Mounjaro starters Nov '24 Thread 13 - The one where we are lucky to end our best Summer in years thinner and more comfortable in our own skin

[Mounjaropen]

Welcome to thread lucky number 13!

Link to the old thread here

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/weight-loss-injections/5365725-mounjaro-starters-nov-24-thread-12-the-one-where-we-pack-all-of-the-smaller-size-clothes-into-our-holiday-luggage?page=40

Feel free to lurk or post, absolutely no judgement here, just support and encouragement as we list old clothes on vinted, give thanks for MJ as we have had the BEST Summer in years as we are all significantly lighter.

Join us here to celebrate NSV’s, weight loss milestones, maintenance and our lowest stone brackets!

I’m on W42 D1 and on w2 of my first titrating down pen of 5.0mg

F in my early 50’s
H 5’ 5.5”
SW 13st 11lb
CW 9st 6.0lbs
GW 9st 0lb
Total loss so far 61.0 lbs

We recommend the Shotsy app to monitor the amount of MJ in the system and pleasing graphs to look at…plus the MeThreeSixty body scan app to monitor inch loss for the weeks where weight loss is slow but you might have lost body fat etc. Both are free.

Feel free to swap recipes that might inspire anyone in a food rut, tips for managing side effects, exercise tips, tips for maintenance, titrating up or down and we love a wellness/supplements/beauty/ style chat too 🥰

@MontyJinks that’s an incredible weight loss so be rightly proud of what you’ve achieved. I’m a bit smaller than you and weigh a little bit less but our BMIs are similar. My body fat is lower and my muscle percentage is higher so perhaps if you want to you could focus on body recomposition now over more weight loss. I’d like to reduce my body fat and increase muscle more with strength training but I do prefer running as my way of keeping fit.

my update -
SW - 10 stone 7
CW - 8 stone 0.8lbs
30 weeks on MJ and 8 weeks off
more or less maintained my weight but I am very hungry. I have blood tests coming up and the plan was to consider going back on a low dose if I got the all clear, but the price increase is putting me off and I can see the sense in staying off it after this long. But I do miss the support of MJ and the absence of food noise.

keeping going with the running. Booking another 10k in for September and do need to get into the gym more often. As in, at all!

Thanks @Cantbesure

Yes, you're spot on, that's the key going forward isn't it, to focus on body composition rather than weight loss now.

I do dance fitness, yoga and ballet, so I'm hopefully covered on the cardio and bodyweight front.

Right 💪 tonight I'm going to:

• make a plan to start with the weights at home and book time slots in my diary, starting tomorrow

• book an appointment to join the local leisure centre and an induction to their new fancy weights room within the next month

I know what I need to do, it's just a matter of doing it! Listing it here will (hopefully) give me the accountability I need.

Thanks for the advice and support everyone 😊

5 stone! 🎉

Interesting about the pineapple! I’m wondering now if a pizza with chilli / nduja and pineapple would be the equivalent of Chernobyl

I've found you all. i missed the post with the link to the new thread. off to catch up with all the news.

ooh @sumbum I'm intrigued about what you asked ChatGPT! Can you share the prompt?

Oh gosh yes! There was an Asda chocolate muffin with dramatic consequences wasn't there!
For me it's pineapple. I've not eaten it since I had a violent reaction that confined me to a hotel bathroom for an evening 🥴

Yay! 5 stone klaxons ringing loudly for you @magnoliatreepetals 🎊🥳🔔💃

🤣🤣🤣
After you...

I pasted in my data from both shotsy and the 'monitor your weight' app so there were enough data points and asked it to analyse my weight loss journey. Look for patterns for stalls and plateaus.

Remember to add your height so it works out BMI and what to aim for.

I then asked it to predict what pens i would need if i continued at same rate of loss.

Highly recommend it!

Also, once the data is in it suggests prompts itself!

Good morning folks!

Weekly weigh in on 4.3mg dose..
week 40

SW 18st 4.3lbs
CW 14st 6.6lbs
1.5 lb loss this week
total loss so far 3 stone 11.7lbs
I have lost 21%of my starting weight

SBMI 43
CBMI 34.7

75,262 steps this week

This week I increased from 4.2mg to 4.3mg and I have experienced the most bizarre side effect.
I live in a very rural location and its harvest time. My home is surrounded by barley fields. At harvest time, the atmosphere can be dusty and full of tiny corn lice.
On Saturday, (48 hours after jab) I thought I felt a corn louse on the back of my neck and I swiped in off.
Then there was another, and another, and another. I actually went and got a towel to wipe the back of my neck from side to side as these lice are so minuscule that you feel them but sometimes don’t see them.
Then I was sitting quietly on my own and my scalp was felt like it was “moving” with head lice. The sensation then moved to my face, down my arms, my chest.
At this point I became aware that it was my nerve endings tingling but it felt like I was covered in 100’s of crawling bugs . This strong sensation was with me for about 12 hours then it subsided.

I put a post on the main WLI page and someone replied for me to google formication.
This is AI explication….
“The feeling of bugs crawling on your skin, without an actual physical presence of insects, is a sensation known as formication. It's a type of tactile hallucination, meaning you feel a physical sensation that isn't actually there. This sensation can be described as a crawling, tingling, or itching feeling on the skin.”

It really was most bizarre! Are you itching now 🤣

When I look in the mirror at my face, I am generally standing facing the mirror and I have seen my face changing with the weight loss. However, this week, my grandson was sitting on the floor in front of me and he passed me up a hand held mirror and I caught a glimpse of myself from a different angle.
Oh my goodness me! What a shock I got !
I have a horrendous turkey neck, this led me to inspect further and my face has caved in, quite literally. 😩
To add insult to injury, this week I have also had a few comments “have you been losing weight? I can see it in your face”

I have been taking collagen since I started MJ, using LED mask almost daily using Tretinoin 0.05% nightly for past 3 months.
For those using Tretinoin, should I move up to 0.1%, would this make a difference? I have a tube waiting.

On a positive note…
I wore a jumper yesterday that was very tight last winter and it skimmed my curves beautifully and if I’m honest, I felt amazing in it.

Enough about me, Well done to everyone on the great losses and to those that have reached maintenance stage, we can do this. 💪

Congratulations on the loss this week! That is fantastic. Ignore the naysayers, but I do think in this current world of being PC, people just don’t know what to say these days so try not to take it to heart.

That is one hell of a side-effect! Hope you are feeling better now?

With regards to Tret, its main purpose is to eliminate fine lines. In order to improve skin volume to reduce turkey neck you need treatments which stimulate collagen production such as micro needling. You can buy micro needle devices relatively inexpensively. Alternatively consider a radio frequency treatment at a trusted clinic. I say trusted, because applied incorrectly or with someone who has simply done a one-day course has drawbacks including nerve damage. You need someone who is constantly checking the temperature of your skin to ensure that it is not overheated. Everybody reacts differently to an RF treatment so it’s not a case of setting the machine to a level and simply stopping when the timer says so. In addition everybody has a different pain threshold. Not that RF treatments should be painful, but they can reach the realms of uncomfortability. I have had four R F treatments over the past three months, and whilst I can see an improvement on my jawline, my main issues of sagging skin in the centre part of my throat and my marionette lines have not improved significantly (for reason stated above the throat was never going to improve) but I thought I might see a greater improvement on the marionette lines. RF treatments do continue to work after you have left the clinic so it is one of those treatments where patience is required. Sadly, I do not have much! I am ever hopeful that the treatments will at some point work on my stomach and inner thighs, but at the moment I haven’t seen that much of an improvement either! But then I am hypocritical of these areas at the moment.

Sadly, as we get older turkey neck is to be expected, especially in the front part of the throat area where no clinician should be applying any form of heat or electrical stimulus because of the potential damage or overstimulation to the thyroid. I’m doing all that I can to keep mine at bay, but I have accepted that I either need to suck it up or have a facelift!

👏👏

I love a bit of AI for this sort of thing. Out of interest, how many pens did it suggest that you needed?

Interestingly, pineapple had a similar effect on me at the start of this WL journey, but now not so much. I still can’t stomach the thought of eating nuts though. Weird isn’t it?

Thanks for your post, MJ updates. It certainly gives both hope and comfort to us all that life after MJ is doable. Wishing you all the best for the blood tests.

I totally agree. In my early 20s, I’d have been devastated to be 10 stone and my goal weight was always 8.5 stone. Nowadays, I’d be delighted at 10 stone, I think 8.5 stone would make me look ill and both place me in the healthy BMI range…

Totally agree. I’d generally be using the autumnal months to get Christmas tummy ready 😂

We're doing a buffet of all our favourite things on Christmas Day this year. I think I'm going for something like chicken or salmon with a few different salads that can also be combined with homemade pizza that's dd's selection!

Morning whoop on those loses.
Had a great day on the cruise party, drank so much, more than i have in years, no ill effects this morning(I could still be drunk), I stuck to sparkling wine/prosecco/champagne and didn’t try the cocktails.
Stupidly tried to eat some oxtail, it was only a bit on cracker as a starter but nope far too rich, and the ribeye main I only managed a few slices. So I didn’t go as wild as I could have (I may have eaten pizza but I didn’t go to the ice cream parlour or the dessert station).

I have also lost the taste for Coke Zero.

I took a bunch of selfies I’m happy with, my chicken neck is deffo improved, I have said before my loose skin seems to improve during stalls in weight and I clearly need to stop moaning about not losing right now, if it is fixing my neck and bingo wings instead.

Medexpress have understandable delays on orders, 7-10 days which is cutting it fine before my holiday. May have to cancel and cry at the new cost.

Well done @lovealongbath over 75k steps ❤️

glad you managed to enjoyed cruise ship party @jay55 The pharmacies are all waiting on deliveries but I don’t think they are getting everything they are ordering. Oushk said last night that they are getting deliveries but not always the quantity they are expecting as there are now strict quotas in force. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is Eli Evil Eye Lilly putting the squeeze on to stop people getting deliveries before the price hike ( they are 🤬ing 🤬ers. - please excuse my potty mouth)

i am going to attempt to convince one of the birthday people to opt for a buffet style. I can take the angle of something informal so family can drop in at a time that suits as opposed to a formal eat-out thing which would be stressful in terms of numbers, costs, agreeing date and grandkids. At least grandpa gets something on the day he want. @DarkForces

Hello all! I have been away for several threads but thought I’d check in and see how you’re all doing. Because I’ve been less online I completely missed the Great Mounjaro Price Uproar until it was well underway, so now I have no idea how likely it will be that I’ll get my next pen from Oushk in good time. I think someone else has found the 10mg was out of stock? I went down to 7.5mg for my next order… fingers crossed.

I’m actually so close to goal weight now it probably isn’t a bad time to be considering maintenance, anyway. My stats are:

SW: 93 kg
CW: 68.5 kg
GW: 65kg

I am feeling pretty good right now and would like to stay this way! How has maintenance been treating those who are already there?

@lovealongbath, that is a very interesting side effect. I had a similar sounding crawly/itchy feeling years ago, but mine was because I was having a mild allergic reaction that was making my skin itchy - if I scratched anywhere I got raised hives. Antihistamines sorted it out quickly, but it was ALL over. I also felt like I was covered in crawling creatures, it was horrible!

Losing weight and holding onto muscle - I think it’s pretty dependent on lifting weights and eating protein, even if you are in a calorie deficit (which we all are!).

I remember that losing weight and actually gaining muscle at the same time is pretty difficult. Serious bodybuilder types bulk and cut - build muscle over months, then diet hard - so they can eat enough calories to grow muscles, then lose as much fat as they can so they can show off their work for a set period of time.

There are some beginners weight lifting/HIIT programmes - 90 Day Plan, etc - that do try to walk a line between eating a carefully deigned protein rich food WHILE lifting weights AND being in calorie deficit that people can manage both, but after a certain point you do end up losing weight or building muscle rather than both at once.

It’s a reason why I have been a little sanguine over the “you will lose muscle” warnings with MJ - it’s the same with any calorie restriction, really. If if we were all coasting through on sheer willpower, it would still be a good idea to lift weights and keep moving!

If anyone is trying to get extra pens before the price hike it looks like high doses are back in stock with Oushk. Whether they’ll approve my order (as I got a pen last week) is another matter!

Still doing quite well here, I’ve lost 4st 8 and today dipped under 17st for the first time in a good few years 🥳.

Glad to see everyone else seems to be moving in the right direction too. Like others I’m totally obsessed with the bones I keep discovering 😆. Who knew bones could be so satisfying?!

That sounds delightful!

I'm was hoping we might get a trip away but DD has exams at Uni straight after Xmas so I don't think it is likely. I'd love a few days in a wintry NYC tbh - living my Carrie Bradshaw best life (in my head). 😂

Ooh - Party sounds like it was a lot of fun! I'm off to a boozy lunch tomorrow with friends which I am looking forward to. I'm sitting here in fake tan before going off to play in a tennis match later so that I don't have to do it in the dark when I'm tired afterwards....

Share your chicken neck rectifying secrets with us all!