Puberty’s rough on a growing boy’s heart - risk of heart disease. It not just because of the roller coaster of testosterone-induced crushes that don’t always pan out as hoped. During adolescence, boys experience silent physiological changes that leave them at a higher risk of heart disease than their female counterparts for the remainder of their lives.

Men’s blood pressure and triglyceride levels increase during adolescence, even as their beneficial HDL cholesterol levels fall, Antoinette Moran, a pediatric endocrinologist at the University of Minnesota Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis, found after tracking 507 teens. In contrast, teenage girls experience decreases in triglycerides and an increase in HDL. You can click here to read more about the study, which was published in the journal Circulation.