An 18-year-old bodybuilding influencer’s physique transformation is drawing scrutiny after a side-by-side comparison of his own social media posts showed dramatic facial and physical aging over the span of roughly two years, despite claims that his results came from testosterone alone.
The influencer, named Dylan Bailey, began posting fitness content on Instagram at 19 years old, roughly three years ago, and has been more active on TikTok, where much of his earlier content originated. In one of his earliest videos, posted around four years ago when he was approximately 18 years old, he already displayed a notably developed physique.
By the time he appeared in more recent content at 22 to 23 years old, his appearance had shifted dramatically, prompting comparisons of “wild decade” versus the reality of roughly 18 months.
In one clip, he stated, “I’m not natural. I have ran PEDs for multiple years now.” He also described his early approach to using performance-enhancing drugs without guidance, saying, “When I first started, I did not have a coach. I was haphazardly running s**t and running into side effect after side effect after side effect.”
He said that changed after hiring a coach, describing his condition at the time as, “Earlier this year, this was me on test only. I was 175 lb (79 kg), pretty skinny.” Six months later, he said, “This is my physique. Absolutely blew up and had zero side effects along the way.”
He credited the results to a structured protocol, quoting his coach’s philosophy as, “Because we don’t run stupid cycles. We kept [things] really basic, did not run drastic heavy amounts of stuff. And every single compound in the protocol served a purpose.”
Beyond individual claims, research comparing st**oid users to non-users has examined biological brain aging rather than physical appearance. Findings indicate that baseline individuals show brain aging consistent with their actual age, and those with only short-term ste**id exposure show no significant deviation.
Chronic users, however, showed considerably more advanced biological brain aging than both other groups. Related research from the same body of work found that long-term PED users had reduced gray matter volume and a thinner cerebral cortex compared to non-users.
