INTRO Happy to be here!

kartikeya

Explorer
Joined
Jun 29, 2026
Messages
23
Reaction score
7
Location
New York -> Texas
Hey folks!

I'm Karti — 23, a professional musician based in Western New York, and I'm here to learn as much as I can before I start my own GLP journey.

A bit about my story:

Back in high school I competed in multiple sports, but a knee injury forced me to pull way back on physical activity. Not long after that, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and binge eating became a problem for me. I've made several attempts to drop weight the traditional way, but no serious pounds have come off. My mom and step-dad both had good results with GLP-1s, which got me interested, and what really sold me was seeing people my age and build (6'2, 300 lbs, broad frame) on r/GLPGrad who paired a year of GLPs with a healthy diet and weight training and went through major transformations.

I'm eager to learn more about how the process works, and if any other young folks are in the same situation, reach out so we can commiserate!

Take care,

Karti
 
kartikeya said:

Hey folks!

I'm Karti — 23, a professional musician based in Western New York, and I'm here to learn as much as I can before I start my own GLP journey.

A bit about my story:

Back in high school I competed in multiple sports, but a knee injury forced me to pull way back on physical activity. Not long after that, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and binge eating became a problem for me. I've made several attempts to drop weight the traditional way, but no serious pounds have come off. My mom and step-dad both had good results with GLP-1s, which got me interested, and what really sold me was seeing people my age and build (6'2, 300 lbs, broad frame) on r/GLPGrad who paired a year of GLPs with a healthy diet and weight training and went through major transformations.

I'm eager to learn more about how the process works, and if any other young folks are in the same situation, reach out so we can commiserate!

Take care,

Karti
Going from athlete to professional musician in New York is honestly pretty badass. I get the whole injury forcing you to slow down thing, I've dealt with that too. Hopefully this place works out for you and you hit what you're aiming for. Out of curiosity, what's your music thing, do you play an instrument or anything? Now I'm intrigued 🤣
 
Best of luck — it's achievable. I began from a much older, shorter, and far less active starting point, yet at roughly the same weight and dealing with binge eating problems, I've gone from 145kg down to 64kg. The bulk of that loss happened before I realized inexpensive GLP medications were available, achieved through a low calorie high protein way of eating with no highly rewarding / high glycemic index carb type foods, aiming to avoid setting off binging — that approach worked, though it left me pretty much constantly hungry. Right now I'm on tirz 15mg reta 5mg plus cagri 0.5mg, with weight holding steady, no binging, and not perpetually hungry.
 
Greetings from a fellow Western New Yorker! At 64, I followed a keto diet (comparable to paleo, though with extremely few carbs) for a number of years, until my metabolism completely crashed. Despite being active and eating a relatively moderate amount of calories, I could only manage my weight through relentless daily and weekly fasting. Beginning tirz has been a huge relief. I now eat a much broader range of foods, and carbs no longer scare me. It's possible my starved microbiome is bouncing back! I'm microdosing tirz at 2.5 mg (my starting dose was under 1 mg), and across 4 months I've had gradual but consistent weight loss along with metabolic improvements.
 
Peptidechud said:

kartikeya said:

Hey folks!

I'm Karti — 23, a professional musician based in Western New York, and I'm here to learn as much as I can before I start my own GLP journey.

A bit about my story:

Back in high school I competed in multiple sports, but a knee injury forced me to pull way back on physical activity. Not long after that, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and binge eating became a problem for me. I've made several attempts to drop weight the traditional way, but no serious pounds have come off. My mom and step-dad both had good results with GLP-1s, which got me interested, and what really sold me was seeing people my age and build (6'2, 300 lbs, broad frame) on r/GLPGrad who paired a year of GLPs with a healthy diet and weight training and went through major transformations.

I'm eager to learn more about how the process works, and if any other young folks are in the same situation, reach out so we can commiserate!

Take care,

Karti
Going from athlete to professional musician in New York is honestly pretty badass. I get the whole injury forcing you to slow down thing, I've dealt with that too. Hopefully this place works out for you and you hit what you're aiming for. Out of curiosity, what's your music thing, do you play an instrument or anything? Now I'm intrigued 🤣
Upright bass is my main instrument! Jazz, orchestral, and folk are the styles I play most often, though now and then I also pick up other instruments and dabble in different genres. On top of that, I hold a degree in Music Composition, so whenever time allows, I do some writing too!
 
fortyfourpercent said:

Best of luck — it's achievable. I began from a much older, shorter, and far less active starting point, yet at roughly the same weight and dealing with binge eating problems, I've gone from 145kg down to 64kg. The bulk of that loss happened before I realized inexpensive GLP medications were available, achieved through a low calorie high protein way of eating with no highly rewarding / high glycemic index carb type foods, aiming to avoid setting off binging — that approach worked, though it left me pretty much constantly hungry. Right now I'm on tirz 15mg reta 5mg plus cagri 0.5mg, with weight holding steady, no binging, and not perpetually hungry.
For healthy weight loss, going low calorie and high protein looks like the way to go, particularly when you're fairly active. A few times I've attempted to just power through it, but that constant hunger always gets to me once the day drags on, and with a 65 to 70 hour work week, most days turn into long days. I'd like to know how physically active you've been throughout this whole process. I've been attempting to spend more time at the gym (I had a stretch of 4 months where I went 3 times a week, but I fell off a month and a half ago), and I'm wondering how other people have approached activity while losing weight.
 
team_chocolatine said:

Greetings from a fellow Western New Yorker! At 64, I followed a keto diet (comparable to paleo, though with extremely few carbs) for a number of years, until my metabolism completely crashed. Despite being active and eating a relatively moderate amount of calories, I could only manage my weight through relentless daily and weekly fasting. Beginning tirz has been a huge relief. I now eat a much broader range of foods, and carbs no longer scare me. It's possible my starved microbiome is bouncing back! I'm microdosing tirz at 2.5 mg (my starting dose was under 1 mg), and across 4 months I've had gradual but consistent weight loss along with metabolic improvements.
The point about having more food options is a good one. I've been working on broadening what I eat, and it's been on my mind that glps might make me want to do that less.
 
kartikeya said:

fortyfourpercent said:

Best of luck — it's achievable. I began from a much older, shorter, and far less active starting point, yet at roughly the same weight and dealing with binge eating problems, I've gone from 145kg down to 64kg. The bulk of that loss happened before I realized inexpensive GLP medications were available, achieved through a low calorie high protein way of eating with no highly rewarding / high glycemic index carb type foods, aiming to avoid setting off binging — that approach worked, though it left me pretty much constantly hungry. Right now I'm on tirz 15mg reta 5mg plus cagri 0.5mg, with weight holding steady, no binging, and not perpetually hungry.
For healthy weight loss, going low calorie and high protein looks like the way to go, particularly when you're fairly active. A few times I've attempted to just power through it, but that constant hunger always gets to me once the day drags on, and with a 65 to 70 hour work week, most days turn into long days. I'd like to know how physically active you've been throughout this whole process. I've been attempting to spend more time at the gym (I had a stretch of 4 months where I went 3 times a week, but I fell off a month and a half ago), and I'm wondering how other people have approached activity while losing weight.
When I began, my fitness level was extremely low and my overall health was bad — even a trip to the supermarket wore me out and left me soaked with sweat. I wasn't working, and honestly wasn't in any shape to.

No exercise at all until I reached roughly 115kg. At that point, walking for just 5 minutes caused real pain, particularly in my feet. So I came up with a basic behavioural approach: commit to 5 minutes each day. The whole point was to make the task so effortless that there was no excuse to skip it. It ended up working, and across about 8 months I gradually increased it to 3 hours daily. Sometimes I get an overblown fatigue reaction to exercise where I feel unwell for a day or 2 afterward, and thankfully this method appeared to sidestep that issue. Unfortunately, over the last year or so I haven't managed to keep it up as consistently as I'd hoped.
 
kartikeya said:

team_chocolatine said:

Greetings from a fellow Western New Yorker! At 64, I followed a keto diet (comparable to paleo, though with extremely few carbs) for a number of years, until my metabolism completely crashed. Despite being active and eating a relatively moderate amount of calories, I could only manage my weight through relentless daily and weekly fasting. Beginning tirz has been a huge relief. I now eat a much broader range of foods, and carbs no longer scare me. It's possible my starved microbiome is bouncing back! I'm microdosing tirz at 2.5 mg (my starting dose was under 1 mg), and across 4 months I've had gradual but consistent weight loss along with metabolic improvements.
The point about having more food options is a good one. I've been working on broadening what I eat, and it's been on my mind that glps might make me want to do that less.
For several years before this, I followed Keto, which meant cutting out a wide range of foods. These days, with Tirz, I'm able to enjoy some nice carbs. Still, foods I've always liked frequently don't appeal to me, and on certain days I have no drive to prepare meals. My fat intake has to stay low, and I've also lost the capacity to consume big portions of high-fiber vegetables--so getting enough nutrition takes deliberate effort. It seems I handle some flavor pairings better than others. Two dishes I really like are Thai papaya salad and Greek-style dandelion greens made with garlic, olive oil, and lemon.
 
Back
Top