The bodybuilding diet and moods

As promised, I vowed to communicate the truth of these "experiments", after all, that is the point of all this; to put aside confirmation bias and every other bit of hard wired human bias and tell it how it is.

Bodybuilding Training = Fine. Hard. Physically very demanding. Weights are heavy. Fairly varied and actually quite enjoyable.
Diet = Fine. A lot of pedantic measuring, cooking, food preparation, Tupperware, turkey is dry, chicken is boring, but it is manageable.

Bodybuilding + Diet = Er Wow........  a cataclysmic onslaught to the senses.

Alexithymia and Acatalepsy

These are two new words I learnt the other day.
Alexithymia; An inability to describe emotions in a verbal manner.
Acatalepsy; Incomprehensibleness, or the impossibility of comprehending or conceiving a thing.

Together, I think they describe the situation beautifully.

I can't quite describe the range of emotions that hard training and a calorie restrictive diet is having, but I'll start with a list of monosyllabic and disyllabic words for emphasis; lassitude, fatigue, illness, flat effect, listlessness, desperate desire to lie down -anywhere........I'll stop there as I think you get the picture. It is more a profound "lack" of mood rather than a torrent of mood swings and it is made worse by a particularly nasty bout of bronchitis at the time of writing. This is certainly a test for any functional relationship, mine is no exception. My superbly supportive boyfriend is a Psychiatrist, who has to deal with desperately unwell people everyday. He simultaneously despairs and is proud of me. But what I have realised is very rarely do people do anything of note on their very own, there is always someone who serves as a pillar of strength, close or far away and they most definitely deserve credit.

I suspect that I haven't quite got the diet right, but other competitors all seem to report the same thing. I don't know whether doing this contest "clean" i.e without the use of anabolic steroids makes it better or worse. I don't have to put up with the joys of "female virilization" but the flatlining of my natural endogenous hormones makes me feel like I've had a lobotomy.

What we do and don't know about endogenous Testosterone 

Interestingly I'm looking at doing my MSc research project in collaboration with Imperial College. I want to monitor endogenous Testosterone in physically active women who use oral contraception and those who do not, over one menstrual cycle.
The role of natural testosterone in men and women is still unclear, however research suggests that it has more of a behavioural role effecting motivation and readiness to train. This indirectly affects muscle adaptation through the ability to "push" harder in training. Other suggested roles are in muscle contraction signalling and cognition.
One study (link below) looked at the comparison of baseline free Testosterone (T) and Cortisol (C) concentrations between elite and non elite female athletes. The pooled free T of the elites was (87pg/ml) compared to non-elites (41pg/ml), so over twice as high. What impact this has is uncertain but is suggestive that this higher level of Testosterone could indicate a greater capacity for performance at higher work rates, as well as influencing motivational behaviour.

The study: Comparison of baseline free testosterone and cortisol concentrations between elite and non-elite female athletes; American Journal of Human Biology, 2012

Of course you can't elucidate which is cause and which is effect, but Testosterone does seem to be involved in modifying behaviour, which increases work capacity and indirectly induces physical adaptation. The direct effect Testosterone has on muscle mass within "natural" ranges, I don't know.

Which points me in to the direction of another study in the International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance about what happens when BodyBuilders Diet.

The Study: Natural Bodybuilding Competition Preparation and Recovery: A 12-Month Case Study, by Rossow, Fukuda, Fahs, Loenneke and Stout, in International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance, 2013

This is an interesting study, although very limited because it only monitors a single bodybuilder through his 6 month pre-competition preparation. But the figure below shows the endocrine profile and the dwindling Testosterone levels, coupled with rising Cortisol (through increased lipolysis rather than muscle catabolism because lean body mass did not decrease significantly).

Changes in hormone levels during pre and post competition dieting in a bodybuilder, Rossow 2013. 

Other parameters which changed over the 6 months were: decreased insulin, increased ghrelin, decreased leptin and a decrease in thyroid function (T3 and T4 levels).
Of course this is a study of n=1, so these sets of results will only apply to this particular individual. All hormone levels returned to pre-preparation levels after 3 months, apart from ghrelin and leptin the "hunger regulators".

I definitely feel like my Testosterone levels have dropped and every other hormone I had!! Of course this is confirmation bias because I don't know what contributes to "mood",  but dwindling natural anabolic hormones from hard dieting and training is yet another "tick" for the rational use of "enhancing" through a shot of 'Winstrol' or 'Anavar'. Alas, I won't succumb; It will have to just be another chicken breast. Ah the delights.

On second thought.... this will do the trick, much better for morale.