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I get this question alot.
 
 
If you are unable to workout due to injury, personal issues, illness ect.   What supplements do you recommend taking to help prevent muscle loss, strength, fat gain? 
 
Please give examples of supplements/brand?
 

Whey protein
 
BCAA:  leucine has been shown to kick start protein synthesis and protect muscle from being broken down
 
Creatine: Shown in clinical research to help prevent the loss of muscle mass and strength that usually accompanies a layoff.
 
Fish oil:  Helps aid in fat loss and enhance joint recovery
 
ZMA’s
 
 
Lets hear some of your suggestions!!
 

i’d trim down to the bare bones:
multivitamin
fish oil
vitamin D
any other longevity related supplements you want, for example any of the suppls from the Supp Series 5 or Supp Series 6

if you aren’t working out and trying to build muscle, your body isn’t going to waste resources trying to maintain more muscle than it needs. muscle is the most expensive tissue in the body to create and maintain since it uses the most calories, and your body doesn’t like having more than it needs because it’s inefficient. if your body won’t waste its resources on muscle, niether should you. dumping all that money into creatine and BCAAs and whey protein (unless it’s a meal supplement) would be a waste.

Pete.. You really would not take BCAAs??
 
If anything i would think that would be a great idea

why would it be a good idea?

Because bcaas help protect muscle from breaking down.. plain and simple..

is this another one of your theoretical “you can never work out for the rest of your life” type of questions or is this more along the lines of “you can’t work out for a week because you are on vacation” types?

the reason i say it would be a waste is because if you aren’t working out, your muscles atrophy within a fairly short period of time, meaning they will shrink. your body likes to be efficient with its resources and muscle tissue is probably the most inefficient tissue you can have, so your body will break it down quickly in order to maximize its resources elsewhere. while your muscle tissues are shrinking, you will also have less cells focused on muscle synthesis and regulating muscle proteins.

granted, supplements like creatine and BCAAs will slow this process down, but if you aren’t going to be working out ever again, or never going to need to build muscle, then all that money you are spending on those supplements is a waste, IMO.

I was talking about a short period of time.
 
1-2 months tops!

you should really take creatine if you are not training??  wont that add lots of water weight to you makenig you gain bad weight??

I was talking about a short period of time (1-2 months) without training/working out.  Imo, preventing muscle loss is more important compared to adding some water weight.
 
This is just a temporary precaution to help preserve muscle and strength. I would not suggest taking creatine if you are out of the gym for more then 4 months or more..
 
Personally, i do not take creatine however i was just giving examples of supplements that could help preserve muscle… Don’t bite my head off because of it lol…
 

I just read an article that suggested these 18 things to help injuries heal faster….
Glucosamine, Selenium, Chromium Picolinate, Vitamin E, A Multi-Vitamin, Chondroitin, Vitamin C, Zinc, Vitamin B3, Proteolytic Enzmes, Cetyl Myristoleate, Carnitine, Evening primrose oil, MSM (AKA methylsulfonylmethane), Pregnenolone, DHEA, Omega 3 fatty acid, Co-Enzyme Q10…
Im not going to lie, im not sure if these will all help, but what they said after each thing, like a little description, seemed as if they would, but heres the link to the article if anyone would like to read it, because im not yet sure how to post article with copyright rules and what not on the site. so heres the link…..
http://www.trifuel.com/training/health-nutrition/18-supplements-that-could-help-your--
body-heal-faster

you’re going to retain water if you take creatine, regardless of whether or not you are training, and since it’s only water it really can’t be considered “bad weight”. if it’s only 1 month then continuing to take come creatine probably wouldn’t hurt, although i still think creatine would be a waste.Creatine does work to increase muscle fiber number, but whether or not it would prevent atrophy without any resistance training i do not know. i would probably recommend going off the creatine and then reloading once you resume training.
BCAAs would help prevent catabolism if you took enough, and there has been some recent research to suggest that CoQ10 can help preserve type II muscle fibers.

Pete.. earlier you made this comment
 
“if you aren’t working out and trying to build muscle, your body isn’t going to waste resources trying to maintain more muscle than it needs. muscle is the most expensive tissue in the body to create and maintain since it uses the most calories, and your body doesn’t like having more than it needs because it’s inefficient. if your body won’t waste its resources on muscle, niether should you. dumping all that money into creatine and BCAAs and whey protein (unless it’s a meal supplement) would be a waste. “
 
 
 
 
Now you are saying the complete opposite.
 
Were you referring to a person that never works out in that statement?
 
 

yes i was, so no, i wasn’t contradicting myself. if it’s a matter of only a few weeks or a month off, i would recommend the guidelines i just gave in my last post.

if you are talking about someone that doesn’t work out at all or can’t for the rest of their life (like i thought you might have meant with the original question), no amount of supplementation is going to do them any good and it would be a waste.

essentially what it comes down to is, even when you are working out, your body only wants to maintain as much muscle as is necessary to get the job done. if you force it to carry extra muscle by working out hard and lifting heavy weights and making it need to carry that muscle to perform those actions, it takes a lot of eating and supplying nutrients and protein in order to maintain that muscle. as soon as it can afford to, your body will break that muscle down as a mode of self preservation. when it comes down to it, when your goal is building muscle you are constantly battling with your body and its natural processes in order to keep all that muscle mass.

does that clear things up?

SO what you are saying is that it is VERY crucial to supplement if you are not able to workout for a short period of time?
 
“It takes a lot of eating and supplying nutrients and protein in order to maintain that muscle”
 
In that case if you are not working out you are not forcing your body to carry extra muscle.  Supplementing will at least help prevent your muscle from breaking down..?? Right

right. your body values blood sugar levels more than being able to bench press 500 lbs. if you aren’t providing it with the right stimulus and enough of the right nutrients it will break your muscle down into glucose via gluconeogenesis. see Matt’s cortisol article for more about this.

so yes, it’s important to supplement. 1 month you shouldn’t see too big of a difference but any longer than that and i’d say just give your body a vacation and pick it all (exercise and supplementation) back up when you plan on getting back to business.

 
 
Good explanation Pete! 
By the way this question actually became relevant to me this weekend… My fiancé was sent to the emergency room to get his appendix taken out…
 
WHAT A nightmare! It was so unexpected.  I stayed with him in the hospital for 2 nights and 1 day… He is not going to be able to workout for some time so i will surly pass this information to him…
 
It’s so weird that the appendix has no function in the body… Why would the human body even have one?  I know there have been thousands of studies but it just makes no sense.