Continuing Mounjaro...part 17

[ObsidianTree]

Please note: Mounjaro will only be be prescribed initially if your BMI is above 30. If you have additional health conditions you can get the medication with a BMI 27. (Prediabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol or heart problems)

Pointers for newbies:
1 - For taking your first dose you need to twist the pen a lot to get to 1! Make sure the needle is twisted on tightly. Priming will help confirm if the needle is on securely and not faulty.
2 - When injecting, hold down the button until the number goes back to 0. Once at 0, keep holding down the button and count to 5 with the needle still in so no medication is lost!
3 - Your first dose may not have an immediate effect. For some people the effects build slowly. It could take 3 or 4 days to notice anything, it could take a few weeks. Some people don't feel the meds working until they get to 5mg. See titration chart which shows how the medication builds up in your system. Also below you can plot the effect of your doses.
https://glp1plotter.com/
4 - 2.5mg isn't a therapeutic dose, meaning you aren’t meant to lose on 2.5mg. You need to start on 2.5mg to get your body used to the drug and gradually introduce it into your system and get used to any side effects.
5 - Not everyone loses a lot in the first few weeks. Don't feel discouraged if you don't lose a lot initially. Again, you might need a higher dose to start losing. Also, inches can be lost without anything showing on the scales. Start your journey by taking measurements and check them as you go along.
6 - If you do lose a lot in the first few weeks, please don't assume you will continue losing at this rate. The first few weeks it is usually water weight that is lost, after that a good weight loss is about 2lbs a week. Some weeks you might not lose anything, but this is ok too…again, taking measurements might show inches lost instead.
7 - Some people find that they don't need to go up a pen dose each month if the current pen dosage is working well for them. If you are unsure when to go up, speak to your prescriber.
8 - If you are having bad side effects after titrating up or you are struggling to eat your calories each day, your dose may be too high so should consider lowering your dose. Speak to your prescriber if unsure.
9 - Constipation, coldness, nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, headaches, aches, are side effects. There may be other side effects also. Read info here :
www.medicines.org.uk/emc/product/15481/pil#about-medicine
10 - Taking Mounjaro can stop birth control from being effective. If you are on birth control, consider extra protection if you aren't planning on conceiving anytime soon!
11 - Once you take your first dose you can choose to keep your pen in the fridge or somewhere else. It's up to you.
12 - Don't reuse any needles as this could risk infection. If you damage a needle or one isn't working, you can buy a pack of about 100 spares. https://www.chemist-4-u.com/carepoint-pen-needles-31g-4mm-pack-of-100?gclid=Cj0KCQjwiYOxBhC5ARIsAIvdH51rLZBVFQxuvS7mDJooegtK8BMiyT0PwREMRHhH_1atfQIo8TEbsmkaAkA0EALw_wcB
Also there is a 5th dose in each pen. To extract it you can either try a hard twist or use an insulin needle.
https://medbasic.co.uk/bd-micro-fine-30g-1ml-syringes-needles
13 - Protein is important as eating less protein can cause muscle wastage and hair loss.
Some natural sources of protein:
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/best-sources-protein
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/321522#high-protein-foods
14 - You can use supplements, some that people use are magnesium(for sleep and constipation), protein(to reduce muscle wastage), collagen (skin elasticity), aloe vera(for constipation), psylum husks(fibre for constipation), electrolytes.
15 - Drink lots of water. Water helps with the weight loss. Try and drink at least 2ltrs a day.
16 - Don't be afraid to feel hungry. It is entirely normal and healthy to feel hungry. Just eat something. Treat it as an opportunity to start good habits around hunger. Eat a nice balanced snack or a meal if it's a meal time. It's ok.
17 - Does it makes any difference where you inject? yes it does! Drugs get absorbed at different rates depending on injection site
In order of fastest absorption, it goes:
• Tummy
• Arms
• Thighs
further reading about injection sites and the effects: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/316618
18 - Abdominal side-effects are much easier to control with smaller meals. For example, having 4 small meals in the day vs 2 big meals can have an improvement in nausea and burps.
19 - You can track your calories / protein on apps such as My fitnessPal, Carb Manager or Nutracheck. Nutracheck is quite useful and easy to find foods /build recipes.
20 - Some of the places you can order from are:

MedExpress:
2.5mg and 5mg. £149.99. 7.5mg £169.99, 10mg £189.99. 12.5mg £209.99. 15mg £209.99 Coupon codes no longer working!
The Family Chemist:
2.5mg and 5mg £149. 7.5mg £169, 10mg £169, 12.5mg £194, 15mg £199
Zava medical:
2.5mg £139, 5mg £139, 7.5mg £169, 10mg £189. 12.5mg £204. 15mg £204. Zava offer refer a friend discount of 15% off. Ask for a code on here.
Simple online pharmacy:
£149 2.5mg, £149 5mg, £169 7.5mg £189 10mg
Bolt pharmacy:
2.5mg £149, 5mg £149. 7.5mg £169, 10mg £179, 12.5mg £199, 15mg £199
Asda:
2.5mg and 5mg £179. 7.5mg £189, 10mg £189, 12.5mg £204 15mg £204
There are others not listed.
21- You will still be prescribed Mounjaro when your BMI falls below 30. However, it may be harder to move suppliers once you BMI is below 30 if you wanted to move.
22 - Worried about your supply being cut off when you get to a healthy BMI? Below is some info on some places maintenance plans.
The Family chemist :Would consult you as approached healthy BMI to discuss maintenance under close supervision(if you started with family chemist)
Curate: up to 2 years
Cloud: up to 2 years
Boots: Cut off at BMI 23
Asda: Cut off at a healthy BMI
Pharmacy2u: Will supply for maintenance
Bolt:Individual assessment once BMI 22 and does offer maintenance
Zava:Once healthy BMI will stop prescribing this treatment
Med Express: BMI 25 and cut off.
23 - If you want to switch suppliers, make sure you have pics of your Mounjaro box with your name and dose. This will come in useful when other suppliers ask for evidence.

1st thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5007744-mourjano-starting-soon?page=1
2nd thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5028495-continuing-murnjaropart-2?page=1
3rd thread:
_https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5037623-continuing-mounjaropart-3?page=_1
4th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5044316-continuing-mounjaropart-4?page=1
5th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5048290-continuing-mounjaropart-5?page=1
6th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5057916-continuing-mounjaropart-6?page=1
7th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5062935-continuing-mounjaropart-7?page=1
8th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5068850-continuing-mounjaropart-8?page=1
9th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5074054-continuing-mounjaropart-9?page=1
10th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5080755-continuing-mounjaro-thread-10?page=1
11th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight_loss_chat/5085436-continuing-mounjaro-thread-11?page=1
12th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5090788-continuing-mounjaro-thread-12?page=1
13th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5096704-continuing-mounjaropart-13?page=1
14th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5102149-continuing-mounjaropart-14?page=1
15th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5107426-continuing-mounjaropart-15?page=1
16th thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5115015-continuing-mounjaropart-16?page=1

Thread for newbies just starting out in July:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5101435-mounjaro-july-2024
Video on how to inject:

@OnInstagramAsMounjaroJourneyUK thanks for that info on insulin resistance. Very interesting.

Wow what a brilliant and thoroughly informative read @OnInstagramAsMounjaroJourneyUK I've screenshotted and saved links for all of that. It certainly clears alot up for me and I'll definitely be looking into that some more. Thankyou!

For me, my road to MJ was a combination of working in a job where I took daily abuse from angry patients, the illness and subsequent death of my brother, then lockdown and the challenges of working for the NHS and menopause kicking in, all within a year of each other. The work related stuff got so much worse during covid when I was already a wreck after my brother died so I took it out on food and then menopause made it near on impossible to lose any of the weight and my gp fobbed me off because I was “too young” at 42/43. My numerous efforts at trying to lose weight since have all fallen flat because nothing worked, and I tried them all - low carb, WW, SW, fast 800, intermittent fasting, 5/2, CICO, the lot. CICO is the biggest lie to menopausal women!

Thankfully I found the confidence to change jobs so I don’t have to deal with the daily crap and have found a job that I really enjoy. The rest has kind of just fallen into place 🙂 I have absolutely no doubt that I wouldn’t have lost this much weight without MJ

On the upside though, I went out on my pushbike this morning for the first time since before MJ and almost 2 stone lighter and there was such a difference!

I think daily weighing is definitely going to have to be part of my maintenance strategy. I always gain when I stop weighing/stop weighing when I start gaining. No more hiding in baggy clothes/loose scrubs/ stretchy trousers either as it's too easy to gain half a stone without noticing.

Diet wise, I do think it will be a lot easier to eat well when I'm slim though, because the healthy/unhealthy choices have an immediate impact. When you're 17+ stone, one more slice of toast doesn't make much difference. Nor does a week of healthy eating, because there's so far to go.
When I'm at goal, there will be a greater risk/reward to my food choices. Ditto exercise. Not saying it will be easy, but I think it's easier to eat well when you're feeling healthy.

Has anyone found their cycle has got longer? I’m a week late, tested and not pg so I’m wondering if the mj is having an unwanted side effect.

2 questions! 1 week in. Would like to up protein and do strength stuff at home.

1. Not sure if I can really manage cooking and eating enough protein every day, it's been quite an effort to get to 1mg/kg this last week. I'd like to avoid processed stuff but thinking of trying it for convenience- what artificial protein sources do you use? Is it all a powder that gets mixed into a drink? Does it taste ok?

1. Strength training- I'm sold on the benefits, but not sure where to start- anyone got any specific recommendations/links etc??

Thank you!

can anyone let me know what their losses have been like on 10mg? My progress has stalled slightly on 7.5mg although the suppression is still there and I haven’t changed what I’m eating from the earlier doses. I’ve seen similar reports from others so I’d love to hear if 10mg kicked things off again

Just did my bonus dose from 5mg pen and did 8ml so a slight step up.

I have 7.5mg and a 5mg pens in the fridge and will prob go up to 7.5 next week and save the 5 for titrating down. I want to get the weight off so keen to increase dose but also worried about side effects. I have been lucky to have had virtually no bad sore effects so far.

In the past the suppression hits me about 8 hours after the jab so looking forward to that feeling again tomorrow.

@freemyboobs some of us use myprotein clear whey drinks to get protein and fluid intake up. Dilute more than it states on the tub.

Some flavours are hit and miss. I've enjoyed orange mango and also dragonfruit.

You can get two tubs serving 20 portions each for £30 currently

I can give you £10 off a £45 spend if you want a code also free delivery. It also gives me £10 credit

I want to know about the 1ml insulin syringe needles too. I don’t think you can buy them over counter at Boots. Where are people getting them from?

@GreyFinch I have exactly the same query. On week 5 on 7.5 and the suppression is good but the last three weeks losses have been an absolute minimum, maybe a couple of hundred grams. Would moving up to 10 help? Interested to hear how others have found it.

@Aslockton I bought the ones linked in the first post of the thread.

Similar situation here, I've done 4 weeks on 7.5mg, with a week of 6.5 and one of 6.125 beforehand, so I'm well adjusted to it now and minimal side effects. I am still debating whether to go up to 10mg this week. My loss isn't really slow, but it's very up and down the past few weeks so hard to tell!

Also the pens I've got would be in use for far too long if I stick at 7.5, so doing 10mg would get me through them a bit faster. I've got a 12.5mg pen with expiry end November and a 15mg that expires end of October and still have 4 full doses in my 10mg pen! If I don't want them open too long or expiring, I need to go up as per the programme really.

@Aslockton I use the 1ml ones liked in the first post. You can measure how much bonus dose you get with them and I am scared of the ‘hard twist’.
I got almost 1ml bonus dose today but used 0.8 as I didn’t want too much of a dose increase.

That was a great post about insulin resistance @OnInstagramAsMounjaroJourneyUK thank you, it answered the things I'd been wondering about. Until just now, I thought insulin resistance was sometimes the result of poor eating habits in otherwise healthy people who become obese (like the old me with my truck loads of chocolate and other processed crap). I was wondering if I had somehow 'made' myself insulin resistant!

I've given you a follow.

What's worrying is that it doesn't look like there are many good options at the moment.

I think a lot of prescribers are struggling with the ever increasing number of customers

Thanks for the great post @OnInstagramAsMounjaroJourneyUK

I have always wondered about insulin resistance and been pretty sure I must have had it.

It did for me. I lost an average of 0.5 pounds a week on 7.5 but 1.5 on 10mg.

Pleased that my post helped! There are so many levels to it but it explains why we can struggle to lose weight the bigger we are and why we Yo-yo l.

Something ai didnt go into in that post is not only foes insulin resistance make you store more energy as fast, it can also make you hungrier -

"Without enough insulin, glucose builds up in your blood, causing hyperglycemia (high blood sugar). Glucose (sugar) is the main form of energy your body uses from the food you eat. Without enough insulin, your body can't use glucose for energy. This lack of energy usage causes an increase in hunger."
https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/symptoms/24637-polyphagia-hyperphagia

When you add this together with the set point theory discussed oreviously (that it can take 1 - 6 years for your bidy to settle at a weight and that your body wants to keep you at a certain point so the metabolism acts like a thermostat (it increases when you eat to excess and slows when you under eat and may lose too much weight), it really shows how we were always dieting against the odds!

And it shows how these weight loss injections should be viewed as a medicine and never an easy way out (it suits people with 'better' biology to think they have more willpower...)

I'll get off my soapbox now 😆

@ObsidianTree Yes I think you are right about them being overwhelmed. And I suspect the holiday season may leave them short staffed.

@OnInstagramAsMounjaroJourneyUK great post, thank you. I always assumed I wasn't insulin resistant as my blood sugar is in the normal range (albeit towards the higher end of the range) but I think maybe I was wrong. Carbs are definitely my nemesis - though not since mj.

Light bulb moment!

Went a jaunt on my ebike for the first time in ages.

I always felt e bikes are tremendously heavy, and certainly wouldn't have fancied pedaling mine far with a flat battery and no assist from it.

Today I realised it's not actually that heavy at all and really quite easy to pedal. I was flying along with the power switched off.

Yep, it wasnt the bike that weighed a ton, it was me😂

Feeling slightly terrified. I have just taken my first 12.5mg dose. I was crushingly tired after my first 10mg dose but no other side effects and I had good suppression. I then seemed to acclimate to it pretty quickly and lost about 7lbs while using the pen. So I decided to try 12.5mg as I have a week where I can focus purely on work and weight loss before I go on holiday.

Am currently hoping the side effects will be nothing worse than I felt on 10mg.

@OnInstagramAsMounjaroJourneyUK thanks that’s useful and definitely relatable. I know something is arye with my insulin levels but I’ve had several blood tests over the last few years and came back ok. But I have a lot of those symptoms for too low blood sugar on a daily basis and then get stuck in a cycle chasing sugar. Since starting MJ it’s like I’ve been stabilised or it’s easier to regulate them without using sweet things.

Yes! I used to be 28 days, regular as clockwork. When I started Mounjaro, my cycle suddenly stretched out to five weeks, and it's been like that for a couple of months now. I am 51, though, so wonky periods aren't exactly unexpected.