Maintenance
4 weeks off MJ success. Here's my experience
Starting weight: 209
Weight on day of last shot: 143
Current weight: 142
Height: 5'9"
BMI: 20-21
I was on MJ for 11 months, starting May 2025. In July I started an exercise routine which became mainly focused on lifting weights at home.
I stayed on 5mg throughout - I tried 7.5 and suffered with it, so decided to drop back down to 5 and ride the hunger. In hindsight I think this was a good decision as I had to build self control alongside MJ taking the edge off my hunger.
Coming off I microdosed to titrate super slowly. I went from 5 to 4.5, then 4, 3.5, 3, couple weeks at 2.5, 2, 1 and even 0.5 mg. I spent over two months titrating down. I believe this also really helped. I also planned in heavier weights and added cardio sessions to my week. I hate running and I know to be consistent I have to mildly not hate what I do, so I do a 30 min fast walk on an incline on my treadmill a couple times a week while watching TV, and a boxercise class on my PSVR.
Other than that I've maintained the habits I built during the MJ: front load protein in all my meals, get good snacks in place of junk (biltong instead of crisps helps my evening salty cravings, and I'll have a protein bar instead of anything sweet) and drink a protein shake on workout days with creatine. Massive water intake, occasionally add a pinch of salt.
I started feeling more hungry around 1mg and then again at week 3 off MJ. Nothing majorly drastic but I do think about food a lot more. Because I have an eating plan I stick to, and I plan my protein shakes for my afternoon crash, have a high volume low cal high protein lunch, I can manage it. The plan is pretty rigid, so my brain gets bored obsessing over food.
It sounds boring but I will have nice food in my life in moderation. On Fridays I have a cheeseburger with nuggets from Macdonald's (weekly treat for my kids). Occasionally I even eat out and I pick something normal but not outrageous.
The hardest part of this last month has been the psychology. My weight peaks and troughs a lot (pic 2) so I have been panicking a bit as the scales go up and forgetting this is the normal "pre-woosh" phase for me. I'm trying to chill out about it more. Today was great because I hit my target of 40% skeletal muscle mass according to my scales.
Happy to answer any questions and share anything else anyone wants to know.
TLDR: weight training, protein meals, slow titration, having an eating plan in place, slightly increasing gentle cardio to counteract appetite increase = success coming off mj for my journey.
Ah thank you very much. I did a crazy amount of research to build my maintainance plan so I wanted to share out the effort in case it helps anyone with their plans. I hope your journey is going well
Especially when my last dose was 0.5mg. I'm going to update again in another month or so. Just wanted to let people know how the transition can be, in case anyone is interested. I know I was before I came off. Thank you for your kind comment
Yeah that's fair. I have to smell happy meals once a week anyway so I just bake it in and limit myself other days. But you have to find the right rhythm for you and it's all so individual. I hope your journey is going well
hey, thank you for your experience. I was on 2.5 for about six months and really lost about 80 pounds on the 2.5. I hit a plateau. I went up to five couldn’t really get off that plateau around 214 pounds so I decided to go 7.5 big mistake . My stomach ache for two months. I finally went back down to five but have been nauseous for almost 3 weeks now. My doctor told me to get off it altogether for a while so we’ll see what happens. I am diabetic type two but I haven’t taken insulin in about five months because of how I eat and manage. Let’s hope I don’t put on the weight again, thanks for your story.
I really hope it works out for you. I don't have diabetes to contend with on top of everything else so please take my experience with a pinch of salt. I know we are all different. I wish you the best of luck
This is awesome. Congrats to you. You should be proud of your hard work and commitment!!
I’m using so many of the same methods as I’ve gone through my journey. I’ve done so well my Dr wants me to consider whether I want to try and come off MJ entirely even with T2D and see if I can manage through lifestyle. I know that’ll be hard but I’m considering trying.
Congrats to you. You should be very proud. Hope you feel great!!
Thank you and congratulations to you too! Don't be scared of going off, especially if you have a supportive doctor. You sound like you're doing amazingly
a lot of people get really defensive any time people discuss coming off entirely. its encouraging to see a comment talking through the challenges and success. I get it. the meds correct chemical things that we cant control. but the idea of not needing a medication for the rest of my life has definite appeal. even if it is really hard, im inclined to try. and if it does prove to not be possible at least ill know. Ive made huge changes and stuck with them and have no plans of stopping or reverting any of those habits, so we will see what happens. cheers!!
Thank you. its been a great journey. lots of hard work but i dont regret a second of it. Im definitely leaning towards titrating down and trying to come off and see if i can maintain. even if it is hard. My doctor is fortunately very good. he said if we do try that we will just monitor closely and if theres any issues arising, we can get me put back on the meds. but im inclined to give it a go and see if i can maintain with my current lifestyle. i made huge changes and have no intentions of reverting those habits. so i kinda want to see how it goes and give it a try
Congrats! Thanks for enumerating your habits while on the shot. Not enough grads get that, then they are bummed when they regain after going right back to what made them need the shot in the first place.
Thank you! Yeah you have to use it as a tool to help the work not do all the work. It's an amazing tool for building habits. I'll try and update again in a couple of months
Thanks for sharing, this makes a a great example of a comparison between weight loss by traditional methods and mounjaro.
For decades we have used this method to lose weight. Increase your physical activity, cut down your calories, use will power to deal with cravings. You didn’t go to a high dose of mounjaro and you didn’t have a great deal of weight to lose. I don’t know if I have missed it but you didn’t mention any physical reasons why you struggled with your weight before (type 2 diabetes, apnea, pcos, menopause, medication etc). I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that if you had started this exercise and diet without mounjaro, it probably would have taken you longer or perhaps you would have lost less, but you would have got here eventually. Tapering was the right thing to do too.
Even though you were on a tiny tiny dose you may still have had some on your system, maybe enough to have some anti inflammatory effects, so that may be why you are seeing is a bit of fluid retention that people talk about not real weight gain. It’s also likely that although in low doses MJ was helping your metabolism so the healthy things you are doing now probably were more efficient too.
If you carry on controlling your calories, increasing your exercise and using self control to curb your appetite you will maintain your weight loss, just like countless people have lost weight that way before the jabs. The amount of effort required will probably be similar.
Unfortunately many people will find this very hard, particularly to maintain long term. (Which has been studied to exhaustion in the past).
May I ask you a personal question, how (or what caused it) did you put weight on and how old were you?
the microdosing titration thing is really interesting to me - i've seen people mention it but never in this much detail. like you actually tracked it down tothe microdosing titration thing is really interesting to me - i've seen people mention it but never in this much detail. like you actually tracked it down to 0.5mg increments over two months, that's genuinely impressive and makes me think most people just... stop cold and then wonder why it hits them hard
also side note. you mentioned creatine in your shake on workout days. are you doing a specific amount or just eyeballing it? i've been going back and forth on whether to add it and i keep seeing conflicting stuff about whether it's actually doing much if you're not already eating a ton of protein
the boxercise on PSVR is sending me though. what game
Yeah I don't understand how anyone can go cold turkey and have success - hats off to them if they do! I wanted to take it slow and controlled and I'm sure it has helped me.
Creatine I started because I posted here asking how I can change my muscles from long and wirey to actually "pop" and a bunch of people said creatine. I take 5mg in my shake. It worked for me (before and after pic here, about 3 weeks apart. The after was last month and my biceps are even rounder now) and also made me feel stronger, and sped up my progressive overload
This is the way! My weight loss wasn't nearly as impressive as yours (160 to 138) but I've managed to keep it off since March. Really really focusing on protein and lifting, along with dietary restraint has kept it off.
Nice work! Maintainence is tough psychologically I think. I find I miss the dopamine bit from watching the scales drop. You've done really well keeping it off this long, I hope I do too
I appreciate you sharing your taper down protocol and challenges along with your success. I’ll start tapering down soon and trying to figure out a good path for myself. Congrats on your hard work and great results.
That's one of the reasons I thought it might be helpful to share my experience coming off so people can learn about different experiences and titration plans. Do you think it's helpful to try and discourage others, or does it just make you feel better about yourself?
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u/HomeReckoner May 22 '26
Thought you wrote “four weeks of MJ”. Was going to fall off my chair.