To stop using MJ due to health anxiety

[AnxietyMJuser26]

Good Morning, I am needing advice on whether I am being unreasonably anxious or whether I should listen to my fears and give in. I have been on Mounjaro since August 2025 and without changing my routine too much due to long shifts at an office job I have managed to lose 4 stone. I left my job in November so started to become more active but not by much and I am still 1 stone away from being 14 stone.

I got to 12.5mg but since being on 7.5mg I started to suffer with side effects, just the normal common ones like an upset stomach which would result in 24 hrs of D&V

since the end of November my health anxiety has been creeping in and telling me that I am doing major harm to my body especially since the last time I managed to lose weight it was because I was pregnant and had gallstones but didn’t know.. my gallbladder was removed in 2019 and never really had major gut issues since so now all I can focus on is causing irreparable damage to my insides

I have attempted to speak to my provider, I have bloods down with my GP which all come back as normal and now I have started trying to drop down but I don’t know how to stop these thoughts that I am going to cause myself a major life changing illness or worse die.. but the other end of the scale is that with 2 small children under 8 I don’t want to be obese for ever.

Am I overthinking this too much and should I just finish my MJ journey and see what the result is too my health at that point?

Sounds like you should stop taking it. Have you started a new job? How’s that going? Is the timing of your health anxiety not related to your change in jobs/routine?

I’ve left my job as I am attempting to focus on the children more and start my own business with my other half’s help. The health anxiety has been since 2018/2019.

I was pregnant whilst I had the gallstones and I kept having attacks of pain but whenever I went to get checked, they couldn’t pinpoint anything because the pain had gone and baby was growing fine.

I was told the attacks would stop once baby was born which was not the case as 4 into C-section recovery I had another attack and then woke up jaundice. This was in the December 2018, they scanned me and confirmed gallstones and then took it out in May 2019.

My little boy was then born premature in January 2020 & the doctors said he was good to be discharged after 10 days even though he only weighed less than 5 lbs which the NHS website says the guideline, he was in and out again until his due date so my anxiety around health was increased tenfold.

I’m trying to come down the dosages rather than cold turkey as heard the symptoms are less uncomfortable if you work down the dosages.. I just don’t know what to do as I don’t want to cause myself irreparable damage.

I took two ibuprofen the other day and then went into a spiral of worry about what it could do to my stomach lining and my gut. I spoke to the GP surgery who advised it should be fine and I also spoke to the prescribing company for my Mounjaro who explained it would be fine.

I don’t want all the weight to fall back on if I stop but I also don’t want to cause myself a major health condition when for all intents and purposes before starting Mounjaro I was heathy just very very overweight with a high BMI.. I know that is not good either

Hi OP, you might get better responses if this is moved to the weight loss injections forum. Lots of people there can help you with side effects and how to manage them.

I was on 7.5mg for 3 months and then on the 4th month I started experiencing a lot of nausea. I then discovered that sometimes when you lose weight, your smaller body can’t handle the higher dose. I stopped to 5mg and I’ve been fine ever since.

Are you getting any help for the health anxiety?

Obviously only you can decide what’s right for you but it might help to get views from other people who know more about the jabs.

Thank you for the advice.. how would I get this moved to the correct category?

I wonder if that is my issue as I was absolutely fine on 2.5 and 5 and then by 7.5 the symptoms started and I wasn’t having any symptoms or concerns of health anxiety before this point either..

I am going to be looking into therapy for both family no contact issues and my health anxiety with everything I suffered during the pregnancies and labours

You will still have health anxiety whether you have MJ or not.
If the symptoms are intolerable, that's a reason to stop with the MJ, assuming you can't get advice that helps you manage the symptoms better.

You will still have HA, though.

Can you just drop back down to 5 again? Don't go cold turkey. Your appetite will come back full force. I'd download my fitness pal, work out your TDEE to loose or maintain your weight and monitor it while you come down the doses.

Without WLI you will need to be careful and to be more mindful.

I am on 5mg 8 months in. I stopped over Christmas as I need to be mindful of what I eat on WLI and didn't want to be sick eating my rare yearly mince pies etc. I put on 7 lbs in three weeks ( but I ate and drank very high calorie foods as was my plan). But it just goes to show how fast it could all pile back on.

I don't want to be on wli injections forever either. But I need to loose more so have a 7lb buffer If ever want to eat Christmas food again. I hate all of the scare mongering on WLI. But what I really fear is vascular dementia from.high blood pressure so I'm taking my prefered risk I'm moving away from.being obese to just overweight.

What exactly are you scared of with WLI or is it just a n named fear?

I think if @mnhq is copied in (as I have done), they might be able to move it for you.

It’s interesting that your health anxiety seems to have ramped up while on the higher doses. Anxiety and low mood have been reported as a side effect of MJ so again it might be that now you’ve lost weight, you just can’t tolerate the higher doses either physically or mentally.

Why not formulate an action plan? Firstly definitely talk to your GP again about HA and see about getting so therapy. If the higher doses are causing your side effects, drop down to the next dose and see how you get on. You might find the lower dose gives you good suppression and that some of your anxiety is eased.

OP I have reported your post as I think it's normal route to flag to MNHQ to move it over to another board x

Op was your health anxiety under control before mounjaro, I see you’ve suffered for about 6 years and hypochondria is very difficult to treat, notoriously so.

it seems taking the meds have kicked it off again, this isn’t a mounjaro issue it is a mental health one. If you stop the drugs will your mind find some other ailment you worry about, or were you fine before?

@AnxietyMJuser26 I’m sorry to hear you are feeling so anxious.
Only you can decide if you feel taking WLI is worth it or not, your MH is very important but being overweight also causes lots of issues in the long run.
If you are on Instagram I recommend following Susan Brian MD she’s an American Dr/endocrinologist and comments on all the latest WLI studies in a very informative way, which I personally find really helpful.
I’d also recommend listening to or reading the book/Audiobook called Weightless by Dr Rocio Salas-Whalen its free to listen if you are a Spotify Premium member, both of these things make me 100% sure I’m personally doing the right thing by taking WLI.
Maybe you could contact your prescription to discuss your anxiety as well.
I also had nausea on 10mg and 7.5mg once I’d lost weight but I’m fine on 5mg (now in maintenance).
Wishing you all the best for the future.

I don’t think I suffer massively with hypochondria.. I am not afraid of going to the doctors and getting a diagnosis etc.

The gallstones were scary for me because no one had any idea that there was even something wrong with me. The midwife when I first mentioned the pain said that pregnancy could cause back pain because I described it as a pain in my upper back.. then when I had my last midwife appointment I was told I’d weighed less than I did at the first appointment, the midwife said some people are just lucky with their weight and shrugged it off. I was concerned but didn’t push it.

After the gallstones were removed in 2019 my pregnancy with my son was worse. I was not sick but my son stopped growing and he had to be delivered at 34 weeks.. he hadn’t grown 30 weeks approx. and even then I pressured the doctors to deliver him when they put me on daily monitoring.

When my son was born premature the doctors told me he was fine and then discharged him after 10 days, he was back in within 3 days as unable to maintain his blood sugar and temperature, then he was discharged again after 5 days then he was back in a week later with a distended abdomen as was not strong to pass bowel movements on his own.

I started to not trust medical staff especially with the gallstones and needing a C section with my first labour but no explanation as to why it was needed, my son was another emergency C-section because of his prematurity so it doesn’t feel like hypochondria but it feels like I don’t want to risk ignoring something to do with my health or making it worse.

I don’t know if there is a word or name for that

Regarding to the MJ I was fine before never really worried about my own health.. more the children’s, it is probably the reason why I didn’t see the weight and some creep back on.

I need to seek therapy for family issues that I have ongoing relating to being no contact with my mother since 2023 so will also be approaching my health concerns with a therapist as well as not happy with the labour and health problems that I suffered in both pregnancies.. never got any real answers or anything

The impact of WLI on mental health has been widely reported and many papers have been published such as this one. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-75965-2 Don’t ignore these symptoms @AnxietyMJuser26

Any kid would prefer to have an overweight but happy and bubbly mum, over a sad and anxious normal weight mum. Don’t underestimate the impact of mental health over the whole family.
There are other weight to lose weight if WLI start messing with your head.

Op, health anxiety and hypochondria are the same condition, I just used the medical term for what you said you had 💐

Oh sorry, @Brightlittlecanary I didn’t realise they are the same thing.. 🤦🏼‍♀️

I didn’t really worry about my own health before starting the MJ.. I’d have to ask my other half as don’t recall worrying about it but may have forgotten.

Seeing the post about MH and taking Mounjaro has got me all worried again that taking it is not only possibly causing me physical health problems but also MH problems.. which I didn’t even think about before 😭

I’d stop taking it to be honest if it is damaging your mental health it’s not worth it I don’t think.

im on it have been fir about 18 months, lost 6 and a half stone, now on a maintenance dose, staying on long term.

my blood test results were all exceptionally healthy at rhe end of last year, I had the whole suite, my blood pressure is now normal, my cholesterol low, my sleep apnea gone and my cortisol levels normal.

these drugs were in trials for 15 years before being licencesed, and they habe been in trials ever since for different things, they are about to be approved for cardio vascular health, and liver and kidney disease is just completing trials for it to be approved for that, they also reduce the chance of certain cancers and are being tested for other health benefits, ie reduction in dementia.

they also reduce inflammation and have an anti ageing impact on us, where they either stop ageing, slow it, or reverse it in some people; this is as as we age, ever time we get ill, we recover, but our cells carry a marker of that illness for ever more, and that’s inflammation, and that inflammation stops the cells regenerating, hence why the anti inflammatory effect has the anti ageing impact, not on our skin, but our insides.

im sure you researched thoroughly before taking this drug, so know all this, and that it is now approved by all countries with a functioning health care system globally with over 50 million on, and the world health organisation now recommending it for a long term use against obesity in all countries with a functioning health care system and is looking to put it in their essential medication lists. The drugs have been in use for over 2o years.

obesity on the other hand is the biggest killer in our society, heart attack stroke diabetes, high blood pressure, fatty liver, kidney disease, and so many other issues it is the number one cause of cancer.

for me, I think you should focus on curing your obesity, that’s your health risk right there, but that’s easy for me to say, I don’t have the same mental health issues.

i would come off and get yourself mentally well. The drugs aren’t for everyone, and I do think you’ve developed hypochondria if you’re even calling your doctors about taking nurofen, something you could have googled and seen was fine.

why not come off, get yourself on an even keel, just enjoy your life and try to lose weight another way, ie by diet alone and if not then reconsider when you’re mentally stronger.