Diario di Piglet410, 22 ott 23

I take Mounjaro, and I agree you have to put in the work! You might lose without working at it, but you won't keep it off. The meds are just a tool to help you stay on track. Good luck to you!  

Girls i have a question for you. Did it start working right away or did it take a while and if so how long? Have a loved one who has been on it for 5 weeks and has lost 7 pounds but says they are not noticing and change in feeling of fullness and, frankly, are eating way way too much. They said they think it is making them angry tho. I was excited when they started so this was a bit of bad news to me. Which is why im asking. 

Much respect to you and Mel about being so open and honest about using meds to help on your journey. Most people have issues with weight because they always reach for food when they think they are bored, stressed, depressed or have made food such a big part of daily and life events or think what they eat somehow brings happiness to their life. Meds don’t help or change those obstacles or way of thinking. They work for the people who need help to turn off the switch in their brain/belly that signals satiety and hunger so they can choose and eat proportions they know are healthy calorically and nutritionally. If you do it right these aren’t drugs for life and you can titrate the dosage down once you retrain your brain to not immediately reach for food when your body senses a sensation of hunger. Stay the course and keep reminding yourself it’s not the drugs you are still making the decisions around what and how much you choose to eat or not eat. 

Friends...we are in the grip of addiction...just like an alcoholic or any addict...and yes...we can always stop...either with some new diet or medication..but its staying stopped that is the rub...try Overeaters Anonymous..it identifies this problem for what it is...an illness ...a lifetime chronic illness and it needs treatment daily forever..or you will relapse...its a promise and guarantee of addiction... OA.org or try Secular OA...both have meetings everywhere on line and OA has many in person meetings...and its a family disease...heritable by children... 

No, it's not cheating to be on prescription drugs for a medical issue. Nor is having bariatric surgery, for those who need it. In fact, I commend you for taking the steps you need to. I struggled for years with the idea that the psych meds I take were a sign of weakness, but they relieved symptoms enough that I could work on things. I hope you take this opportunity to learn a different way to eat and move and live with the effects of the meds supporting, not supplanting, your efforts. Best of luck to you 🤗 And to conclude: stigma sucks! 

As someone on an appetite suppressing medication, now into a second month on a reduced dose (less than 40% of the original dose which I had for three months)—and still holding to CICO and losing weight—I have a bit of perspective on this. First, I totally agree that it is hard work even with the meds. The time on the medication, if one hopes to ever get off it, has to be treated as a window of opportunity to establish a sustainable daily routine that integrates the required calories, nutritional requirements, taste preferences, and decisions when to eat. The structure is so that you can no longer have your eating be at a whim of impulse, cravings, stress, emotions of any kind, which will masquerade as “hunger.” Exactly what honeebuns said, 100%. It’s like a medically assisted period of training for the brain. The point is that the structure has to be built and it takes time—and that structure and time may be different for different folks. The trap that is easy to fall into with the medication is that, when it effectively suppresses appetite, there is the temptation to continue to go with the flow of how the one feels (I don’t feel hungry—I’ll skip this meal—great, the more weight I’ll lose! Etc.) It is still being at the mercy of what one feels with respect to food, which will put one back at square one once off meds. I am more “hungry” on the lower dose of my medication, and, with some days when I skip it, I have a taste of how hard it will be once off it completely. But I am keeping to my now pretty iron-clad and on the clock eating routine (with rare departures for socializing): three satisfying meals, currently 400-500 cal each, about 5 hours apart. All are prepared at home. I LOVE my breakfasts, lunches, dinners. They are truly delicious! They are usually portioned out with a scale, all logged, and quite satisfying. Sure, cravings still strike in between, but it is easier to say no with a planned delicious meal in 2-3 hours. Evenings are tough but I am managing with just fruit post-dinner and more herbal tea to make it to bedtime. I fall asleep in anticipation of my breakfast in the morning! So yes, the food noise is up, but things are under control. I hope to be off the meds starting in 2024, so I still have some time to do some more brain training with this routine. So to Dianne’s point, I don’t think once an overeater, always an overeater. (But check with me in 2024!) I also doubt kids are doomed to it when their parents have an issue with it. That’s not the case in my family. YOH, I think your relative needs to find something else if those meds are not immediately working for her. I think most weight loss meds work pretty much immediately. 

Agnes!!!!! You hit it spot on especially the part of three substantial meals a day. Eating those meals on a regular schedule even if the brain/body because of the meds isn’t signaling hunger. Take the time while on the medication to switch from your tastebuds determining what’s on the plate to educating yourself on what vitamins/minerals/nutrients your body needs for health. 

I'll tag team onto something honeebuns said about taste buds. Believe it or not, your taste buds will eventually follow your diet. While I have occasional treats, and I can eat almost anything in a pinch, I'm a little grossed out these days by a lot of the "craveable" fast foods and processed foods. Over time, you may find you like what you eat more than you eat what you like  

Honeebuns, exactly, eating even when not hungry was such a tough but critical point for me to discover. I’m naturally, like many people, not hungry in the morning. So I often thought, before CICO+meds, I can’t be overeating because, hey, I skipped breakfast or lunch. I couldn’t figure out why I was gaining weight. Ugh! Of course, the first dinner, measured out in my new WOE, made me realize I must have been massively overeating in the evenings before. Sure enough, when I look back at it now, the eating usually started even before dinner with some “appetizer”, through cooking dinner, at dinner itself, dessert, plus more late “snacks” of dinner leftovers, etc. etc. I was in total denial of how I was getting excessive calories. Anyway, best of luck to everyone figuring this stuff out because it sure is not easy! 

With or without the aid of drugs to help suppress appetite, the way to successfully losing the weight and then keeping it off is building new habits. I always ate healthy foods but also ate lots more than I should between meals. And sometimes bigger portions than I should at mealtime. If you don't learn how to successfully eat & build new habits, eventually you'll gain back part or all of your loss. That's why I don't believe in quick fixes & fads. We have to educate ourselves on what foods to eat in a balance to satisfy our nutritional needs while meeting our desire for foods that taste good. If you plan meals that are tasty & fit into your body's caloric needs, it becomes a lot easier.