Mounjaro/Wegovy with > 5 stone/30kg to lose. Thread 8!

[MooBaggage]

Thread EIGHT - blimey we talk a lot! 😄 Anyone using weight loss injections to lose more than 5st/30lbs is very welcome, no matter what stage of the process you are no.

We're high on protein, low on carbs, upping the water and getting the fibre in any which way we can!

Please don't post discount codes as your post will be deleted - these need to go on the discount codes thread.

That does sound fab @RobinEllacotStrike this was a dinner and dance on the village green. The dance floor was rammed all night and a bit of a bun fight - you really had to fight to keep you space!

I don't drink, and haven't done for years so I was sober but I do love to dance!

@Sam187 you could try this: https://gcfglasgow.com/

there is this one - its more expensive than down here (I pay £10 usually but you can pay less/more as you want/need)

https://www.yamastudiosglasgow.com/workshops/ecstatic-dance

we also have one called RISE that is on Sunday mornings at 10am. Google sober dancing in your area. Over the summer our group is putting on some outdoor/forest dancing sessions too & I'm looking forward to that.

sober dancing - who knew that was even possible?! You've got me googling it now 😀

I think I need to come off MJ. I’ve injected my 5th dose of 7.5mg, and did it in my stomach for better suppression. Unfortunately all it has done is make me feel really nauseous, which, in turn, has brought back some of my binge eating disorder behaviours of eating loads when I feel awful. The suppression is still just not there.
I’m still plateaued, it’s been about 3 months now. I’ve made lots of changes but nothing is helping. I still have 3 more 7.5mg doses (which I could get 9mg out of using a syringe) but I’m not sure I can do it anymore. If I do continue I will definitely go back in the arm, as it didn’t seem to make me feel so awful.
I just don’t know what to do, I feel completely stuck

So weigh in today first full week on the injections and I lost 3.5lb and got my 7 stone award! Im so close to 100lb lost in total.

Further more i got talked into chip shop chips to go with the pies we got from the guy who was on the apprentice and I went in, was tempted to get extras but I held strong!

@alwaysscared sorry to hear that the 7.5mg isn’t working for you, and making you feel unwell to boot. Would you need to stay on the 5mg dose for your diabetes via the NHS if you stopped getting the 7.5mg privately?

@SilenceInside yes, the doctor would want to keep me on it, but I don’t know if I want to stay on it. It’s messing with my mental health badly at the moment.
I’m going to try 9mg for the next shot, in my arm, and see how I get on. If it’s just the same, there is no point in me staying on the high dose and paying for it.

@alwaysscared that's horrible re: having nausea but also the binge eating feeling - I'm so sorry 😓

I wish I knew what to advise, but it seems very difficult to know what to do for the best. Talking to the GP sounds like a good idea - I really hope this isn't the end of the journey for you as I know you've lost loads but wanted to keep going.

@alwaysscared If 7.5mg is making you feel unwell, I really would advise against using a higher dose as it is likely to make you feel much worse.

I wonder if it might be a good idea for you to have either a break or a step back to 5mg and use some time to get your head into a better place as this is obviously taking a big toll on you and raised cortisone, from stress, makes weight loss much harder.

It's hard but try to focus on the positive of how far you have come x

@MooBaggage I think a chat with my GP might be in order.
@QueenOfHiraeth 7.5mg has been great when in the arm, in fact I’ve felt the best I’ve felt in years mentally (the suppression wasn’t very good though). It’s just now that I have put it in my stomach. It’s so hard to know what to do, but a break might be needed, and then a restart. But I’m so scared I will pile it all back on again

It's a hard decision for you. If you do stop or step back you would have to do it mindfully and try to remain in the healthy lifestyle mindset we are all trying to learn.
I just wonder if, and I mean this with kindness, you have got into an anxiety spiral here and need to address that first as cortisol levels fight against weight loss. You started on MJ and, clearly, lost a lot of weight quite quickly (did you say about 5stone in 6 months?) then had the drama with the GP which was, understandably, infuriating and, from there you seem to have a lot of anxiety around the whole process.
I also wonder if you may have been undereating as the NHS rarely advises well on eating so your body is now recalibrating. Given that you have listened and learned so much about nutrition recently, maybe it would be an idea to step back, let your body adjust and then restart with your new knowledge so you work with the Mounjaro in a less stressful, slower and more sustainable way

@alwaysscared I would consider stepping down to a lower dose for a bit and just maintain. I maintained by not increasing my dose for 5 months whilst I sorted out health issues. It allowed me the headspace to sort out other stuff whilst not thinking about my weight.

If you’ve already lost a decent amount it doesn’t hurt to allow your body time to adjust to the new normal by maintaining. You can stop worrying about losing weight and focus on building other healthy habits like relaxation and meditation, exercise, flexibility etc. You will still be improving your health without putting yourself under too much pressure.
Maybe instead of blasting yourself with a higher dose you try a more relaxed month or two on a lower one.

@alwaysscared

please remember that you are on Mounjaro for your diabetes, that is it’s purpose, it is controlling your blood sugars, keeping them within range which is preventing the toxic build up of sugar in your system which over time causes damage to your eyes, nerves, circulation etc,

Weightloss is a byproduct for you not the main goal.

You are putting a lot of focus and attention on the numbers on the scale, what are the numbers on your glucose monitor and your HbA1C tests? What has the effect of Mounjaro been on other medications, have you been able to reduce things like metformin?

Thanks everyone
@InfoSecInTheCity strangely enough, my sugars are a bit higher now I’m on 7.5mg, but I have reduced my beta blocker which I think was lowering my sugars. I was sitting at about 4.5 and I think that was too low for me, I’m now sitting at 5.5 to 6.5 but feeling much better than I did at 4.5. I am not on any other diabetes meds.
@ChazsBrilliantAttitude yes, you are probably right. I’m going to finish this pen then take a step back I think.
@QueenOfHiraeth I think I have been under eating, and then going for snacks because I’m so hungry. Today I have decided to turn that around, so I had a high calorie breakfast (500 calories) at 11am (also quite high carb as I had oats 😬) and I’m now not sat here thinking about when I can next eat. Maybe I need to try and eat a bit more intuitively
I have had anxiety disorder, OCD and related mental health issues since I was 11, my cortisol is always high. I am in constant flight or fight, so I just have to work with that.

@alwaysscared I think you've hit the nail on the head re: eating intuitively - this has been a huge learning point for me over the last 5 months. I think I've never been able to do that because of my poor insulin control due to PCOS - my cravings for sugar have dominated any other type of thinking about hunger/appetite.

It feels wrong somehow to allow our brains the time to think about whether we're hungry and what we want to eat - rather than just snack endlessly and mindlessly (speaking for myself!). I'm learning to have a think about what I want to eat and whether a coffee or glass of sparkly water with lime cordial (my new found joy!) will do instead.

I'll keep fingers crossed that you can keep going with all the changes you've made to what you eat and the eating intuitively - and that the lower dose of MJ will continue to do what it needs to do re: your diabetes.

@alwaysscared i hope things settle for you. I haven’t commented much on your circs as I really don’t feel I can help as mine are so different, but I would agree with others who might say its time to just let things settle in. Everything is coming over as a little frantic, but the reality is, you’ve gotten this far, there’s no deadline for completion. I would agree with continuing, without the pressure of a scale, or getting too fixated on moments of feeling ‘its not working’. Last month was a crappy one for me, and I have realised that fretting over it (and I know its mad to say stop fretting, as if folks wouldn’t get stressed if they had a choice!) made it far worse - like I got locked into the cycle of it all. Two weeks off the scale helped for me - maybe it could for you?

Other news, ASDA are clearly inundated with orders now prices have dropped! Ordered Thursday day time and today approved, although they have detailed it on their site now that lead times are 7 days for approval and delivery.

I’ve been on MJ 10 months and they’ve not asked for new pictures or any refreshed consultations since the first though, which I am surprised about!

BUT I think maintenance plans are on the horizion for them! I noticed in my approval message today that they have including specific wording, as follows,

Once you have reached a healthy BMI (which is under 25 for most people) or your target weight if it’s higher, your aim should be to maintain your weight, rather than keep losing more. There is no evidence to say which dose you should use to do this, so it’s up to you to decide which one will be best for you to stay on to maintain a healthy weight without becoming underweight. Our doctors can help you assess as needed, simply send us a message (see our previous advice about tolerating side effects and dose reduction).We’d recommend aiming for a BMI of around 22-23.
If you need to drop your dose to maintain your weight rather than keep losing more, we'd suggest dropping down one or two doses to begin with. Then review your progress after a few weeks to see if you need to stay on that dose, or go up again or go down, depending on how well you're doing. You can maintain on any dose that feels right for you.
Remember, your aim should always be to make appropriate lifestyle changes whilst on treatment so that eventually you won’t need medication any more, and can continue maintaining a healthy weight without it.
^^
When stopping Mounjaro you can do so immediately. You don’t need to titrate down gradually.

its been on on my approval messages since April, but only spotted it today! Nothing on the website yet; so interested to see if it becomes a proper plan!

Does anyone have a smart watch that monitors health data like pulse, breathing rate etc? I have an Apple Watch, and my resting heart rate has fallen over the time that I’ve been losing weight. It was around 70bpm and is now just dipping under 60bpm, regularly 56 or so. My walking heart rate has also massively fallen, from 115bpm to high 80s. I actually had some alerts overnight that my heart rate had dropped into the 40s whilst I was asleep. Was wondering if others had similar, and should I be worried about it?! Or is it a good thing??

First thing to do is check your strap is tight enough now you’ve lost weight. It’s probably not getting a good reading overnight when you are laying on it and it’s moving out of place.

i have an Apple Watch and my resting and active HR and my respiration rate have all come down with weightloss.

I discovered that my local pharmacy has just started doing MJ and at no higher price than all the others hooray. I can just pop down the road, get weighed and pick up a pen. The pharmacist is also on it. Somehow that feels so much less dodgy than random pharmacies round the country!

So,after speaking to my diabetic nurse and told her all I can eat is fruit, I got a telling off for not mentioning it sooner!
I understand where she's coming from. I managed a ham sandwich on seeded bread and didn't feel too bad afterward I pushed through the nausea and now feel better for it.
Anyway ,my blood sugar's now at 5.5 which is healthy for me.
I'm now only eating apples and trying for 4 small meals a day. I still feel nauseous but I'm going to make myself eat properly as the nurse said I'd have to come off my if I carried on only eating fruit,which I don't want,so now I'm doing a food diary to show my progress to the nurse .
Thanks all for the concern and advice!! 🙂

@Amarajean that all sounds positive and hopefully the regular small meals will have you feeling better soon.

@AnneinEdinburgh very handy to be able to get your Mounjaro locally direct from a pharmacy.

@InfoSecInTheCitymy watch strap has been tightened as I’ve lost weight, it’s four notches in from where it was. I think I’ll just change the settings not to notify unless it goes under 40 and not worry about it unless it drops further.

@Amarajean Someone on here said a while back they asked AI to give them a meal plan of however many calories, however much protein, etc and it did a good job. Would that be easier than you trying to decide what to eat as you go along. I find decision fatigue is a real thing
It is really important for diabetics to eat low GI foods, even more than for the rest of us, so although fruit is healthier than mainlining sugar, it is not good as it all high GI

That's a really good idea - I used Chat GPT a bit ago to give me meal suggestions that are high protein, no/low carbs, gluten free and lactose free and it made me a lovely weekly meal planner 😊

It also sorted me out a weights workout plan that I completely ignore.

I like using Chat GPT for meal planning, you can get very very specific with your prompts and make it as detailed as you like.

Prompt idea
Task: Create a 7 day meal plan for 1 person, provide recipes that detail ingredients, quantities and cooking instructions. Each day should consist of Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner and 2 snacks. Prep time for each meal should not exceed 10 mins and cooking time should not exceed 40 mins.
Dietary requirements: Total calorie intake to not exceed 1500 calories, Macros: minimum 100g Protein, minimum 25g Fibre, Carbs to not exceed 100g.
Allergies: None
Likes: include these where possible. Pork, chicken, beef, broccoli, green beans, sugar snap peas, sweetcorn, chilli, spicy foods, Mexican, Italian, Spanish, tomatoes, Greek yoghurt, peanut butter, eggs, mushrooms.
Dislikes: avoid these foods unless they can be completely hidden in a recipe. Cauliflower, coconut, beans, avocado, lamb,
Hate: Do not include these in any meals or snacks: Fish, seafood, offal.

This was what it produced from the prompt above