It's my fault...I was unclear. I speculate that the blood flow to the muscles while weight training with insulin helps the nutrients go to the muscles rather than elsewhere (fat). But, I have absolutely zero scientific basis for this belief. I can only go by the results I get, which are very positive.
BTW, what did you mean earlier when you said you are surprised I don't get a "rebound effect."
Also, how do you explain the placebo effect? I know it's a medical reality, but I find it fascinating. What do you think happens within the body?
Sorry, I missed the rebound effect..... basically this occurs in some individuals when they take in a large quantity of relatively simple carbohydrates over a short period of time. Basically I was referring to a "sugar low" or "sugar crash"---which may be a term you are more familiar with. Its also something you described when you talked about not taking insulin but taking in that huge load of carbs.
What happens in intiially blood glucose levels will go up, then the body responds by secreting insulin, which in some individuals can result in rapid falling blood glucose levels later on---the "crash", which also leads to the secretion of regulatory hormones to stabilize the blood glucose levels. I'm not sure how to figure in your exogenous insulin administration other than you are a person prone to blood glucose swings (which you've more or less proven with your descriptions of how you felt without exogenous insulin, but to be thorough, you'd have to check fructosamine levels and look at serial blood glucoses to prove it) and by taking exogenous insulin you don't experience that wide effect becuase your blood sugar doesn't deviate substantially from normal. You don't go high then drop suddenly. This may explain the reason you've seen such a positive response to insulin. It may also be an indication of problems in the future---problems like Type II diabetes because at this time your body can't seem to handle a high carbohydrate load. Does that makes sense?
Placebo and mindset about lifting weights is a whole other other topic I could harp on for pages and pages. I see it all the time in the veterinary field---in order for a treatement to work, an owner has to believe it will work for their pet. This carries over into human medicine too and especially in teh traditional Chinese and Herbal medicine modalities. Cancer patients are prime examples. I've seen people with end stage cancer literally will themselves back to life and on with their lives. Why? because they decided they could do it. At the same time, I've seen cancer just rip through a person and within weeks of being diagnosed, they are dead. Why? I think because that person didn't get up and go back to work, instead they layed in bed, they felt sorry for themselves, and ultimately, they let the cancer beat them. The same holds true with weight training. I'm a powerlifter. I have to decide I'm going to squat 800+ lbs or bench 500+ lbs or its never going to happen. That mental game is why you can see some individuals consistantly lift 20-40 lb PRs (I'm one of those individuals) on the platform, but not be able to do it in the gym until the day of the meet. I also see it with one of my training partners. He's been beat up through his life. He'll come into the gym bitching and moaning most days about aches and pains. If my wife--a smallish woman---gives him crap, the aches and pains suddenly disappear and he starts training hard. He's strong when he gets that mindset. He's not worth a shit until she gets in his face. Why? His mindset isn't right.
All of this ties in in my mind in bodybuilders taking drugs. Bodybuilding is a combination of weight training, evaluation of appearance, and a diet that in my mind can at times take an iron will to get through to get to even close to competitive conditioning. Yet you see so many people posting on message boards like this one looking for a shortcut. I'm not talking about the national level competitor looking for that last little bit of an edge, I'm talking more about the noncompetitive lifter who wants to "gain a little mass" or "get swole" or "get cut". These individuals will more than likely gain or lose 5 lbs if they'd just eat right and go to the gym. They don't need any magical pill to make them do it, yet because of Americas pill popping society, they take them. This is why the supplement industry has made itself a multibillion dollar industry and its why blackmarket underground labs are able to still make a fortune. Its also why certian people claim 20 lb gains from cell tech in 3 weeks and/or underground underdosed, mislabeled anabolics.
If a person decides they want to do something, and they want to do it bad enough, they can literally will their body to do what their brain wants. It just takes the right mindset.
