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BromoFAQ (T-mag)
Most of you have been waiting with bated breath for an update regarding my experiences with the dopaminergic drug, bromocriptine maleate (BM), something I've talked about before here in this column and at the T-Mag forum.
[Editor's note: Bromocriptine's approved use is for treating Parkinson's and other neurologic disorders.]
I've continued to use Parlodel (brand name bromocriptine maleate) as I'm fortunate enough to have an enlightened physician friend who's legally prescribing it for me. While previously I was excited by the theoretical fat loss potential of BM, I have to say that practically, the results surpassed even my expectations.
Currently, I'm 174 pounds at under 6% body fat as measured by calipers. Now I'm sure some of you out there are going to say, "Shit, man, you're tiny!" Well then, this segment of "Useful Stuff" is not for you! If you're interested in becoming a 250-pound monster, my experiences and my opinions are probably of minimal interest and use to you. Lots of luck, fellas. But if you're interested in more of an underwear model type of look (a look that women seem to appreciate a whole lot more than the Conan the Barbarian look), read on.
Are you still with me? Good! BM has helped me lose just over sixteen pounds of adipose tissue in about two months. So how did I do it? I started by taking 2.5mg of BM per day before bed back in the middle of the summer. This was actually a mistake. For starters, the dose was too high for me to start with and taking this before bed was probably not a smart idea. Unfortunately, BM has some CNS stimulatory effects (at least on me) that caused me to have a heck of a time falling a sleep. A few days into this experiment, I opted to switch from taking it before bedtime to taking it around 6 or 7 A.M. in the morning. If you're planning on using BM, I'd strongly suggest that you not take it at night.
However, even switching to the daytime didn't eliminate all the side effects. I still felt "twitchy"… I suppose that's the best way to describe it. Suspecting that the dose might still be too high, I opted to cut back to 1.25mg of BM per day and titrate my way up. I feel this method is the absolute safest and best way to use BM. So I'd also suggest that if you're going to try BM, start at 1.25 mg.
I titrated up as high as 6.25 mg per day which was the threshold of tolerability for me (and then I dropped down to 5.0 mg which is where I am now). The way I titrated up was to increase the dose by 1.25 mg every five days. This seemed to minimize the CNS and psychological side effects that BM can impart.
So how did BM make me feel and what did I use with it? Well, I ended up adding in a small amount of Cytomel around the third week (25 mcg of T3 per day to be exact). I'm not sure how necessary this is for everyone, but I noticed that I was "cold" in the mornings about two weeks after I started the BM. My body temperature was down about 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit and I decided that this could adversely impact my quest to metabolize fat (so hence, I added in enough T3 to get by body temperature back to baseline). I'm not sure if the drop in body temperature was caused by the BM or the change in my diet, but it's surely something you might want to look at and be aware of when you start using BM. Adjust accordingly.
Dopaminergic agonists tend to have a stimulant effect. I actually like the way BM makes me feel; it seems to "up my energy" but not in a speedy, ephedra sort of manner. I'm more alert and less drained when using BM.
It also affected my diet in an unconscious manner. I've always craved carbohydrates — this flaw has always been the demise of any dieting program I've undertaken and made keto dieting (especially Fat Fasting) exceedingly difficult. I noticed that BM tended to blunt my craving for carbs. It also blunted my appetite.
I wouldn't characterize BM as an appetite suppressant in the manner that phenylpropanolamine or phentiramine resins are, but I noticed that instead of eating everything on my plate because it was there, I only ate until I was satiated. So yes, my caloric intake dropped by about 500 calories per day (this is an average and a guesstimate) and I consumed less carbohydrates (this was unintentional).
Upon reflection, my diet looked a lot like the old Isocaloric Diet that Dan Duchaine used to espouse where you eat an almost equal ratio of carbs, fats, and proteins. It's important to add that all of these changes in my diet were unconscious and I never felt hungry or unsatisfied. My tastes just changed quite a bit while using BM.
My results thus far with BM look like this: when I started this experiment, I weighed 196 pounds and held about 13.2% body fat. Yesterday, I weighed in at 174 pounds at approximately 5.5% body fat (it's hard to be exact with the calipers when your skin folds get thinner). This represents just over a sixteen-pound loss in body fat in two months. I realize this may not seem spectacular when compared to keto dieting, after all, this merely represents a two to three-pound weight loss per week. Heck, people do that with Slim Fast. But there are a few things to keep in mind that make this truly interesting, if not downright amazing:
1) My loss of lean body mass was minimal. Of the 22 pounds I dumped, less than six pounds of that was LBM. Had I opted to use a mild anabolic or MAG-10, I'm sure I could've eliminated any and all loss of LBM.
2) I made no conscious effort to change my diet! This is truly huge. Even though my diet did change substantially, it wasn't a conscious effort. All I intended to do was take a few extra pills per day, not suffer through some Draconian dieting scheme. This was very easy!
3) I feel fantastic. When was the last time you heard of anyone feeling truly fantastic while trying to lose weight?
I'm sure I could've lost more fat in this time period had I "known what I was doing" (remember, this was an experiment). I'm going to continue using BM at 5.0mg per day for the next sixty days or so. Expect another, more in-depth update at that time.
I'll leave you with a few final thoughts about using BM for weight loss. I'd suggest not using any ephedra based products (or yohimbine or synephrine) with BM as even the smallest dose of ephedra (8mg) caused the hair on the back of my neck to stand straight up. You'll most likely not enjoy the way you feel with stimulatory alkaloids if you're on BM. I'd also suggest that you consider adding an anabolic with BM (MAG-10 will work fine). If you do choose to use BM, drop us a line here at T-mag and let us know your results.
__________________
Most of you have been waiting with bated breath for an update regarding my experiences with the dopaminergic drug, bromocriptine maleate (BM), something I've talked about before here in this column and at the T-Mag forum.
[Editor's note: Bromocriptine's approved use is for treating Parkinson's and other neurologic disorders.]
I've continued to use Parlodel (brand name bromocriptine maleate) as I'm fortunate enough to have an enlightened physician friend who's legally prescribing it for me. While previously I was excited by the theoretical fat loss potential of BM, I have to say that practically, the results surpassed even my expectations.
Currently, I'm 174 pounds at under 6% body fat as measured by calipers. Now I'm sure some of you out there are going to say, "Shit, man, you're tiny!" Well then, this segment of "Useful Stuff" is not for you! If you're interested in becoming a 250-pound monster, my experiences and my opinions are probably of minimal interest and use to you. Lots of luck, fellas. But if you're interested in more of an underwear model type of look (a look that women seem to appreciate a whole lot more than the Conan the Barbarian look), read on.
Are you still with me? Good! BM has helped me lose just over sixteen pounds of adipose tissue in about two months. So how did I do it? I started by taking 2.5mg of BM per day before bed back in the middle of the summer. This was actually a mistake. For starters, the dose was too high for me to start with and taking this before bed was probably not a smart idea. Unfortunately, BM has some CNS stimulatory effects (at least on me) that caused me to have a heck of a time falling a sleep. A few days into this experiment, I opted to switch from taking it before bedtime to taking it around 6 or 7 A.M. in the morning. If you're planning on using BM, I'd strongly suggest that you not take it at night.
However, even switching to the daytime didn't eliminate all the side effects. I still felt "twitchy"… I suppose that's the best way to describe it. Suspecting that the dose might still be too high, I opted to cut back to 1.25mg of BM per day and titrate my way up. I feel this method is the absolute safest and best way to use BM. So I'd also suggest that if you're going to try BM, start at 1.25 mg.
I titrated up as high as 6.25 mg per day which was the threshold of tolerability for me (and then I dropped down to 5.0 mg which is where I am now). The way I titrated up was to increase the dose by 1.25 mg every five days. This seemed to minimize the CNS and psychological side effects that BM can impart.
So how did BM make me feel and what did I use with it? Well, I ended up adding in a small amount of Cytomel around the third week (25 mcg of T3 per day to be exact). I'm not sure how necessary this is for everyone, but I noticed that I was "cold" in the mornings about two weeks after I started the BM. My body temperature was down about 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit and I decided that this could adversely impact my quest to metabolize fat (so hence, I added in enough T3 to get by body temperature back to baseline). I'm not sure if the drop in body temperature was caused by the BM or the change in my diet, but it's surely something you might want to look at and be aware of when you start using BM. Adjust accordingly.
Dopaminergic agonists tend to have a stimulant effect. I actually like the way BM makes me feel; it seems to "up my energy" but not in a speedy, ephedra sort of manner. I'm more alert and less drained when using BM.
It also affected my diet in an unconscious manner. I've always craved carbohydrates — this flaw has always been the demise of any dieting program I've undertaken and made keto dieting (especially Fat Fasting) exceedingly difficult. I noticed that BM tended to blunt my craving for carbs. It also blunted my appetite.
I wouldn't characterize BM as an appetite suppressant in the manner that phenylpropanolamine or phentiramine resins are, but I noticed that instead of eating everything on my plate because it was there, I only ate until I was satiated. So yes, my caloric intake dropped by about 500 calories per day (this is an average and a guesstimate) and I consumed less carbohydrates (this was unintentional).
Upon reflection, my diet looked a lot like the old Isocaloric Diet that Dan Duchaine used to espouse where you eat an almost equal ratio of carbs, fats, and proteins. It's important to add that all of these changes in my diet were unconscious and I never felt hungry or unsatisfied. My tastes just changed quite a bit while using BM.
My results thus far with BM look like this: when I started this experiment, I weighed 196 pounds and held about 13.2% body fat. Yesterday, I weighed in at 174 pounds at approximately 5.5% body fat (it's hard to be exact with the calipers when your skin folds get thinner). This represents just over a sixteen-pound loss in body fat in two months. I realize this may not seem spectacular when compared to keto dieting, after all, this merely represents a two to three-pound weight loss per week. Heck, people do that with Slim Fast. But there are a few things to keep in mind that make this truly interesting, if not downright amazing:
1) My loss of lean body mass was minimal. Of the 22 pounds I dumped, less than six pounds of that was LBM. Had I opted to use a mild anabolic or MAG-10, I'm sure I could've eliminated any and all loss of LBM.
2) I made no conscious effort to change my diet! This is truly huge. Even though my diet did change substantially, it wasn't a conscious effort. All I intended to do was take a few extra pills per day, not suffer through some Draconian dieting scheme. This was very easy!
3) I feel fantastic. When was the last time you heard of anyone feeling truly fantastic while trying to lose weight?
I'm sure I could've lost more fat in this time period had I "known what I was doing" (remember, this was an experiment). I'm going to continue using BM at 5.0mg per day for the next sixty days or so. Expect another, more in-depth update at that time.
I'll leave you with a few final thoughts about using BM for weight loss. I'd suggest not using any ephedra based products (or yohimbine or synephrine) with BM as even the smallest dose of ephedra (8mg) caused the hair on the back of my neck to stand straight up. You'll most likely not enjoy the way you feel with stimulatory alkaloids if you're on BM. I'd also suggest that you consider adding an anabolic with BM (MAG-10 will work fine). If you do choose to use BM, drop us a line here at T-mag and let us know your results.
__________________
