18-year-old high school student Zaid Laila is part of a growing online movement called “looksmaxxing,” which is the pursuit of peak physical appearance at any cost.
According to sources, Laila he has chosen one of the most powerful and risky paths to get there: trenbolone. It is an anabolic ste**id developed for use in livestock, classified as a Schedule III controlled sub stance, and illegal to possess or distribute without a prescription.
“Why wait 10 years to like reach a physique when I can do it in here?” Laila said.
He shared a before photo from early 2024, and the change is visible. When asked directly how a teenager ends up looking the way he does, Laila did not hesitate.
“A lot of st**oids and a lot of working out, honestly,” he noted.
He says he has been on roids for roughly 10 months, describing his former self as unattractive.
He stated, “I was fat, ugly, like short, which those three things obviously make you an unattractive male. And definitely when I started taking the st**oids, all those things definitely changed. Like I got more jacked and like better looking, honestly, for sure.”
Trenbolone, commonly called Tren, is among the most potent anabolic st**oids available. Originally developed to bulk up cattle before slaughter, it has no approved medical use in humans.
“These are st**oids. This is like the strongest one you can basically get or take. One of the most toxic. And you are injecting it into your body every single day,” Laila acknowledged. “I mean, they use it on cows.”
He sources his supply through a contact on WhatsApp, a dealer based in China who, according to Laila, sells the product for less than the cost of a T-shirt. His education on how to use it came entirely from YouTube.
“I watched like a few YouTube videos, honestly,” he said.
Dr. Jason Nogata, a professor of pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco, who specializes in male teenage health, says the consequences of this kind of use can be severe and long-lasting.
“Anabolic st**oids in general can have really significant consequences to your heart, liver, and kidneys. And Trenbolone, because it’s so powerful, has even more significant side effects. There is no human safe indication for this animal drug.”
Dr. Nogata also points to a cultural shift driving young men toward these compounds in the first place.
“There are many young people now who don’t know what it is. They aren’t actually participating in any type of sports, who are using these dr**s only for the purposes of looking better,” he said. “I think it’s relatively less recognized that actually with more social media, there have been pressures for boys to build muscle.”
Laila does not dispute the role social media played in his decision. When asked to describe his feed, the answer was simple.
“Obviously, gym influencers, the top ones right now,” he stated.
Asked whether he would have pursued st**oids without social media, his answer was equally direct: “No. Definitely seeing people do it is what makes you want to do it, for sure.”
Obtaining these is not a complicated process. “It’s not hard to get. No, it’s not. At all. Anyone can get their hands on it if you just try,” he said.
Additionally, his father states that he is deeply concerned about his son and overwhelmed by the misinformation Zaid uses to justify his Trenbolone use. He first learned of it not from Zaid directly, but from a family member who spotted one of his videos online. Laila had already blocked his parents from his social media accounts entirely.
CBS News correspondent Adam Yamaguchi, who reported the story, noted the deeper cost of what he witnessed.
“This looksmaxixng thing subsumes the things that really matter in life. Like character and integrity and kindness. The things that will carry you throughout the course of your life,” Yamaguchi said.
When Yamaguchi, a dedicated long-time gym-goer himself, discussed his own workout routine with Laila, the teenager’s response was revealing. Laila took quiet pride in having achieved in roughly one year what Yamaguchi had worked toward for decades.
“It’s a shortcut,” Yamaguchi observed. “That, I think, is important to understand why Gen Z is flocking to this. You can transform overnight. Not everything that glitters is gold, man. Not every shortcut is worth it,” he stated.
Despite warnings from both family and medical professionals, Laila remains committed. When asked whether he worries about causing real harm to his body, he was candid.
He noted, “I’d say I do care and I know what can come with it. I’m just going to do it the safest way possible. If I have a heart attack at 30, I have a heart attack.”
His father has made his position clear but feels powerless. Yamaguchi described the dynamic plainly: “He’s deeply concerned about his son’s health. But he says, ‘I’m kind of helpless because my child spends so much time on social media. He’s sort of under the spell of social media influencers.'”
When Laila’s father told him to stop, the response left little room for negotiation.
He said, “I explained to him everything, told him, ‘Hey, I’m doing this regardless, basically. Even if you tell me not to do it, I’m still going to do it. So if I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it the safest way possible. I just want you to know that.'”
And when pressed on his physical health, Laila points to his blood work as evidence that everything is fine.
“I mean, I look healthy, I am healthy, and I can show my blood work,” he informed.
