Everything was so smooth for so long. Now I'm getting more fluctuations. It's gone up a little day-by-day all week and then plunged down suddenly today (oddly after going out for sashimi). How can I know what is going on with such bad data? Drives me crazy. Being close to goal is crazy-making. I should set a new goal just so I can feel far enough away not to care.
Who has switched to twice a week dosing for maintenance rather than spacing out doses? How has that been?
A few months ago somebody posted a bunch of screenshots of what they described as "screenshots from when this sub was good." I downloaded the screenshots that I thought were good. I'm posting them here for you. I've added a few of my own as well.
I'm 61 years old.
Today I worked at the garden. I felt tired and weak from having my shot on Friday and diarrhea all weekend. When I came home I had a message that reminded me I need to create a slide show presentation. So I sat on the couch all day making my presentation and didn't get any exercise.
And now the squirrels in my head start going round and round. Fat and lazy. Fat and lazy. I'm going to get fat if I don't go for a walk today. I'm already fat. It already stopped working. I've already gained it all back.
I walk by a mirror. I'm not fat. But I feel like I'm fat.
I'm just too old for this. I wish it would stop. I wish I could be the new me. But I'm still the old me.
Tomorrow we lift. Tomorrow is a new day. It will be better tomorrow. I'll be the new me tomorrow. Today is just one of those days. You know?
I cancelled my next order because it was going to be another 3 months of BPI and I figured by end of June when it was time to send the order to the pharmacy there wouldn't be any more BPI. What should I do if I want to order something else in June or July? Do I have to start over?
For maintenance, how do you manage the ordering? Continuing to order every 3 or 6 months will grow your inventory faster than your use if you are not taking as much or spreading out your doses. And ordering monthly gets you bad prices. What's your ordering strategy?
Someone in the tirzepatide compound sub compiled a list of ingredients of various compound pharmacy tirzepatide vials. Many of the companies use more and different ingredients than just sterile water and benzyl alcohol. In fact, Ely Lilly's ingredients list seems to contain many ingredients.
I saw on one site that sells solutions and other supplies, they offer a bac water that contains sodium chloride. Can you think of a reason why a solution of sterile water, sodium chloride and benzyl alcohol would not be perfectly fine for reconstituting tirz given compounding pharmacies often include sodium chloride as an ingredient in their solution?
There was a big drop this morning, probably a glitch in my scale, who knows.
Instead of elation and thinking wow, I'm 1 pound away from goal, my thought was oh no! I don't want the weight loss phase to be over yet.
The weight loss phase is fun. It's fun to see a new body in the mirror, to see clothes get loose and formerly tight close fit again. I'm not ready to feel the end of that kind of fun.
I'm afraid of trying to figure the maintenance part out. I'm afraid to have days of hunger, or to have the food noise come back. I'm afraid to eat more and gain it all back. Afraid of failure. I'm staying on tirz for maintenance, I just am afraid of how trial and error messy it will be.
Anybody else?
This is not super scientific, just personal observation from a 61F skeptic.
I get precancerous lesions and patches on my face and hands from sun damage. I've tried two topical ghk-cu over the counter products from Amazon. One is a 1% with hyaluronic acid serum (The Ordinary) and the other is a 4% spray for the hair (YLMOEISTY, some random brand). The hyaluronic acid leaves me feeling sticky and gross so I switched to the spray. The spray, which I spray on my skin not my hair, seems to work very well. I spray it on my hands and then rub it on my face, back of hands and arms. Some of my precancerous patches are gone and some are reduced significantly. I'll continue using this.
I add to my face some basic hyaluronic acid lotion from CVS and on my arms and legs I've been using AmLac creme. The AmLac reduces the dryness, but skin still remains crepey.
Additionally I'm injecting 300mcg Sermorelin 5 nights a week since January. I've noticed my skin has gotten thicker. It has gotten much harder to insert needles into my skin. I have to push with more force, or jiggle the needle to get it to go in. I'm a bit afraid to just jab with force. It's gotten to be quite a bother, actually, but thicker skin means when something pokes or scratches me, especially my forearms, I don't just start bleeding under and out of the skin. Thin skin is a sign of aging and Sermorelin is actually working. I'm surprised. I truly expected it to be snake oil.
My doctor has me switching from oral estrogen to the patch. The first thing I see when my prescription is sent to the pharmacy is there is a shortage and they don't know when the patch will be in stock. So I had my doctor sent in another prescription for oral estrogen.
The patch came and I picked it up and opened the box. There are 4 patches in there. Months are longer than 4 weeks. Is this going to be my life from now on, where you never have enough and are always skipping weeks?
I decided to not use the patch until I'm out of oral estrogen so I can build a stockpile of patches.
It was bad enough on oral keeping enough on hand so I could take vacations and not be a slave to the day of the month I can pick up a prescription. I would skip days so I could build a little stockpile and do automatic refills so I could get more than 12 bottles in a year and then I could be free to take vacations in the wilderness a month or more long (I am retired).
What strategies do you have to keep enough patches on hand so you can just live your life without being chained to the pharmacy?
Long ago I bought a lot of really cool tights from Gear Bunch. I struggled to wear them because I was too fat. The tight spandex would creep the legs down slowly but surely. I added drawstings to them so I could tighten them on my waist and hopefully keep them from sliding down. After losing weight I was so happy I could wear them again. They didn't feel tight and they stayed up! I pulled out the drawstrings. Suddenly this morning the waist bands are getting loose. I had to put the drawstring back in. 😕I know there are better fitting leggings out there but I love the tattoo art on them. I guess this is a NSV or a scale victory but what a bummer. I'm losing even the new smaller thrift store clothes I bought not too long ago.
I can see it now. I'm pretty happy. I lost 20lbs or so before my start picture, but didn't take a picture.
I have done everything possible that I can think of. Diet, exercise, supplements, and Tirzepatide. My total cholesterol was 350. Now it is only 229 with good ratios! Dr. said no need to take any medication.
Supplements:
I have done everything possible that I can think of. Diet, exercise, supplements, and even Tirzepatide is said to reduce cholesterol. My cholesterol was 350. Now it is only 229 with good ratios! Dr. said no need to take any medication.
Tirz away and keep the doctor away!
Supplements:
I'm getting close to maintenance. I'm also short and old. My weight loss is pretty slow, especially now near the end. I lift weights so I'm sure that makes the scale less meaningful anyway. I eat very little, in the realm of 1000-1300 calories per day. I'm pretty active, walking 20k steps or more some days, lifting weights twice a week (5/3/1 program on squats and deads, just general lifting on press and bench), hiking once a week, garden maintenance 3x per week so I put "lightly active" in TDEE calculator and maintenance is 1500 calories. This is all fine, I'm not asking for CICO advice.
What I am asking about is that maintenance is hardly going to be any different than what I'm doing now. Really all I would have to do to maintain is to eat some cookies now and then. I can't imagine changing my dose or dose schedule will make much of a difference. Is there anybody in a similar position who can share what maintenance is like for you? Did it just turn out that you didn't change anything?
I went to a new doctor today, the first time since using Tirzepatide. I weighed the same at the doctor as I do naked at home, even though I was fully clothed wearing shoes, a rather heavy leather belt and after lunch and a big glass of water.
My blood pressure and heart rate were good. I guess the increased heart rate on Tirz doesn't last forever.
The doctor was surprised I am a 61 year old woman without any chronic conditions and only one medication, for hot flashes. Which was why I was there, to get a refill. She said I should use a patch instead of pills. Before I even got home the pharmacy tells me there's a shortage of patches.
What is with this disaster of a healthcare system? Now I will have nothing for hot flashes.
She is willing to help me get PCSK9 inhibitors for family high cholesterol. I have to try Zetia first which she acknowledged will do nothing for a person who barely eats any fat at all, thanks to Tirz. But insurance companies make you jump through stupid hoops.
Pray for us Saint Luigi.
She asked who prescribed the "Mounjaro" (that's what they put in my chart when I said Tirzepatide.) I told her I get it from a telehealth. She had nothing bad to say about that.
She asked what my starting weight was and I told her about how my highest weight was 165 or so and I could get about 15lbs off hiking 800 miles of the Continental Divide every year for the last 4 years, and then gain it back, but when I got to the end of the trail I knew this was an unsustainable thing to keep doing, so I decided to try Tirz at a start weight of about 150. And here I am, a total of almost 40lbs later. She asked if I was on maintenance and I told her I only lose ounces each week, that I'd like to get to 120 but it's slow. Whatever happens will happen. She seemed supportive of it all.
I felt really good about this. I've done every possible thing I can do to address high cholesterol on my end. Presenting as a normal weight person makes health care professionals take you way more seriously, it seems. I was not dismissed, she believed me that my diet is nearly perfect, I was not offered another statin. I feel pretty proud of turning myself from an overweight person a couple points from obesity and headed for metabolic disease or heart disease into a healthy, normal weight person who feels pretty great.
