September 25 starters thread2 - gliding into autumn

[outofofficeagain]

We go (vy) again …

I think I was quite tired when I took my jab last night. I was due my third 3.75mg jab but had to use a syringe as my pen is nearly at an end. It's dawned on me this morning that I did it wrong and I've actually only had about 3mg. Idiot! I just wasn't concentrating and was in a hurry. Won't do that again. As it's only 0.75mg less than I meant to take, I'm just going to see how I get on.

In better news, after my zero loss at last week's weigh in, I was a bit anxious for this week's weigh in this morning. But I was 5lb down! So last week was definitely a time of the month issue! Very pleased. So that's now 29lb lost in 11 weeks and through the 2 stone loss barrier. Feeling very motivated.

I only get some written info from my prescriber, but I'm a nurse so I feel quite confident in titrating my meds. While I know lots of people have good experiences staying on the lower doses, my understanding is that 2.5 is a sub-clinical titration dose and 5 is a maintenance dose, so I always planned to move to 7.5 as a minimum. It's worked ok for me, as I have always found my food noise was returning more by the end of the 4-5 weeks, and moving up seemed to make sense.

But I know we're all different and different choices work for others!

I suppose I'm in more of a debate about my next pen, whether to stay on 7.5 another month or go up. I was just wondering if anyone else had been in the same situation?

My weigh-in today:

SW - 15 st BMI 30
1st GW 13 st 7 (9% bodyweight)
13 st 7 lbs BMI 28
1 lb
20 lbs

Next GW: 13 st

Has anyone else lost their bum? Mine is now like a pancake and the skin there feels so soft and saggy 🙈

I’m seriously going to have to refocus my workout routine to target my glutes and hopefully build them up as it’s not a good look 😆

Yes! 😭

(And that's despite half an hour on the exercise bike nearly every day Boo!).

My bum definitely feels softer. Luckily it’s always been massive (long before the butt lift was a thing) so lucky I still have plenty left.

A bit of a whoosh from me this week. I’m 2kgs down and tantalising close to being in double figures (in kgs). Almost 20lbs gone since I started Mounjaro in late September. I’ve just take jab #9.

I'm definitely feeling softer around my arms and my thighs 🫠

Weigh in day for me. 3lbs down!

SW: 12st 9
CW: 9st 12

I'm so happy to be in the 9 stone bracket again after about 11 years!

My first target on my Nutracheck app is 9 stone 9 so i'm really close. My actual target is more like 8 stone. Long way to go still but definitely feeling more confident in myself.

Yay to @wodantimbercoaster , @SerafinasGoose , @GhostOrchid and @JustPickleRick for your losses! I love reading about how well you are all doing.

Weigh in day for me too.

SW 14:12
CW. 13:01

Total lost 25lbs in 12 weeks.

Only lost 1.5lbs in 2 weeks. It’s really slowing down and I’m not eating very much as suppression is still good. It’s looking unlikely I’ll make my Christmas goal of 12:07 now. 🙁

I’m feeling a bit disheartened this morning. I had a great week at my conference and found out I won an award which means a lot to me, so I was cloud nine from that point of view. But there were lots of photos of me as a result and while I’m pleased to be down a stone from when I started 10 weeks ago, I still have a long way to go and looking at the photos was a wake up call that I still look quite big.

It was also another week where I was out of my routine with food - conference and hotel food, lots of drinking, didn’t sleep well, lots of nerves about speaking too. On the plus side, the MJ definitely made it a lot easier for me to rein things in and stay fairly sensible, and I went running for half an hour twice while I was away plus really focused on water. But on the negative side, I haven’t lost any weight again this week and when I compare my total loss of 15lbs over 10 weeks to what other people have managed over the same period then I feel I have really let myself down.

I jabbed the very last bit from my current pen yesterday morning, which was about 0.4ml so slightly under 3.75mg I think (I’ve been on 3.75mg for five weeks). I think I need to go up to 5mg though. 3.75mg is still giving me good suppression for 4/5 days after jabbing so I have mixed feelings about going up - I think if I was just at home and in my routine all the time, it would probably be fine as I’d just have the momentum from good routine to carry me through, and it’s not like I’m ravenous any of the time. But that’s not what I’ve got in front of me, and the next five weekends all have trips away or visitors staying with us so if I stick to 3.75mg I think it’ll be a case of maintaining probably.

I’ve got a weekend away with friends next week though so - yet again - another thing to throw me off course! I don’t feel I can risk stepping the dose up just before that so I may wait until I’m back on Sunday evening and do my first 5mg then. Going to try to have a good weekend too and hope the scales will show at least a very small loss by Monday!!

My hair started falling out from stress this year (before MJ) but I'm quite concerned about losing more! I can see my scalp pretty clearly through it!! I'm not super vain, but it's more concerning than anything. Do you find biotin is very helpful? I read collagen doesn't really do much that a complete protein supplement doesn't do as it's broken down into amino acids anyway.

Scientist here, and you're right! Put a haribo in water and watch it swell up!

W13 D1 5mg (or 3.75mg, I haven’t decided yet)
SW 19st 3lbs
CW 15st 13lbs
GW1 15st
GW2 13st
Last week -4lbs, 45lbs in total.

My current weight is now in the same stone bracket as my first target weight, it feels good! But this week I have felt really hungry (some of this is food noise because after a glass of water, I’m fine). I’ve upped my calorie intake a bit and increased my protein but regardless I really had to resist having seconds. I have also had an extra banana/yogurt as an evening snack. I have been walking more so still having a decent calorie deficit and pleased with the latest loss.

I have a 5mg pen and whilst I usually jab in the morning, I haven’t done it yet because I’m debating whether I should go up to 5mg or stay on 3.75mg. I’m still losing weight on the lower dose but it’s hard work, feels like I’m doing it instead of mj. Which in the long term isn’t a bad thing but I’m still paying for the jab and would like to feel some suppression. I will see how today goes, I’m out and about all day so don’t want to have any surprises.

@SoUncertain I think biotin has made the biggest difference from all the supplements. Since starting, my nails definitely got stronger so I’m confident that it’s worked at least on one area. I had my haircut this week and my hairdresser said that I have a good amount of new growth coming through. For shedding she recommended Kerastase Genesis hair serum. I think that’s been recommended on other threads too so I will be adding it to my routine. It’s £31 on Amazon at the moment, normal price £45+. You can only use it for 6 weeks and then need to have a break.

Congratulations on your award @OneDayIWillLearn!

Routine (and crudely, no social life) is helpful. I also find it hard to navigate work and social events as food (and drink) is so much about social bonding in these settings rather than nourishment, and I worry that refusing to join in can be read as aloof or standoffish or unfriendly and my people pleasing side takes over.

This is exactly it. You have put it very well! It’s very important to me to be a generous host too and to some extent you set the tone for your guests if you’re all like ‘none for me thanks!’

This is one of the things I’ve found best about MJ actually as it does help me put the breaks on in those social situations so I am learning a new way of socialising and I could have easily been gaining weight over the last couple of months rather than (albeit gradually!) losing.

But yes, it’s a big challenge for me and I definitely don’t feel I’ve cracked it yet!

I’ve found that people don’t actually notice or care. Noone really notices what I order or eat but I’m finding my own regulation much easier. In the past I was uncontrollable when faced with a buffet!

My friend has just been prescribed wegovy due to underlying health conditions. She is being a bit judgey that I'm doing 3.75mg rather than following the prescribed dose of 5mg, and also that I'm using the golden dose. Difference is hers is free and mine is like £200/£250 a pen!!! Yeah I'm going to maximise it!

Congratulations on your award! I also had a work thing and looked bigger than expected in photos. I was glad that I've shifted about 11kg before meeting everyone though! I could also keep up on the route march across London to make our dinner reservation!

@OneDayIWillLearn well done on your loss so far and honestly don’t feel too disheartened by the photos. Photos tend to make us look bigger than we are. As an example, my colleague at my work summer conference had lost 2 stone, she looked great. When she saw the photos she said she looked massive and I explained that she did not look anywhere near as big as the photos portrayed she looked.

With the dose increase, when I went from 2.5 to 3.75- that’s when I got a really bad headache for a few days and felt a little rough. But moving from 3.75 to 5, I had no side effects at all. I actually feel better on 5 than any other dose so far. The suppression is now pretty much lasting all week. I know we’re all different though 🥰

Ahhh brilliant, well done! 👏🏼👏🏼

Come on @Chopsy123 you absolutely have that target in the bag for Christmas! 💪🏻

I've lost a load from my bum. Can still feel the muscle, but definitely a lot smaller. I usually cycle 100+miles every week, but have skipped the past couple bc of colds, crappy weather etc, but I'm motivated to get back on.

Thanks for the encouraging words, I appreciate it! You’re right, photos probably aren’t the thing to focus on.

I have done a slightly weird ‘halfway house’ of doing a 2.5mg dose from the second 2.5mg pen I bought at the start and haven’t used. So I had roughly 3mg from golden dose on Friday morning and then 2.5mg yesterday. No idea if that will ‘add up’ to 5mg but I was feeling hungry on Saturday and Sunday and getting some food noise, and my willpower isn’t in a strong enough place to deal with that! I do feel a bit reluctant to mess with the dose like this though and felt a bit remorseful afterwards and woke up in the middle of the night worrying about it. I feel fine today though and food noise is back under control so hoping I’ve got away with it.

My fear is/ was what will happen with an increased dose plus weekend away that’s coming up, as last time I had that combination I ended up having a horrible d and v episode in the middle of the night (in a hotel!). I hadn’t actually been particularly wild in what I’d eaten/ drunk but I think maybe just richer than usual food from eating out - even though I’d made ‘good’ choices - was too much with the step up in dose. So hoping I don’t get the same this weekend and that the extra 2.5mg will just top me up a bit rather than having that ‘step up’ effect.

And then I’ll go onto a normal 5mg once I’m back from the weekend away.

I was a pound up this morning vs a week ago, sitting today at 12 stone 9lbs. So I think I need to let go of the idea I’ll be back in the 11s any time in 2025 - hasn’t happened since 2021 (and even then it was brief!) so I guess I wait a bit longer. I’d be happy if I’m well established in the lower half of the 12 bracket though - maybe 12 stone 3 or 4 for my wedding anniversary, which is the weekend before Christmas.