Type 1 Diabetic, How can I bulk up?

Weightman

New member
Whats up,

Ok so I am 27 yrs old and a type 1, insulin dependent diabetic. I take 1 6 unit shot of Levemir at night before bed, and about 10 units per meal depending on how I feel and the carb intake for said meal. I go to the gym very often, and generally work out til I cant even do 3/4 weight on the muscle group. I see myself toning up, even putting on some muscle (usually I get excited by the 'pump' but I know thats temporary). Anyways, I heard insulin usage can lead to gains. I read some threads related to this and it was flooded with acronyms, some which I could make out (at least I assume) and others that were greek to me. Primarily I didn't see anyone talking about Diabetics utilizing insulin for gains, just people who have normal insulin production. So my question is what do I gotta do to bulk up?

Regards,
Weightman
 
Insulin spikes are needed after a workout and are derived from High GI foods, e.g simple sugars etc..

i'm not quite sure how ud go about the whole sugar intake and being diabetic..
one way around it i guess could be to take Waxy Maize which is derived from corn starch i guess. but dont hold me to it. i dont want u have some sort of diabetic attack lol
 
Ha yeah, I generally take a protein shake within 15 minutes of workout and some whole wheat carbs along side a 5unit shot. Prepare a high protein, mid carb, low fat dinner and have another 5unit shot. While I am seeing some gains (mainly memory muscle in my opinion) I really want to astonish myself and I'm sure someone out here has some tricks to help me get yok'd.
 
For safety's sake, you'd be better off getting your excess calories from healthy fats. Using insulin for gains is moderately wishy washy for a non-diabetic, but in some ways may be safer for you as you aren't as concerned about issues with natural production, and obviously would have blood test strips, meter, glucose tabs, etc handy. I'd still be careful. You can look for the Fat Bastard protocol by Author L Rea for one idea as to how to use it.
 
You probably have an advantage considering that you can king of revolve your insulin spikes around body building. You better know what your doing, and stay stafe though.


Brett Michals has diabetes, and he seemd pretty fit before the couple of health scares he had.
 
Hey bro,

I am type 1 also. First thing you need to do is to ignore most of the non-diabetic insulin related stuff that you read. Most of it is wrong.

If you are serious about making gains OR serious about your health you really should make and follow a meal plan (do a search - lots of info here) which includes measuring/weighing food portions and counting calories, protein, carbs, and fats. You will need a decent (digital) food scale, measuring cups, and some software like fitday.com.

The rationale behind the two reasons are as follows:

in order to build muscle your body needs surplus protein AND surplus calories. If you are not tracking your food and only eating by appetite you might not get enough. Some people advocate just winging it by eating plenty of calorie rich foods. This will work for them - although they will probably put on more fat than necessary. For diabetics however, this is a recipe for out of control blood glucose.

This leads to the next reason, if you eat from a meal plan you can experiment and determine how much insulin you need for a given meal. This helps take the guesswork out of managing blood glucose.

So first step is to make a meal plan appropriate for your goals. Second step is to match your insulin usage to that plan. It is NOT the reverse.

What do you use for your fast acting insulin?
 
I take Levimir at night, about 5-6 units, and Novolog for my fast acting... roughly 10 units per meal. When I go to the gym I will have my protein shake right after and do a 4 unit shot, then prepare dinner and do another 7 units with that meal. I have just started tracking my foods (online), but have been tracking meals since my diagnosis. The site I use is "fatsecret.com", basically I determine what I ate, down to producer of said food item, and based on those nutrition facts I am able to track calories, fat percentage, protein percentage and carb percentage for the day.. it also allows me to track my work outs and it will deduct the calories burned over the course of a day (from sitting to walking to sleeping to weight training) from my overall caloric intake.
 
Ok we take the same stuff ('cept outside the US Novolog is called Novorapid.)

Here are some miscellaneous ramblings re: insulin, diabetes and bulking:

- 'Spiking' insulin PWO as a prerequisite for bulking is a load of goat crap IMO. What is needed is the surplus calories to compensate for the energy one expends during the workout to keep from going catabolic and fuel growth. So if you burn 300 kcals during your workout you want to make sure that you have an extra 300 kcals in the same approximate time frame. The body will produce whatever insulin it needs for that meal or in our case we take whatever is required for it. It is backwards to set a PWO insulin dose and then design a meal for it. Insulin follows food - not the other way around.

- If you are already following a meal plan then you are 90% there. Just make sure that you are at a daily calorie level appropriate for bulking for your stats. A rule of thumb for calories is 20X body weight. If you are tall for your weight and/or are active outside the gym (ie hard laborer or play sports) then you will likely need more. If your weight on the scale does not go up in a week or two, increase cals. If it is going up too fast (ie feels like you are getting fat) back off.

- Don't overdo it in the gym. As a diabetic I am inclined to do more rather than less for health reasons but this often causes me to overtrain. 3-4 days per week for 30-45 minutes of weights is plenty if you train with intensity.

- When bulking I find that I have to do at least 8 meals per day and keep carbs up around 50% in order to match one meal with on shot of Novolog. The digestion time for larger meals with higher fat content tends to extend past the 2 hour active time for the Novolog and blood glucose tends to run high after 2 hours.
 
Generally I am averaging about 4000 calories a day, roughly 40% carbs, unfortunately 30% fat and 30% protein. Work outs: About an hour to an hour and a half a day.. usually tuesday-sunday with monday off. I run bi/tri/shoulders one day, then chest/back/legs the next. I cycle through muscle groups on any given day... 3 sets bi, 3 sets tri, 3 sets shoulder then recycle through with a different work out for the muscle groups. I take Novolog 3 times a day (each meal), and often will add a small dosage here and there depending on what I eat. I have seen some weight gain but it fluxuates so often that it's tough to really track. 171 Friday, 173 saturday, 172 sunday... we shall see about today. I weigh in Pre work out and post work out, but I go with my post work out numbers.
 
I wouldn't bother checking the scale everyday. You don't lose fat that fast - fluctuations will be more due to changes in water, food, etc.

However, over time (weeks) if you are not gaining weight, then you need to increase calories or decrease activity (hence my comment about time in the gym).

Nothing wrong with your macro ratios if they are working for you.

So you basically eat only 3 meals per day? You might be gaining a higher portion of fat vs muscle with so few meals. I know eating more often can be a pain but IMO 5 meals is a bare minimum.
 
Yeah I would love to have more meals a day, time and money are the factors there. Figure I have breakfast, then jam out to work. Lunch is meager, then the gym after work, then protein shake and dinner, maybe a snack later. I am averaging about 650 calories more than I am burning so around 3500-4000 calories daily intake. I do need to cut down on my fat intake for sure. Ideally I would like to have a 50%protein, 35% carb, 15% fat breakdown for any given day. So I guess at this point since I barely began tracking all of this (started the 21st) I should continue doing what I am doing and see what happens. Body wise... I am seeing some size gain, but mainly getting more cut (which I don't mind but isn't necessarily my goal). I was definately diggin myself last night haha
 
hi im also diabetic type 1 , just started weight training about 5 weeks ago and have ask't lost of people for bulking up meal plans , but there not diabetic and all there giving me is to much carbs and all and raises my blood glucose levels. so could you give me an meal plan or an idea cos dont have a clue lol
 
Type I diabetes Truths - I Concur

Nitrox said:
Ok we take the same stuff ('cept outside the US Novolog is called Novorapid.)

Here are some miscellaneous ramblings re: insulin, diabetes and bulking:

- .......'Spiking' insulin PWO as a prerequisite for bulking is a load of goat crap IMO. What is needed is the surplus calories to compensate for the energy one expends during the workout to keep from going catabolic and fuel growth. So if you burn 300 kcals during your workout you want to make sure that you have an extra 300 kcals in the same approximate time frame. The body will produce whatever insulin it needs for that meal or in our case we take whatever is required for it. It is backwards to set a PWO insulin dose and then design a meal for it. Insulin follows food - not the other way around.

-......The digestion time for larger meals with higher fat content tends to extend past the 2 hour active time for the Novolog and blood glucose tends to run high after 2 hours.
Click to expand...

First of all, Thanks to Nitrox for giving good advice. I recently joined AM and this is my first encounter with a thread that has replies (Nitrox) that:
1- I attest to through 16 years of Insulin Dependent Diabetes.
2- State Empirical knowledge

I find these parts particularly important:
"....Insulin follows food - not the other way around." <---FACT
"The digestion time for larger meals with higher fat content tends to extend past the 2 hour active time for the Novolog..." <----FACT

I'll add this FACT also:

Insulin propels much more than glucose into targeted cells. Cells, compounds, and transport mechanisms are three dimensional. Insulin activates parts of a cell that are shaped like an auger or RNA or a drill bit. Once this 3 dimensional transport mechanism starts spinning, it propels whatever compounds that fit, through to the intracellular fluid.

-DP
 
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