Mounjaro / Wegovy with > 5st / 30kg to lose: Thread 6

[VelociraptorsVelociRapping]

Thread SIX of this lovely community. Anyone using weight-loss injections to lose more than 5 stone or 30kg is very welcome to join us, no matter what stage of the process you are on. Share your losses, your non-scale victories (NSV), your frustrations and your love of Longley Farm cottage cheese and kiwi fruit here!

Please don’t post discount codes on this thread as your post will be deleted. These need to go in the dedicated thread on this board.

Well done everyone who is smashing it!

I am Scottish - live in the Highlands. I have told not a soul (apart from all of you) that I am on MJ and never intend to. Everyone around me knows I am on a healthy eating journey - they see what I eat. One of the advantages of not having suppression is, I can eat normal/large ish meals when I eat out and I can usually finish my plateful (but do stop when I am full). It is obvious from what I order that I am "sticking to" my plan.

I started MJ in September when my size 22 jeggings were so tight they hurt and all my bras were digging in. I had bought clothes in a size 24+. I was physically sore from decorating, etc and found it tricky to reach down and get up off the floor....

My dear friend dying of cancer has affected me deeply and it made me assess my health in a very profound way. I am completely bereft without her. Something triggered me and I admit to being frightened by the prospect of dying relatively young (her cancer had nothing to do with her lifestyle - feel the need to say that if it is coming across that way). I am trying to say it made me think about my mortality at a very deep level.

Another friend made a throwaway comment (positive) about WLI's and here I am.

Dinner lady arm though😂@dimples76

Really sorry for your loss @NewbieMJ. It is very touching that despite your friend not being here, they had such an impact on your journey. Grief is a terrible
thing, a heart ache I’ve never known before. I wonder what my dad would have said about my weight loss, though I don’t think I would have told him about my injections.I’m sure your friend would be very proud of you making such an impact on your health. My dad would be proud of me too.

I kept everything MJ and diet-related quiet for months (other than DH, the kids and a couple of colleagues as they and I are geeks about health/medication) but did tell a group of female friends just after Christmas. All have been very supportive but there are some friends I have still not told, mostly retired GPs as I suspect they will not be up-to-date about the medication but will maintain their attitude of knowing best regardless!

On the plus side I am almost at the end of a huge clothes clear out. My wardrobe has ranged from 16s to 24s and I can't believe how much stuff I have! I can't cope with Vinted and can't be arsed with the faff of selling things for just a few quid, even if it does mount up so I have given a load to friends and will bag the rest up for a friend who does charity selling.

PS. I am not Scottish, no Scottish heritage or connections, have only ever been there once for a weekend and it rained the whole time, only stopping as we crossed back into England. Sorry to let the side down!

Interesting hearing about all the different opinions on this, several months after starting especially.

I am still completely secret about it. My weightloss is very noticeable now, but folks, if they ask, never ask how or assume injections - out loud at least. I have briefly talked about calorie counting and being consistent with a deficit once or twice when asked a bit if it was Slimming World or whatever.

Is it shame? Sometimes it probably is. Sometimes its just because I do not want to hear thin people talk about it being the devil’s work. Sometimes I just don’t want to engage with that kind of negativity about fat bodies and eating disorder type behaviours. Sometimes I just don’t want to think about dieting more than I already do.

I am not saying its going to be a secret forever, but I actually feel really comfortable in that secret now; as my dose has been fairly consistent for months on end, so I don’t worry about managing to live a ‘normal’ life around folks and bad reactions etc.

I am surprisingly really enjoying exercise. It’s always felt like a chore before to do anything except swimming, and even that I found easy to put off if it was cold, rainy, a bit busy on the roads, I heard a funny noise (you get the drift)

So this week:
Monday - Swimming
Tuesday - Gym
Wednesday - Gym
Thursday - Swimming
Friday - Gym
Saturday - Swimming (DD and her friend are going for a splash about so I’ll be in the ‘boring’ pool next to them doing lengths.
Sunday - Rest, but hopefully it will be dry and sunny enough to tackle the garden a bit, or just hang out in my hammock, it is Mother’s Day after all.

I have found myself more focused at work, more ready to start the day and just generally more relaxed.

My mum's 95 year old friend, who was an absolute beauty as a young woman, immediately noticed when we went round today. She's very appearance conscious so it really matters to her.

I wonder if people asking or suspecting MJ use depends on the type of area you live in? I am in an area where there there is a significant number of people very image focussed, lots of botox, fillers, surgery, etc (although not so much in my immediate friendship group). I never know whether to be pleased they trust me or offended when people tell me about fillers and tweakments!
There is a aesthetics clinic and a private GP led service that both run clinics and supply MJ properly so maybe there is more awareness here

OMG I am finally home and in bed after my gig evening - which I loved..! Stood up and danced for 5 hours, so surely this is as good as a work out - and will be a real test of whether the plantar fasciitis has completely gone, as my feet are really sore right now, but am hoping they will recover quickly!

Pleased though, as I didn't struggle with back ache and although I'm knackered, it was doable, which I don't think I would have managed as well a few months ago!

P.S. I am not from Scotland, but am in the North West and have been lots of times on holiday 😀

Glad you had a good night @MooBaggageremember plenty of water today and do your heel/toe foot stretches to relieve your sore feet. I used to like standing on the edge of the bottom stair backwards and letting my heel drop down it really felt like it was stretching all the squished up tight muscles.

Weigh in day for me today after 30 something weeks

SW: 241.2 lbs, 17st 3
CW: 174.6 lbs, 12st 7
Total loss: 66.6 lbs, 4st 11

After gaining 2.4lbs last week I have lost 4.1 this week so the blip has been corrected. Another tough week ahead though as I’m staying with family who a) really stress me out and b) eat enormous amounts of very carby food and drink like fishes 😭

The best news is that according to my scales 🙌 my body fat mass and % are now “standard” instead of “high”. I think that would be for the first time since I was a child and I’m 54. Or 56 if you ask the scales 🤨

@MooBaggage I'm in the NW too!
Just waiting for my MJ delivery this morning. Stupid that after 10 months I'm still always on edge waiting for it
I caved and ordered a 15mg after hearing about the shortages although I don't need it just yet. It's only £10 more than 12.5mg so I could use it for a lower dose if needed.

<waves> 😄

I need to order my next pen but am having ridiculously high suppression having moved from 5mg which didn't seem to do anything, to 6.5mg which is making me feel rough 🙄

So I don't know whether to get a 5mg pen but do 6mg, which might be about right for me, or 7.5mg pen and make it last longer doing 6mg (but will go over the recommended 30 day expiry). Aaarrgghhh....

I really really don't want or need to increase to 7.5mg, but seem to need that bit more than 5mg.

Hmm..... Need to decide today, so any words of wisdom gratefully appreciated!

(obvs I know no-one can actually give me medical advice and it's my choice etc. etc..!)

Have just done the maths and the 7.5mg pen would give me 6 x doses of 6mg, which is possibly pushing the 30 day limit to far, to 42 days. Although it's tempting, because I can then increase if I'm finding the 6mg not quite right, I'll probably play it safe and order a 5mg pen, which will last for 4 weeks with the self injection last dose.

Sorry for the wittering!

@MooBaggage I do this with my 10mg pen - I take a dose of 8.5 which seems to be a good amount for me. (I go over the recommended expiry with no bad effects).

At least if you had the 7.5mg you could tweak it later on if you need more.

I am creeping down the scales, but will take each pound off as a win...

SW: 18 stone 11 (263 pounds)
CW: 15 stone 2 (212 pounds)

Lost 3 stone 9 (51 pounds) since 2nd September.

I am very much enjoying the journey, but DESPERATE to get to 14 stone something and get to that 4 stone loss.

I'm so sorry for your loss! Good luck with your weightloss journey x

I just received my 5ml pen and am regretting it a bit. I went for 5 because I felt suppression was wearing off. But this last week of 2.5 I've barely been able to eat! So now I don't know whether I should go up to 5?

Week 38 weigh in for me.

SW: 139kg (21st 12 lbs)
CW: 91.6kg (14st 6 lbs), was 92.4kg (14st 5.5 lbs) last week
GW: 90kg (14st 2 lbs) fourth interim goal.

Current pen: 7.5mg, 28 weeks on this dosage.

A 0.2kg "gain", which I will take as essentially staying the same. Grr, annoying. I really want to get to 90kg and start breaking into the 80s. I have another 2 weeks on this pen, so I will make a focussed effort to improve on my exercise and really watch my calories and see if that makes a difference. If not, then maybe it's time to move to 10mg.

If you think you'd be better staying on 2.5 you could contact your provider to see if they could send the lower strength out in time and keep the 5 in your fridge. I did that between 7.5 and 10, they were really helpful

@MooBaggage
Sorry if I am misunderstanding, but 6 doses takes 5 weeks, not 6, so 35 days not 42.

So you inject on day 0, 7, 14, 21, 28, 35.

I think that’s fine and did it when I found myself not feeling great on 15mg but with most of the pen still to use.

Oooh - of course! Thank you 😊

Your scales are much nicer to you than mine are! I am 56 and they have my age as 63 😱

Hasn't changed even though I have lost over 6st now!

You can continue to take 2.5mg using your 5mg pen by only clicking 30 times when you turn the dose knob (instead of 60 clicks to get all the way to the 1 in the window).

Doing this means if you find in a couple/three weeks 2.5mg is really consistently wearing off you can then consider moving to 5mg (or somewhere between 2.5mg and 5mg if you prefer).

Sticking to the lower doses for as long as you can stay in calorie deficit is a good strategy when you have a lot of weight to lose.

Little bit of a brag here but my scales say my metabolic age is 39, I’m 41 so feeling quite chuffed about that 😆

Just to add to the geography bits of the chat, I’m also not Scots based, I’m in the East Mids area.

I am another in Scotland!

If you got a higher dose pen eg 5mg but only wanted to take eg 3mg, does the pen allow you to do more than 4 injections or will it stop you at 4?