Mounjaro - Best tips from regular users

[SweetpeaM33]

Hi all,

I've taken the plunge and ordered the first dose of Mounjaro today - I've been thinking about it for months and finally decided.

I was hoping to get some tips from regular users. Is there anything you wish you'd known, or done differently when you were starting out, or along your journey? Anything that helped you keep symptoms at bay? Any recommendations of supplements... or any other helpful advice please.

Thank you.

I'm down 37kg in 1 year.

Eating 2 kiwifruit a day avoids constipation without medication.

🥝🥝

One year in, almost.

protein and exercise, maintain your muscle and use this time to find exercise that you can commit to.

find a few breakfasts and lunches that fit your macros and calories and make lots of different versions.

take biotin, iron and magnesium.

drink plenty.

eat as much soluble and insoluble fibre as you can to keep you going.

deal with your emotions, think about why you need to lose the weight and how you will manage after WLI. Develop really good coping mechanisms and not unhealthy ones that will just transfer to a new area of your life.

Make sure you include fruit, protein, and veg into your diet. All the foods that you like you will eat less of it. Your body will switch you off to food cravings you will feel full for longer when you do eat. You will feel sickly the best way to handle this is water and exercise like walking or jogging whatever you are comfortable with. Weight lifting is better for low impact exercise and swimming. The sickly feeling doesn't go but you have to eat or else you will turn mad and your mental health will be compromised. I have to decided to stop taking it after this pen 7.5mg. I have been taking it for 4 months I feel I got what I needed from it. It helped lower my blood sugar and I am no stranger to eating less I was very skinny before I had children. It's helped me in more ways than one.

Good luck on your journey.

You have to be careful of not developing an eating disorder. You have to eat what you are doing could potentially harm your body.

You need to eat even if you don’t feel like it. I eat three meals a day. You will lose muscle and too much weight too fast if you don’t eat, and then ruin your metabolism so much that you will regain quickly once you stop the drug. I see it as this is helping me lose weight in a healthy way, without feeling deprived or having to follow a restrictive diet.
You will probably lose quickly the first month (I lost like 5kg) and then it will slow. This is normal. Sometimes you might not lose anything in a week. Sometimes I gain a bit right before my period. This is all normal. Losing slowly and steadily is so
much healthier.

Also a bowl of bran flakes. I drink water and eat high fiber breakfast cereal, and have not been constipated once

I second the bit about putting the needle into the shard bin- I also stabbed myself on the pen side too!!

'You will feel sickly/the sicky feeling doesn't go' sorry this happened to you but it definitely doesn't to everyone. I've been absolutely fine.

Don't overly worry about side effects cos lots of people have none.

You’re totally right as it would be gutting ti
lose it !
had no idea about the syringes - thanks for heads up!
x

Sorry if I wasn’t clear- I eat three meals a day, but some days (particularly 24 and 48 hours after my jab) I find it a bit more difficult, so I make sure I have an alternative to hand rather than skip a meal. I’m still eating- I went out for a curry tonight!

I’ve done this too 😂 - sometimes it’s been sorer putting the needle in the bin than the actual jab (and, shamefully, I’m a nurse- you’d think I’d be able to do it)
Sore thumbs are obviously a common Mounjaro side effect!

I've lost over 2 stone since the start of May when I first started taking it. I wasn't planning on taking it long term. My weight gain was because of pregnancy and then I held on to the weight through comfort eating. What I eat normally is healthy so all I need to do is continue with smaller portions and regular exercise.

I cooked a lasagne with pork mince, olive oil, chicken gravy that was made the day before with two tbsp of brown sugar, and becjemel ect. I had a small portion with salad none of that is unhealthy. After eating it I felt like shite. I think the issue is we cook with a lot of seasoning that makes the food rich. I can eat seasoned chicken with salad and baby potatoes and feel fine after. Eating with my family makes them happy and me. I can't eat chicken with any potatoes and salad/veg for the next 6 months.

Sorry for the confusion

Glapp.io is a good (and free) website to log your injections, weight and side effects. It shows how much medication is in your system at any one time and what body phase you are in relation to the medication.
Get some good scales so you can track your progress across different metrics. Renpho are excellent (£25 from Amazon). They track weight, body fat, subcutaneous fat, protein, water, bone mass, metabolic age etc.

I’m not focussing on calories, and instead just trying to hit protein, fibre and water goals each day.

I’m trying to weigh monthly when I order my new pen (rather than daily/weekly), to help me see progress over a month because I was getting hung up on only losing a pound a particular week and berating myself.

I also use smart weighing scales which measure the body’s fat/muscle/water etc, (£25 from Argos), so even if I haven’t lost much weight, I can see progress and achievements in other ways.

I used H&B’s protein calculator to work out how much I need to eat each day based on my height, weight and activity levels;
https://www.hollandandbarrett.com/the-health-hub/sports-nutrition/protein/how-much-protein-do-you-really-need/

For constipation, I try and eat 30g of fibre each day. I also have 3 teaspoons of inulin syrup in my morning yogurt. It’s from chicory root. It helps sweeten the yogurt and is 3g of fibre per teaspoon. it’s a prebiotic so feeds your healthy bacteria so great for gut health. Start small and build up to allow your body to get used to it. You will fart loads initially so start at the weekend when you can fart in peace in the comfort of your own home.
https://www.hollandandbarrett.com/shop/product/chicory-fibre-syrup-230g-6100004789

Again, to avoid constipation, I also mix a teaspoon of chia seeds into my morning yogurt each day. Soak them for at least 30 mins before eating in yogurt/milk otherwise you will get blocked!

An easy protein win for me is I have 30g of collagen in my morning coffee and this is 30g of protein. My skin and hair look great too.

I take a bottle of water upstairs at night and drink this as soon as I wake up. Helps me work towards my water intake goals before my day has even started.

I take multi vitamins and a biotin supplement to prevent hair loss.

I also do strength training using an app called Fitbod. It’s £100 for the year - you input what equipment you have at home (if any), what you want to achieve, how many times a week you want to exercise, how long for, whether cardio/strength etc and it puts together workouts, progressively making it harder as you get fitter. It will also do body weight only exercises if you don’t have any equipment. It gives you video demonstrations of each exercise so you can see what you’re supposed to be doing. Much cheaper than a gym membership or a personal trainer. It’s the only exercise program that I enjoy and have stuck with. If any exercises are too hard, you can replace them and ask it not to suggest it again.

I reckon you could get ChatGPT to do what Fitbod is doing for free. Won’t be as pretty but very good for training and plans.

Hi Op, just checking in to see how you are getting on. Last week for me was a challenging week. I was very acidic and what I threw up last week Sunday was horrible I was ready to pack it all in. My partner offered me his medicine it's for gastroenteritis what a game changer I have not felt like throwing up andthe acidity in my stomach has eased. I felt hungry yesterday and ate out the kitchen. I ate very little before yesterday. If you are acidic and throwing up take gaviscon or something similar it's a game changer. Just thought I would let you know in case you get that symptom.

Keep a bottle of water beside your bed you need to stay hydrated.

Hi Falseknock,

Sorry to hear your first week wasn't so pleasant for you, hopefully it'll pass once youve settled more. Good to know that the Indigestion relief medication helped.... I did stock up on several such items inc. the Boots version of Gaviscon and some constipation meds too.

I'm getting on OK, I'm on Day 5 now, started last Saturday. Tbh, I wouldn't say I've noticed a big difference in that feeling of fullness. I am eating well though because that's the choice I made when I started. I havent had many symptoms either... I don't have constipation or nausea or anything like that so far. I've been eating plenty of fibre and protein and drinking lots of water, so perhaps that's helping. But maybe it's going to take longer for me to notice an impact of the first dose - if at all, maybe I need a higher dose! I'm hoping I start to notice the difference soon as otherwise, I worry that it'll be too easy to veer towards non healthy foods again. x

The first doses don’t often have massive impact for people, some are lucky and stay on it the whole time. Just keep doing what you are doing!

the sulphur burps and indigestion can be so unpleasant, pepto bismuth (?) pink stuff helps and mint capsules.