The Start Of My Wegovy Journey - A Pleasant Surprise!

Hi everyone - I'm back!

I had a lovely holiday in Majorca. The weather was gorgeous, and I really enjoyed not having to get up early or go anywhere. It was all-inclusive, but I was still on Mounjaro and only ate until I was full. I didn’t really snack between meals either. Generally, I had either breakfast and dinner or lunch and dinner because I couldn’t manage more than that. As you know, I love ice cream, but I limited myself to one a day.

I have a confession though — I drank every day! The hotel had sangria on tap, and I made full use of it. We had cocktails after dinner most nights too. I didn’t try the red wine, but I had a couple of glasses of white wine and it wasn’t great. The real test was whether I’d manage to refrain when I got home — and I have. I haven’t had a drink, and I haven’t wanted one. This is how I used to be with alcohol: only drinking when I went to a party or out for a meal. Hopefully, I’ve cured myself of drinking for the sake of it.

When I got home, I weighed myself and found I’d gained 3.5 lbs, which is pretty good for an all-inclusive hotel with alcoholic drinks. I thought it was probably water retention as my rings had got tight — and I was right. By the time I weighed in four days later, all of it had gone. I was really pleased. Since my last blog, I’ve lost two pounds, so I’m still going in the right direction.

I took my first dose of Wegovy three days ago and, after reading lots of negative posts about it, I really wasn’t expecting much. People have been saying they’re constantly hungry and have gained weight, so I wasn’t confident at all. Some have only had a couple of doses and have already gone back to Mounjaro.

Well, I can tell you I’ve had more suppression than I had on Mounjaro over the last few weeks I was using it, and my food noise — which was getting louder — has quietened down. My weight loss on Mounjaro had dropped to around half a pound a week. In fact, I lost just 4 lbs in the final eight weeks of Mounjaro, which is obviously better than nothing, but to put it into context, I lost 11 lbs over the previous eight weeks — so my weight loss was down to almost a third of what I was losing before.

People are more likely to post negative views on social media than positive ones, so it’s not surprising there are so many. But it’s not helpful to those switching to Wegovy who are already anxious about it. There are also a lot of posts bemoaning the side effects, but I haven’t had any.

I’ve just read a post on Facebook from a woman who described what it’s like to be a constant dieter to an absolute tee. She talked about being a bit overweight when she first started dieting, but gaining all the weight back — plus a bit more — which then became a vicious circle until she was a lot overweight. I could’ve written it!

What was interesting was that she looked into what happens to your body when you lose weight. She said dieting interferes with your ability to know when you’re full because it disrupts the hormones that regulate hunger and fullness. I’d never heard of this, so I Googled it — and she’s absolutely right.

Ghrelin is the hormone that stimulates your appetite, and when you diet, your body increases the amount of ghrelin to try and get you to eat more. Leptin is the hormone that signals fullness and is produced by fat cells. When you lose fat, you have less leptin, so the signal to stop eating is weakened. This leads to the part of your brain that controls food restraint becoming less active, and your metabolism slows down to conserve energy.

Wegovy doesn’t have the fat-burning hormone found in Mounjaro, so it’s important to take regular aerobic exercise, do resistance training to build muscle, drink plenty, eat enough protein, and get quality sleep.  In other words, Wegovy takes a bit more work but, ultimately, we should be working towards eating sensibly and taking exercise for the rest of our lives.

So, as usual, here are the stats:

Weight - 12st 2.5lb
BMI - 32.2
Total weight loss on Mounjaro - 3 stone 12.5lbs 
Wegovy dose - 0.5mg

One last thing; I looked at the latest comparison between Mounjaro and Wegovy and it appears that they have a similar success rate at around 18 months of use. So, if you have a lot of weight to lose, it will definitely be more cost effective to stick with Wegovy. The average 12 months costs are:

• Mounjaro - £3,684
• Wegovy - £2,988

Using a subscription service, such as that offered by SheMed, will also save money in the long run. They charge £159 every four weeks, which works out at £2,067 for a year.

See you next week x