You've reached your goal weight - come chat about maintenance, not regaining, going cold turkey or titrating down

[MargoLivebetter]

Would people who've hit their target weight be interested in a general thread on how they are getting on? You might be titrating your WLI down, you might be going cold turkey, you might be on a maintenance programme or you might have gone back on.

I used MJ for 5 months and I've hit my goal and I'm muddling through with my own version of "maintenance". I'm doing a 1.25 dose weekly to use up what I've got left and cut down gradually, so I don't lose all the benefits of MJ immediately. I was a complete lightweight and did the whole 5 months on just 2.5, as I had savage suppression and loss of appetite. So, I'm just halving my dosage.

I'd be interested to hear how others are getting on, given it all feels a bit new and the long-term aspects of weight maintenance are not yet much talked about.

Im joining in from the oct 25 starters thread as Im not sure how Im going to exit MJ so following everyone's experiences.
Thank you for all of your posts.

Yes, exactly, it was not weighing and not caring that let my weight creep up so much! But what’s the right level of monitoring? I guess it’ll take a while to find out.

Yes, daily feels excessive but when I've been on it I've weighed daily, plus I don't want it to get out of hand (at least I can just up my dose when I feel like things are getting away, but this is not what I want to do long term).
I think I might keep a diary Bridget Jones style, weight and what I ate (not necessarily calories as that can send me a bit crazy but I think it's useful to see a trend

Agree what’s £15

You misunderstand my original point. I'm asking how Oushk gets away with it despite the tightening up regulations. They must have found a loophole.

Edited

Actually other pharmacies do allow restarts so will see if any of these allow ordering every 8-12 weeks. Obviously not livewell though after the spamming on here!

monj.co.uk/restarting-mounjaro-uk/

My weight fluctuates so much that I weigh daily when at home, but I don’t always log it if I don’t like what I see. I actually find it reassuring as if I get home after a weekend away and see a much larger number than I had hoped for, I know it will come down again

Simple Online Pharmacy aren't on that list, but they allow re-starts as long as it isn't more than 12 weeks since you last had a dose. And obviously you re-start back on 2.5mg.

Hello @Tarragon123 congratulations on all that you've lost. That is really significant. Mounjaro made me feel very tired, so you may find as you titrate down you feel less fatigued.

Welcome @HappyNewt good to have you reaching the next stage. Lots of helpful tips and different approaches on here to keep you company.

So glad you reached goal @ShrankLastWinter . The change from losing to maintaining is a bit of an odd one and does take a while to adjust to, but in a way it is a great problem to have too.

Having done this so many times before and failing at maintenance... I absolutely recommend calorie counting.
I use myfitnesspal but any calorie logger. Hell, just write it on a piece of paper! Figure out your maintenance calories first, but don't rush it. Mine appear to be a little lower than the TDEE calculator estimates, but that's because it's hard to work out with excercise. I started at 1500 cals, then daily weighed and only increased when I was sure I wasn't at maintenance. It took around 3 weeks each increase of 100 cals to be sure.
Then just keep logging until you're in a groove with it.
I tried to stop counting a couple of weeks ago, but chickened out as I like my safety net. I don't always eat to my cals, but it keeps me accountable and I try to match my activity to what I'm consuming.

Oh and I still daily weigh as much as possible. Unless I've had a late dinner followed by an early morning get up as I know it will be wildly out! But I weigh at least 5 times a week.

I weigh daily too. I find it the best way to prevent things going in the wrong direction for too long.

I still weigh weekly. When I was on MJ, I weighed once a week as well and thought when I stopped, l’ll start weighing twice a month but I chickened out. I don’t want it to be obsessive but since going alone with maintenance, checking my weight and seeing consistency has been like an added check. I’ve decided to stick with weekly weighing for another year at least.

I weigh weekly too and usually report it on here too. It is a habit I got in on the August 2024 WLI thread and I find it helps keep me accountable.

Interestingly I asked ChatGPT last night about habits for people who have kept weight off and they suggested daily weighing. I am too scared to put the weight back on so I will be weighing daily (or as often as possible, sometimes I forget) for the foreseeable future. Maybe after a while I will drag out to weekly and beyond but my weight fluctuates quite wildly and I'd be worried if I left it a week or so it would go too high.

I also decided I want to track. I've stayed at maintenance for the last 3 months (on mj) but still no idea about maintenance calories. I don't want to track calories as it drives me insane but I've decided to track using my slimming world app, it's difficult of course because I don't know how big my jacket potato is etc, but I don't want to be weighing my food or writing down bits of lettuce so this works best for me and then I can figure out how much I can eat roughly before trying to titrate slowly down (I went from 5 to 2.5 but recently gone back up to 3.75 as bad habits had come back, I think it will be helpful knowing what I should be eating to help with habits)

I tracked whilst I was on Mj. I didn't do it for the calories as like most of us I knew those. I did it to remind me about portion sizes. And that really helped! Really like Nutracheck app.

Before and now my calories are based on a macros calculator based on average activity and exercise. Works really well for me. The only time I add back calories is if I've been on a 2+ hour walk.

I'm starting to think about maintenance. Mounjaro has been great for me on the whole - but I've been quite tired and quite meh-ish about life since I've been on it. For people on this thread that have had the same reaction, did that improve when you came off/went onto a lower maintenance dose? (Also think weighing myself regularly will be key btw - thank you for people's experience over that...)

@MJOverInvestor I also felt very weary and a bit meh whilst on MJ. It improved a bit when I halved my dose and went away completely when I quit it altogether. I was very relieved.

Thank you! That's very good to know. I've been on MJ for nearly a year now - slowly reaching 7.5 and I wonder if the fatigue/meh-ness is cumulative. I'm still at a BMI of just over 30 but would love to have more enthusiasm for life so am wondering about starting to taper down earlier than planned... so all advice gratefully received (I'm an emotional/frustration eater).

@MargoLivebetter thank you, that’s really interesting. I am starting to feel less fatigued. Maybe its been a side effect all these months and I haven’t realised.

I’m really in two minds about what to do next. I’ve managed to stretch my last microdose. Should have taken it on Monday, but as I was away, I thought I’d just take it on Tuesday. However, I’m seeing if I can make it until Friday, which is a week. Maybe I can last longer. Seriously just thinking about doing cold turkey now. Is/has anyone else done this?

I weigh myself a lot more now, not daily but probably four times a week. Not quite at maintenance yet but hopefully it won't be long.

I'm slightly nervous about going onto 15mg at two stone lighter, though my body so far has been fairly under-reactive to Mounjaro as it is with most drugs. I did have more nausea and tiredness on 12.5mg and my blood sugar got too low a couple of times, but have mostly felt just as well as on other doses.

I plan to continue to track my food on maintenance. I've tracked for such a long time on Nutracheck anyway (on and off since 2021, very much on all this year) it has become a habit, and does not seem onerous.

@Tarragon123 I kind of ended up where you are. I planned to do a small dose for way longer than I did. I ended up completely forgetting to do it at all one week and then went cold turkey. The uptick in energy levels was fantastic, the increase in food noise less so and I also had a huge IBS flare up as the MJ left my system too. However, I didn't panic and it all calmed down. I think I took my last dose some time in March.

There are a few other posters on here who have also gone down the cold turkey route. I'm fairly sure @SnacklessWonder is one and she has gone on to lose more weight. Others have given it a go and then gone back on again, so there are no hard and fast rules or right ways or wrong ways.

Do you need to go up a dose @jellyfishperiwinkle ? Are you losing weight on 12.5mg?

Yes I have done quite well on it, @MargoLivebetter I've got the 15mg pen in my fridge though for Friday. Perhaps I should do 50 clicks only?

Energy levels and an actual interest in things have definitely come back since I came off.

Energy levels and an actual interest in things have definitely come back since I came off.

Ah, that's good to know that it might be the Mounjaro, or partly. I lost my DM only three months ago and am also at menopause- mostly I've felt ok, everything considered - particularly in terms of lack of low oestrogen symptoms, I'm amazed. But yes, sometimes a bit meh and feel that I can't be arsed- more than usual.

I was on the mini pill (desogestrel) for a few years, as it was reckoned to be better with endometriosis. Certainly the symptoms were managed pretty well, but then my sex drive seemed to really drop and I was having vaginal atrophy by the age of 46/47. I went back on the combined pill, knowing I could only have a couple of years on it and felt much better all round, and the oestrogen really sorted out the unpleasant symptoms.

Then I stopped taking anything as coming up to 50 I wanted to see if my periods had stopped naturally, three months before I started taking mounjaro. I've had no periods and the unpleasant low oestrogen symptoms have not returned, eight/nine months on, thank goodness, but I was amazed as I expected to feel absolutely pants!

How interesting, unrelated to the conversation but I've been on desogestrel 20+ years due to migraines (I'm also on progesterone pill, oestrogen gel and oestrogen pessary) and I've struggled with vaginal atrophy despite the pessaries. I don't think I can take the mini pill but I wonder if I need more oestrogen. My libido is non existent, this was pre-mj. I wondered if it was because I was unhappy with my body, but I've lost the weight and still have no interest, plus not sure it works anymore 😱