Studies show insulin use being a strong anti-catabolic drug in nature, once we reach the point of not having enough glucose for our insulin levels, glucagon raises which then starts breaking down our muscle tissue for glucose to balance the even slightly high insulin level to glucose in your blood. So yes, even insulin’s strong anti-catabolic nature could not stop the amino acid dumping of glucagon. So if you use long-acting insulin twice a day, you will have lower levels in the daytime when you need it the most to optimally drive nutrients into muscle, and create a nice catabolic scenario during your non-feeding (sleeping) hours.
Short-acting insulin use for a bodybuilder is the other choice. No intermediate (medium acting) here unless you are a diabetic having trouble controlling your blood sugar levels in between meals. Otherwise, you are going to miss the peak hour for your meal of insulin levels and then go hypo when you have nothing in your body and possibly catabolic due to glucagon that I already talked about above. Short-acting insulin is not too tricky, but you must also factor in your gastric emptying rate. Some are slower and some are faster than others.
As an example, even a doctor (a good one) will advise your needs might be 15 minutes before a meal or 15 minutes after a meal. This is something you have to figure out on your own by feel and/or BG readings. If you notice you start feeling hypo during a meal, your gastric empty rate might be slow, and/or you took your insulin too early before the meal. Or if you notice you are going hypo long after a meal. You took your insulin too late for your meal and or your gastric emptying rate is fast. I personally find on average most do best with 10-15mins before a meal with items like Humalog (a short-acting insulin)
Insulin dosing needs.
Anyone who ever gives you a recommendation of insulin dosing is purely just playing a game of chance and hoping you are using the optimal amount and not to low and not too high. Everyone’s insulin needs will vary and even medically the standard rule for new diabetics varies largely from 4 to 18g carbs per IU. Do you need 4 or 18g? Even more? even less? Who knows. Do you want to use less than optimal dosing where you are barely benefiting? Example using 5iu and your sensitivity is not the best while eating 150g carbs a meal, and your body actually requires 25iu? For one, you are setting yourself up for negative health effects when you require such a high dose and just hoping 5iu gets the job done, leaving your body with high BG for hours on end. And two, you are not getting anywhere near the optimal amount of your nutrients into your muscles for optimal growth.
When you want to find out the dose you require you simply start low. Say majority of your meals are 100g carbs, you pick a safe number that you are comfortable with, 2-5iu. You check your BG levels and notice that you’re a little bit high still a few hours later. (I prefer to check before meals, 1 hour after, 2 hours, 3 hours and 4 hours when first figuring out exact needs as everyone’s digestion rate varies like I already said.) So if you are a little bit high, go ahead and up it comfortably depending on how high at the next meal, say you’re a little high, up it by 2. say you’re very high, up it by 5. And continue like so.
I am not preaching anyone to use insulin here, or to know how to read a BG meter and fully understand what dose is putting their level where and how much to increase it by as well. Although at the same time people work up insulin’s dangers to be way overblown. As a bodybuilder using insulin and eating large amounts of foods, and using a dose you know is in your range, it’s basically impossible to have a complication. Studies on attempted suicides with insulin using extremely high doses have only resulted in 2.7 percent actually achieving their death. While also factoring in these people were not eating like a Bodybuilder. These people knowingly took an insanely high dose of insulin much over their needs without eating to commit suicide while a bodybuilding is consuming food to counteract the blood sugar drop and using a dose that he knows is in a safe range for his body’s needs. Again, if only 2.7 percent of people taking insanely high doses without eating food WITH the intention of killing themselves died, then a bodybuilder taking a small dose and eating 100-200g carbs a meal has pretty damn good odds.
Also to put some more things into perspective: An average male on a 3000 calorie per day diet would produce 70iu insulin, post hepatic levels so total more than this actually. This figure is for post hepatic insulin released into circulation. The pancreas actually produces about twice as much and half is exacted in the liver before it's released into circulation via the portal vein. So when guys think their 5iu is a big dose, generally for most it will barely budge them. Also, the highest insulin dose ever recorded was 35,000iu… just some food for thought. This is the reason we have u500, which many also don't know about. 1ml u500 is 500iu vs u100 which we all use is 100iu per ml.
My personal experience and experiences on other’s insulin needs.
On average, I find most men trying to grow, and again this is a very general average, because one guy might be eating 5k calories and the next guy 6k and so on, so take it as a very rough average. I find most men will be somewhere between 15-20iu a meal on a heavy bulk of a fast-acting insulin. And long-acting like Lantus to be around 50-70iu on a heavy bulk again for a decent sized male. Lower ranges less common is 5iu a meal and 30iu Lantus a day. Higher ranges, 100iu Lantus, and 20-30iu Humalog a meal.
All depending on their sensitivity, food intake, and if GH is used and how much. There have been times when my sensitivity was amazing and some meals/food intake 10iu was optimal for me, and there has been a time where 100iu Lantus morning and 65iu Humalog a meal was still not cutting it for me due to a GH analog. So realize this is how much sensitivity and individual needs can vary. Take no one’s suggestions of doses and start low and find what you need safely.
Does insulin make you fat?
No insulin does not make you fat. If this was the case then every diabetic out there who continues to eat shit would be growing at insanely rapid rates and we would all be able to tell the diabetics apart by them all being 800lbs. Considering the fact that a common diabetic will use insulin in the hundreds, and sometimes even thousands of IU a day. Most of us can’t tell a diabetic from a non-diabetic, well simply you can't actually. And if it were also true, there would be no such thing as type 1 diabetic bodybuilders who have insulin in them 24/7 and able to compete at stage ready bodyfat levels.
Diet makes you fat, plain and simple. You eat you make insulin, you don't eat, you still make insulin. Yet we can all get lean. Yes, insulin does drive nutrients into the cells, but what is insulin resistance, diabetes? It is a decrease in insulin sensitivity to the muscles. Fat and muscle have DIFFERENT sensitivities believe it or not. So no insulin isn’t going to have the same effect on everyone’s fat and muscle naturally or synthetically. And you can use specific items/supplements to increase insulin sensitivity to the muscles and decrease it to the fat cells (glutamine is one such item). So you are driving more nutrients to the muscle then fat, which again if you were resistant in the first place, your natural production would be making you fat anyways. As an example with made-up figures: let’s say naturally if you are put on 20lbs of muscle and 2lbs of fat over 6 months, with insulin it would be 40lbs muscle and 4lbs of fat 4lbs fat (remember these are arbitrary figures for an example). So what did you just do? You doubled your muscle and fat gain. Is the ratio ANY different then what you would have achieved naturally? No not at all. Sure you gained double the fat, but double the muscle, something you would have done anyway at the 1-year mark, you just attained it sooner. (Again, to restate this before anyone gets the idea that I am saying this is what will happen, I am not. I am showing a point in how insulin sensitivity at the different sites and diet play a role and insulin is doing the same job it would have done anyways.)
Continued...
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