How much insulin do we need?

Insulin in an anabolic hormone. Actually it is the key anabolic hormone. Without it we do not grow, regenerate, heal, gain weight, we are ageing faster… Our cells simply do not work well. This hormone holds a key for food (or nutrients) to enter the cells. And the real question is how much of insulin we need? The more the better? As little as possible?

As we have seen in my previous post, lack on insulin in the body will cause mobilization of nutrients from the cells. Glucose, and other carbohydrates in addition to fats and proteins, will be released from cells and specialized tissue stores following a principle of intercellular solidarity to keep the main body functions running. In case of complete starvation this can be enough to survive for some tens of days in case there is sufficient water supply. However, intercellular solidarity has its price. Fats and proteins can only be burnt with sufficient oxygen supply (aerobic conditions). If the oxygen supply is not high enough and without moderate activity, undesired molecules, like ketones and cholesterol, abundantly form to acidify our body fluids or plug our arteries. Starvation must therefore be controlled and associated with aerobic activity and lack of insulin will not exactly foster the vitality of our cells on the long run.

What about the more the better? This condition is the most likely scenario in people treated with insulin. Overload of insulin can cause two major issues. First, cells will get overloaded with all kinds of nutrients. We can only store or integrate a limited amount of carbohydrates or proteins in a typical cell. All excess will typically transform and deposit as fat. And we do not generally need fat deposits outside the fat storage tissue. Our heart surely does not work better with this additional load. And the second, if we bombard our cells with active substances, they will start hiding the receptors on the cell surfaces and develop a tolerance. More and more insulin will be needed until it will simply stop being effective.

So, how much insulin do we need then? Our bodies need enough insulin to keep us mostly anabolic during daytime. At night, when we want to sleep for eight hours or more, drop of insulin should allow some limited intercellular solidarity and together with other hormonal systems prevent us waking up as hungry and aggressive as wolfs. It is now easy to understand that if we let our body waist circumference to increase, the insulin demand will grow too. It is also likely that pancreas can follow such an increased demand until a certain limit. And after crossing this limit the glucose will start to rise to boost insulin release to help keeping the body mass. Should one then go to the doctor and get treated or simply just try to stop the process and get leaner? To try to bring the body dimensions back to the range where internal insulin supply can handle it on its own. I believe this is the simplest thing to do.