#10

You say you can’t afford the blood tests, but can you afford a finger-prick glucose monitor? With a lot of discipline, you could keep a glucose monitoring diary before and after starting rapamycin. That would give you some insight into what impact (if any) rapamycin is having on your blood glucose.

Edit: even better, get a CGM. They’re expensive, but probably less so that paying for regular bloods.

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#11

Kidalondon wrote above

#12

Umi I am taking sea buckthorne for dry eyes and really like it.

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#13

I take astaxanthin and have collected many articles that justify my choice in taking a course of this (two weeks ) every now and then and especially in summer. Its really helped me in a lot of ways from skin and brain fog. I dont know a negative if from a good source-mine is 12mg from Green Nutritionals.

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#14

I take 5 mg. Also arcabose 25 mg. And berberine once a day. If I get sick for some reason I skip that week. Also started lithium which I cut in half about 12 mg. Any thoughts on my regimen is welcome. Thank you

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#15

I’ve skipped on sick weeks too. I just wondered, after skipping, do people start again at low dose and build up or go straight to the usual dose?

#16

I’ve stopped berberine for the time being, till I get my first post Rapamycin blood work. I want to know the lipid profile without any influences if that makes sense.

#17

Just taken my first 1mg tablet. Won’t lie, I was nervous. Will monitor how I do throughout the day and as I’m away next week I’ll probably stick to 1mg for an extra week.

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#18

Follow up to this: my total cholesterol is up from 199 to 240 after starting Rapamycin and pausing berberine. Also in spite of having a really healthy diet totally free of added sugars and alcohol, non smoker, exercise and lift regularly, I am chunky (post Menopausal abdominal fats that come from nowhere;), and yesterday’s blood work shows I am now prediabetic. Arrghh. Quit Rapamycin? Start taking various supplements?? This is so much. :face_with_spiral_eyes:

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#19

I had a very similar experience with very similar numbers, going from high 180s to around 240 after regular and higher dose rapamycin (I am typically around 8mg/week).

I can’t tell you what you should do, but I can tell you what I’ve done.

I started a statin, and that got my LDL down from around 240 to around 136. In the past week I’ve added ezetimibe and bempadoic acid as I’m targeting around 60 for LDL. I go in tomorrow for a blood test and will report back.

See these other threads:

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#20

I think the frequency at which people take rapamycin is an issue. (Then again I am perhaps a bit biased that way). Rapamycin will chronically increase glucose and cholesterol. However, we don’t want to increse autophagy all the time. It is best done intermittently.

How frequently do you take Rapamycin?

I am doing a blood test later today after a particularly high dose of Rapamycin on Sunday. I will monitor what happens to my HbA1c and LDL-C figures over the next few weeks.

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#21

Do you mind clarifying what you mean by ‘I am chunky’ despite doing regular exercise? Are you saying taking rapamycin has brought this on? Also how much Rapamycin are you taking weekly and why not take Berberine on the days your not taking Rap?

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#22

I haven’t taken the plunge yet, so my suggestion doesn’t come from experience.

You said earlier you would start with 1mg and work up to 5mg. Couldn’t you just lower the dose and retest later?

#23

Total cholesterol is not a good biomarker. You’d want either the non-HDL-c by substracting HDL from it, LDL, or for the best measurement apoB.

#24

I take it once a week, at 6mg. The only reason I do it this way is from reading a lot on this website. How do you mean intermittent? Less frequently? More breaks? Thanks :slight_smile:

#25

@Kidalondon No Rapamycin definitely did not bring this on. I’m a 61 year old woman, I’d say abdominal fat came on very slowly during peri and post menopause. I weigh 172 ish pounds, height 5’4". To be fair to myself, weightlifting has given me a fair bit of muscle, so not all of this weight is fat. I can still deadlift around 180 - though I should do more, I’m lifting more cautiously now because my knees are not great. I also row on an erg a couple of times a week, and swim regularly in the winter.

Yes, I’m back on the Berberine as of yesterday - I wondered if it was in fact the Berberine that brought it down in the first place, so I stopped for two months to see.

Also I’ve been off Rapamycin for around a month because I was sick, now I don’t know what to do… How long does it take for Rapamycin to elevate the lipid profile, and how long does it stay elevated? Does anyone know?

@AnUser LDL up from around 134 to 155.

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#26

@mondagai I could, it’s all pretty confusing as we all know - hard to know what to do.

#27

Berberine and astaxanthin are on my longevity plan once or twice a week and they are two great supplements. Berberine is an AMP activator like metformin. Astaxanthin is a great free radical scavenger. Why are you so negative about it?

#28

@nikney I’m not negative, and I take both of those again as of yesterday. I upped the cardio and at the same time I started berberine and bergamot, and I wanted to know if the big drop in the lipid numbers were due to supplements or cardio or both, so I stopped the supplements, and the numbers jumped up. I had some fantasy that cardio alone would be enough :slight_smile: Supplements=$€, cardio is free, that’s all. Back to supplements :smile:

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#29

Interested to hear what happens to your ldl-c now you’re back on the berberine. Please keep us updated

And good luck!

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