3 months on mounjaro and no loss

[leopard23]

between Jan and April this year I lost 2.5 stone on a keto diet and felt great. I have another 2-3 stone to lose (SW 18st, CW 15st 10 lbs, GW around 13st 7lbs). I started to find the weight loss really slow down and thought I’d try mounjaro to help me lose the remaining weight. Keto was really restrictive and I was finding it hard to stick to it. I started MJ in July and have built up to 10mg, but I haven’t lost any weight on it. I train twice a week with a PT and eat well, but have found since I’ve been on MJ I feel sick and I’m reaching for beige foods. I have chronic constipation on it and I’ve not noticed any of the positive side effects at all… I’m desperate to reduce food noise but I still feel exactly the same as I did before. I had assumed I needed a higher dose for it to work, but even that isn’t doing anything. Has anyone else had this experience? I’m thinking of switching to Wegovy to see if that helps. Obviously I can’t afford to stay on it if it’s not working, I just had high hopes this would help me shift the last few stone.

You’ve lost nothing at all? Or just less
than you’d hoped ? Mine was really slow , like 1-2lb
a week and took me 9 months to lose 3 stone , but got there in the end ! If you can afford to , hang in there x

You still need to monitor your eating. I found counting calories best. Many people find if they don’t eat ‘clean’ then they do feel sick and suffer from constipation.

@bugalugs45no nothing at all! I’ve lost and gained the same 3lbs for the past 3 months!

@Winterscomingbrrri suppose I had hoped it would be easier to control my eating because I wouldn’t have as much of an appetite/less ‘food noise’ - the main reasons I’m taking MJ. At the moment it feels just as hard as it did when I was sticking religiously to keto and I wanted it to feel easier. Maybe I’m just asking for too much!

Have you thought about changing your injection site? If injecting into your stomach are you sure your outside of the 5cm radius of your belly button? It sounds like it's having no effect on you

I lost 2.5 stone on 16:8 diet before starting Mounjaro. I lost a stone in the first 6 weeks which i put down to too nauseous to eat. The weight loss then stopped completely over the next 3 months which I put down fo a plateau. I increased the dosage on as advised by the provider as I didn’t have much suppression except for the days whe. I was too ill to eat. I have since stoped. Binned the last pen after 2 weeks and started losing weight again (back to 16:8). Still have 1.5 stone to go so will continue as I am for now and try low dose W in November/December to hopefully help with temptation over Christmas. I’m doing ok with food noise right now but struggle when I fall of the food wagon to get back in to good habits. Hence why I will try W for 2 months at the worst time of the year for temptation.

How much are you actually eating though? It doesn't sound as if you are eating particularly healthy foods. 'Beige foods' tend to be very carb/fat/sugar dense so you are probably way over your daily limit. What's your TDEE?

@leopard23 could you try a couple of weeks at least of changing your diet to high protein, low carb, lots of leafy veg and things like berries. Work with the Mounjaro rather than eating lots of beige carbs. Drink plenty of water, if you are not already.

That may help to reduce the feeling sick aspect and also help with the constipation. And it may help with curbing the food noise.

Are you tracking calories properly? Are you keeping hydrated? Taking all the recommended supplements?

You won’t lose if you’re still eating too many calories. Work out your tdee for weight loss and stick to it.

Echoing others, you need to be in a calorie deficit to lose weight. Workout what your intake needs to be. High protein and high fibre along with mj will help keep u fuller for longer.

What have you done for constipation, are you taking say psyllium husk each morning and drinking 3 litres of water a day? As you can see the drugs don’t do the heavy lifting, that’s a myth, we have to do it ourselves.

I don’t really understand you eat beige food as you feel nauseas, are you saying if you feel sick you can’t eat healthy foods? Do you think maybe it’s the beige foods mixed with the drug that’s giving you nausea?

If I ate beige food I don't think I'd lose, even on mj, one thing I've learned being on mj is that that the body really doesn't like upf food, I don't think it even recognises it as food. I bloat, don't lose and generally feel unwell consuming that crap. If I eat real food: meat, eggs, fruit, fish, vegetables, the weight drops off,you can eat a lot of it too.

Drink at least 2 litres of water a day as mounjaro dehydrates which also may be causing constipation.
Try to stick to.protein and veg with some carbs like sweet potato. Today I had cauliflower and brocoli rice as its low calorie and low carb with chicken in blackbean sauce 309 calories and 26g protein. Yesterday I had grilled chicken with quinoa and veg.
Try to cut out the beige food as carbs cause water retention and eating them all the time is probably why you aren't losing any weight.

It’s not magic, you need to calorie count and eat healthy food. I’ve barely eaten any beige food since starting in June. Even when feeling sick.

I can’t see how you would be on 10mg after 3 months. But either way you shouldn’t move up until the side effects have eased off. I’m 4.5 months in and only just about to go to 7.5mg. I stayed on 2.5 for 2 months, then gradually to 5 and so on.

Appreciate all the replies, thank you!

I mean I’m obviously not in a calorie deficit or I’d be losing weight, so it’s clear that’s the problem. I suppose I had hoped that it would help me to remain in a calorie deficit by quieting food noise and reducing my appetite - neither of which have happened!

I’ve lost 2 stone in a year. It’s taken a super human effort of calorie counting and gym training.

It's never been linear and you require a lot of water and good foods. I can’t go much above a daily intake of 1300 cals or I won’t see a loss. I do not count exercise calories.

I have been very queasy and have still get heartburn with anything greasy.

I am doing the same as I would be on a diet and use Mounjaro for support.

I’m surprised to see you’re at 10mgs already but you can go as high as 15 as a dose of you don’t have side effects.

Start at the beginning principles by understanding what Mounjaro does and why it works.

It is designed to increase our insulin production in response to high blood sugar and to make our bodies more sensitive to the insulin so it is more effective.

It also slows digestion helping you to feel fuller for longer.

If you subsist on a diet of carbs you are essentially fighting the Mounjaro by continually raising your blood sugar, if your diet doesn’t have enough fibre then you will be messing with your digestion and preventing it from working properly.

• So start with calculating your TDEE and figuring out how many calories you should be eating, approx 500 below TdEE should see you making steady losses.
• Reduce (not eliminate, just keep it sensible) carbs and choose ones that are complex like whole grains and green veg rather than starchy and refined.
• add in good sources of protein like beans, pulses, lean meat, fish (muscle development and slow to digest so good for satiety)
• and good fats like avocado, oily fish, nut butters, eggs, full fat dairy (keep you feeling fuller, good for skin, hair, nails and brain)
• make sure you’re getting a decent amount of fibre like vegetable, beans, pulses, nuts, seeds and whole grains (good for digestion and satiety, reduces risk of colon cancer)
• water/fluid, it really doesn’t need to be water but you need to stay hydrated, muscles use water to heal, the chemical process of breaking down fat uses water and if you don’t drink enough water your body retains what it has because it’s clever enough to know it’s important. So drink till you pee like a racehorse.
• Hard to do if your busy but sleep is also really important, if your don’t get enough quality sleep it messes with your hormones causing you to feel hungrier and slowing down weight loss.

Honestly I really do think if you change up the quality of what you’re eating and make sure you’re hydrated that you’ll notice a big difference in how hungry you feel and you’ll start seeing the weight loss again.

Have you reduced what you eat? I was eating 1700 calories a day before taking Mounjaro and have lost 1lb a week eating 1400-1500 a day, over two stone.

How much exercise are you doing? Unless you up your exercise as well as stop eating shit you won’t lose weight

Sorry this is what I’ve found. No weight loss on the 2.mg or 5mg.

Just remained the same as a diabetic as on no medication

so at least nhs officials get to claim some of us don’t even need diabetic medications would be right.

Lots of good advice here which is worth trying. It may be that your body has got used to your keto and deficit so I would agree with @InfoSecInTheCity's advice.
There are, however, around 5-8% of people who are classed as non-responders (defined as less than 5% weight loss over 3 months) so, if all else fails, remember it may not be your fault!

@Nearly50omg it says in the OP how much exercise she does.

If she’s eating beige food she’s no longer on a keto diet. And has not been since she started the drug.

I’ve lost 6 stones over 18 months on Mounjaro. I’m on 6.75mg dose at the moment, I’ve had to increase the doses very very slowly as my stomach just won’t tolerate it otherwise. But what I have had to do is track my calories every single day and still be hungry quite a lot of the time. If I’d been on 15mg I’d probably have no appetite at all but I can’t take that high a dose so I’ve still had to learn to be hungry at times and say no to certain foods.

That's what I meant, she'd been on keto for some time so restarting beige food is a change for the body which it may be reacting to. Another reason to follow the very good advice posted upthread