When I heard about muscle loss on the GLP-1s, including the Mounjaro I started six months ago, I wasn’t too concerned. I’m postmenopausal and over 60 years old, 63 later this month, so am in the prime frame to have the most issues.
The New York Times says in “The Race Is On to Stop Ozempic Muscle Loss“:
…it’s critical for these patients to find ways to maintain their muscle. Older adults and postmenopausal women, in particular, are at risk for becoming frail or developing osteoporosis if they lose too much muscle, said Dr. Scott Hagan, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Washington who studies obesity. But anyone who loses muscle could experience weakness and fatigue, Dr. Hagan said, and could be at an increased risk of falls and injuries.
I read that and still didn’t think this really applied to me. But as I read more and more, I saw that both Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly are working hard to find a counter to the muscle loss.
MedWatch states in “Novo Nordisk prepares to launch muscle mass preservation drug
The Danish pharmaceutical giant thereby follows on the heels of competitor Eli Lilly.” :
Novo Nordisk is also on the way with a new treatment that will ensure that overweight people can be treated for weight loss and not risk losing muscle mass at the same time, executive vice president for Development Martin Holst Lange announced on Thursday at a teleconference for analysts.
Novo Nordisk thus follows in the footsteps of Eli Lilly, which last week announced that it will look into combining its weight loss drug Mounjaro with an experimental muscle loss drug to ensure that this does not happen.
Was there something to this muscle loss after all?
A Picture Says It All
I decided to go through my pictures and see what the GLP-1s had done to my body over the past two years.
I was on Trulicity (dulaglutide) for a year, and now taking Mounjaro (tirzepatide) for the past six months, both of them for my Type 2 Diabetes. Because I had no idea I was on a GLP-1 with Trulicity, I did not take pictures of my 86 pound weight loss. I thought I was doing a great job on my own!
Note that I do not watch television, do not see social media, had no reason to search out anything beyond the couple of things pertaining to Trulicity as I started taking it July 28, 2022. The Trulicity package insert said I might lose 6-10 pounds. I ignored that because I never lose weight when a medication says I will. And 6-10 pounds off 405 pounds? Puh-lease.
As I started Mounjaro on September 7, 2023 however, I became ravenous for GLP-1 (Trulicity/Ozempic/Wegovy) and GLP-1/GIP (Mounjaro/Zepbound) information. It was then I realized I had been losing weight on Trulicity and might be losing more on Mounjaro. I didn’t start taking pictures right away, mostly random pics of me in new outfits.
But now with my newfound muscle-loss knowledge, I wanted to see what I had in my photo storage.
This was one month after starting Mounjaro and at that time had lost 153 pounds since April 2022. Again, I didn’t know about the muscle loss aspects until recently, so it was simply a pic of my sagging arm for my granddaughter who thought my batwings felt like dough.
(If the dates seem off, it’s because I lost 40 pounds on my own before starting Trulicity.)
That’s a dramatic difference. I was watching my arm do weird things, even telling my youngest daughter something was up. I still didn’t know in December there was muscle loss going on right before my eyes.
The changes between the first and third pictures, 6-month’s time, was only a weight loss of 38 pounds.
This began to horrify me. If I hold my arm down, it looks like those 1970s Italian wine bottle candles. Except it my skin dripping down, not wax.
Yes, I Am Older Now
I’m in my 60’s now. The elasticity in my body surely has abandoned me. I can’t expect to have taut skin, even if I lost 20 pounds.
When I lost 190 pounds after the Gastric Bypass in 2001, I was a babe of 40. I had baggy-saggy skin, but nothing like this. And I lost the 190 pounds in a year! Those changes in my arm happened over 6 months. It isn’t just my skin not bouncing back.
What Am I Going to Do About It?
The general consensus is I need plastic surgery to remove all the skin. I’ve had so many surgeries, the prospect of having parts of my of my body sliced off doesn’t please me. Plus the money. Where would that come from?
So I am going to do what I can and work out like a maniac. Mind you, I really hate going to the gym, but even as I try to embrace my wax museum skin, I want to put some muscle back underneath.
I have 2, 3, and 5 pound weights at home, but stopped by Planet Fitness the other day and visualized myself there. I can walk there and back home, so that’s cool. I’m doing decently on cardio, walking 2-3 miles a day. That sounds lame to many, I’m sure, but I am still a beginner walker who was sedentary for 20+ years. I started by walking to the living room without a walker and now am going 2-3 miles a day. I’m very proud of myself!
Hiding My Skin
I have never hidden my body. Even at 405 pounds, I was wearing sleeveless tie dye dresses.
My kids are weirded out that I wear mostly black now after a lifetime of brights and tie dye.
But now that I am losing weight and have so much is sagging skin, I am, for the first time ever, self-conscious about my body. It’s so odd, I’m talking about it in therapy. Why, at my largest weight, did I not care? Was it because I was so fat my whole life and was used to it? Why does my skin bother me so much?
I’m wearing a 3/4 length sweaters to cover my upper arms because I still wear sleeveless shirts and dresses. I have never covered any of myself until now. That bugs me a lot. I want to embrace and be proud of this skin because it’s visible proof of my improving health. But people stare. As much, if not more, than when I was so fat I couldn’t walk.
I’m more confused than ever about my body. The good news is I am not weak or tired or falling… the symptoms of muscle loss.
Testing for Muscle Loss
I’m going for two separate DEXA Scans to see how my muscles are faring. I wish I had gotten one a year ago, but didn’t know I should. If you’re reading this, get a Body Composition DEXA Scan asap! My second is a Bone Density DEXA scan to check on the osteopenia in my left hip and pelvic bone. It actually seems to be improving, which is cool. Both will give me complementary information. Will report back after I get those done.
Would I Take Mounjaro Again?
Excuse my language, but fuck yeah! I am taking it still and plan on taking it or one of its future sisters forevermore.
I got the heart valve problem from Fen-Phen when I took it. I have a plethora of issues that came from the RNY Gastric Bypass. So if wax-melting skin is the worst I get from GLP-1s, then I will gladly take it.
The health gain I have gotten from Trulicity and Mounjaro cannot be measured. Well, it can with labs and the quality of my life, but it is an endless amount of benefits for me. Ones I plan on keeping for the rest of my life.