MelKaye3's Journal, 10 October 2023

Good for you. The Mounjaro in your system likely helped moderate your eating behaviour a bit although we all know that even with the meds we can eat over the effects of the med. It takes about 25 days to fully clear so when you went on vacation you had a decent level of the med in your system still. I often wonder (I'm an Oz girl) whether the habits we are learning now regarding food intake, portion size, food quality will carry us once at maintenance, or whether we'll need this for life. What does your PCP think? 

My PCP said I need to be prepared to take it forever (or something like it). What she said is that obesity is a disease which requires lifelong treatment just like any other chronic condition. I will probably space out the shots to every 10 days or 2 weeks once I reach goal. But that's a long way off! I think I've decided I'd like to get down to 160, which would be 100 pounds lost. So a long way to go!  

A lot of what i have read about these drugs is that most people gain weight after stopping. That it is just as you said melkaye-probably need to be on for life. However, if you have established a long run of healthy eating and portion control after being in maintenance for a while i wonder if you could dial back either the strength of the shot or the time between taking the shots? Do you know? 

But with reasoning there would be no recovery any from any major drug addiction ever. I mean don't get me wrong but heroin and other drug addictions have recovery not to say that obesity is like heroin addiction. But food addiction and drug addiction have a lot of similarity and food addiction at least has some value. I've known people who have recovered from extreme drug addictions I have stayed recovered for decades/life. I know these diet drugs haven't been around for long enough for us to have the medical research to know one way or another but the idea that there is no possibility of living without it after using it seems a little extreme. I'm not saying of course that it would be easy at all and that most people wouldn't have a lot of difficulty but the idea that all people would have to be on it forever seems a little much and a bit self-serving to the drug companies. I believe that with your portion control, better choices, and good support structure structure that you and others would have a better chance than they give you credit for. Know I maybe wrong but sense there isn't enough data at this point either way I choose to believe in people/you. 😊 

Don't get me wrong, I hope I don't need it forever! Which is why I'm making changes to help me in the long term. But realistically, I realize that my body might never work correctly without the meds. And that's something I'm prepared for.  

As far as addicts go, I actually work in addictions/recovery and guess what? Many of our patients do take meds forever either in the form of something like suboxone or something to help with cravings. Or in the case of dual diagnosis, meds for bipolar, depression, or anxiety to manage those and help prevent returning to the substance. It is great if they don't need them, but I'm thankful they're available for people who need a bit more help.  

🙏💙🙏