Full Recovery After Weight-Loss/Nutrition-Related TE
I wanted to share my timeline and recovery, because those posts were helpful for me when I was going through my TE experience.
After titrating up to the highest dose of Wegovy (2.4 mg), I essentially stopped eating for several months. I didn’t really notice how little I was eating, I lost a lot of weight, and I was happy with the results.
Three months later—late June/early July 2024—I started shedding excessively. I completely panicked, because my hair has always been one of my favorite physical features—something I’m known for.
I waited a long time—3 months—to see a dermatologist and get the TE diagnosis (I had just been obsessively googling and lurking here and on YouTube) which was a mistake; I think it would have helped me to know earlier on that it was definitely going to be temporary.
October 2024, after seeing the dermatologist, I started taking 1.25 mg of oral minoxidil daily. I also stopped taking Wegovy, because I was terrified it was the medication itself and not just the lack of calories/protein that may have been the trigger.
I was in active shedding for 5-6 months. It slowed and eventually went back to normal in December/January. The panic and constant rumination and fixation persisted. It was one of the most anxious times of my life. By the time the shedding had stopped, I’d lost between 40-50% of my hair.
I started noticing regrowth shortly after the shedding stopped. I did the blow dryer trick—pointing a blow dryer at your hair while you hold it up with a brush to blow the short hair away so you can see it—constantly, to reassure myself. I included a photo of this.
In April 2025, I wanted to make sure I was doing everything I could to speed regrowth, so I had my blood work done, and my ferritin was low. I started taking 72 mg of iron nightly. I also started taking OMI hair peptides. And, with MASSIVE amounts of anxiety, I decided to trust my gut that it was the lack of nutrition and not the medication that caused the shedding, and I got back on a maintenance dose of Wegovy—first .5 mg for a month, then up to 1 mg, which I have taken weekly since.
Since then, I’ve just been slowly regrowing—no issues with the Wegovy—and I’m thrilled to say that my hair is fully back to original thickness, length, and texture. My hair is naturally curly, but it became so damaged it completely lost its curl when I was shedding—you can see the difference between the regrowth and damage in one of the photos. It took a little over 2 years since I started shedding to feel 100% recovered.
Here are some photos of the journey. The ponytail just under 2 inches was October 4, 2024. The ponytail just over 3 inches was today, October 4, 2026.
(I still take the minoxidil, iron, and OMI daily—I imagine I always will.)