken when using Pergolide as an adjunct to your diet, maintenance, or mass plan (although I would counsel against the latter, which I’ll explain in a little more detail below). So without further ado, let’s end all the Pergolide puzzlement and address all the hows, whats, whens and whys, so you can start using Pergolide if you so choose.

Look Ma! I Lived to Tell About it!!!

So everyone knows where I’m coming from, I played around with Pergolide proper from late August of last year to this past March. In other words, I spent roughly half of a calendar year on the stuff, and I am well aware of what it does and what it doesn’t do in terms of the tangible and/or visible effects that can come from use. However, I cannot say the same is true in regards to my knowledge of Pergolide-related contraindications or the effects that can come from long-term use– the research simply isn’t there to work with.

But, because “I love” (or at least would love to morally exonerate my ass so I don’t lose any more sleep over this stuff than I already do...), I’m still going to attempt a thorough treatment of the health issues, risks, and myths that have sprung up around Pergolide.

The first place we obviously want to look is the brain itself and the DA activity that goes on when Pergolide is introduced. Me, I like the brain, and I tend to think it’s fairly important in the scheme of things, which is why I’d first like to establish how using Pergolide– even large amounts of it– isn’t going to further neuro-degeneration, promote oxidative stress, permanently impair cognitive impairment, or damage any key receptor(s), cell(s) or nervous tissue(s).

However, when used for body-composition purposes which I will be elaborating on shortly, Pergolide does seem to induce a varying degree of psychological effects in individuals, which is something that all perspective users should be aware of before they begin use. Still, in my own experience, these effects are all dose-correlated; they will not persist if you lower your dose, and they don’t cause any permanent alteration in cognitive perception or function. Once usage has been titrated down and halted to properly allow the Pergolide to clear from your system, you will only have to deal with your new-found signaling and set-point issues, not with any sort of perpetual, Pergolide-related psychotic episodes (unless you choose to give getting the munchies big time such an unsympathetic designation).

It’s important to remember that Pergolide is a direct receptor-agonist that stimulates D1 & D2 only when it (or if one of its potentially-active metabolites) starts binding to post-synaptic striatal neurons (1). Because of this, using Pergolide allows us to elevate DA signaling WITHOUT elevating extracellular dopamine levels, allowing us to circumvent the host of problems that can come from repetitive, excessive DA-buildup. Remember, all dopamine must eventually undergo oxidative metabolization (via MAO– a process which produces reactive oxygen species, dopamine quinone, and several other metabolite-byproducts which can promote neuro-degeneration, negatively alter protein function, and inhibit brain-mitochondrial respiration (2,3)).