Maintenance on Tirz or Reta....thoughts?

Stace_wow

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Hi everyone,

I am curious what everyone is doing for maintenance after weight loss. If you lost weight with Reta, are you maintaining with Reta? If you lost with Tirz are you staying on Tirz at a lower dose, same dose, max dose? Do you use GLP's for maintenance? I hear some folks saying loss with Reta, maintain with Tirz, and the other way around.

I am on Tirz, and I am in a weight loss with Tirz and but considering maintenance with Reta for body recomp benefits, and I'm interested in hearing what others have done, and what has been successful. I began my journey with Tirz since it was my intro to gray and widely accepted, but my real interest in GLPs has been Reta.

HW 400

SW 286

CW 264

7.5mg
 
I'm currently on 6mg Reta, 6 months in and about 10lbs from goal weight. I plan on switching to Tirz for maintenance though. I'm hoping to get away form the elevated HR and lower HRV that Reta has caused since I believe maintenance is going to be a long term deal. Also since the dosage will be much lower, I feel the added appetite suppression would be beneficial.
 
I can see it going a few ways depends on goals.

Like if lost weight on tirz, but wanted some additional lipid control or non alcoholic fatty liver, pop on reta.

If lost on reta, switch to tirz for lower resting heart rate and possibly better sleep.

Im a weirdo who stacks sema and reta. So for cutting, I add and titrate up reta and pretty much maintain on same sema dose.
 
Just one users experience. I have been on maintenance for over 12 months now. I lost weight - 55lbs over 6 months - on Tirzepatide starting at 1mg/week ramping up to 8mg/week. I've been maintaining since on 2.5mg/week Tirz. I'm basically still at goal weight 12 months later. So finding a maintenance dose has worked for me.

My arguments for using Tirz - if it works for you - is it is a more vetted compound, more widely available, more accepted by doctors, and cheaper. I likely will be taking something for the rest on my life for maintenance, and at this point in time Tirz wins the pro/con debate for me.

I am thinking about loosing another 10-15lbs and using an added dosage of Reta to facilitate it. That will be my first experience with Reta. I now have a kit on hand and will start on my next needle night on Saturday.
 
You are obviously responding pretty well to tirz given the dose you are on and the weight lost, which helps. Not sure it makes a lot of difference if you use tirz or reta to lose the rest of the weight or for maintenance, it looks like you have enough dosage headroom to get to your target on tirz. The only thing I think is important is that the evidence says you need to stay on the dose used to lose the weight to keep it off, though there are people on this forum maintaining on lower doses. But given you will be trying to keep a lot of weight off trying lower maintenance doses is fine, but if you start regaining weight do not be surprised if you have to increase doses back up.
 
I am on both, my maintenance is about 75% highest dose. I enjoy the lack of noise and cravings

on Tirz. I enjoy the added energy of Reta. I plan to keep using both.
 
I’ve been maintaining on tirz for about 14-15 months now. My highest dose was 15mg when I hit my goal weight, and I still take it weekly. I vary the dosing between 10-15mg depending on how my appetite/weight has been the last week. I have no intention of switching away from tirz because I

know it works for me.
 
I only started GLP's after losing most of the weight, and used them so I was no longer permanently hungry. After unpleasant side effects even at low doses of ozempic, tirz at 15mg was a major improvement , but I was still fairly hungry so added reta 5mg/w, my weight gradually drifted down from 78 kg to 64 kg over a bit less than a year. Added 0.5 of cagri to see if it would help, not sure yet, but I seem to be able to eat when hungry, and weight is near stable, still being fairly careful to avoid high calorie type foods, but I am no longer sure this is essential as my appetite just seems to be adjusting correctly for those calories now, when I do eat something with higher calorific density, where it certainly did not when I was obese or without the GLP drugs.
 
I’m about 7lbs away from my goal. I’ll stay on Reta, but I haven’t decided on a dose yet. I’m currently on 8mg.
 
lessthanhalf said:


The only thing I think is important is that the evidence says you need to stay on the dose used to lose the weight to keep it off, though there are people on this forum maintaining on lower doses.

Click to expand...

Are you sure about this? I don’t recall any studies examing maintenance dose regimes. But I could have definitely missed it.

What I think we can say from SURMOUNT is that if someone stays on the same dose, as during the weight loss, that there is generally no weight regain. But that’s different than saying those folks needed to stay on those specific doses to effectively maintain. We also can say that stopping is not good for weight regain, but in between, I’m not so sure what we can say.
 
Stace_wow said:


Hi everyone,

I am curious what everyone is doing for maintenance after weight loss. If you lost weight with Reta, are you maintaining with Reta? If you lost with Tirz are you staying on Tirz at a lower dose, same dose, max dose? Do you use GLP's for maintenance? I hear some folks saying loss with Reta, maintain with Tirz, and the other way around.

I am on Tirz, and I am in a weight loss with Tirz and but considering maintenance with Reta for body recomp benefits, and I'm interested in hearing what others have done, and what has been successful. I began my journey with Tirz since it was my intro to gray and widely accepted, but my real interest in GLPs has been Reta.

HW 400

SW 286

CW 264

7.5mg

Click to expand...

First and foremost, congratulations on your terrific weight loss. 🎉

I’m not in maintenance yet, but very soon (122lbs lost 8 to go). My plan is to stay on my current tirz dose (20mg) for at least 6 months to a year.

What I’m looking forward to most as part of my journey is staying at the same weight for an extended period of time. Having lost 100lbs or more several times in my life, I was never able to maintain. So my thought is why mess with dosage immediately on hitting goal. What we know from the tirzepatide clinical studies is that participants who stayed on the same dose didn’t gain weight. I believe that lower doses are possible and probably preferred, but that’s a separate discussion.

As far as tirzepatide or retatrutide, since you’re having success on tirzepatide, I’m not sure why to switch. I’d personally ride tirz as long as you can and then start stacking if things stall.

Best of luck to you!
 
Thank you! You are right, I love Tirz so far, and I wont be doing anything but titrating up and monitoring my weight, intake, and exercise for at least the next 6 months.
 
Grogu said:


Are you sure about this? I don’t recall any studies examing maintenance dose regimes. But I could have definitely missed it.

What I think we can say from SURMOUNT is that if someone stays on the same dose, as during the weight loss, that there is generally no weight regain. But that’s different than saying those folks needed to stay on those specific doses to effectively maintain. We also can say that stopping is not good for weight regain, but in between, I’m not so sure what we can say.

Click to expand...
The surmount-maintain studies give some clues about maintenance doses. Attached image shows percentage of people that maintained weight loss on tirzepatide 10/15mg vs tirzepatide 5mg vs placebo.
 
It is going to be interesting to see what happens after multiple years and decades in maintenance. Long term maintenance has always been the failing point for weight reduction programs. Mounjaro has only been on the market for 4 years and widespread use for weight loss is even more recent. What will peeps that stay on Triz maintenance for a decade or two experience.
 
Habibibi said:


The surmount-maintain studies give some clues about maintenance doses. Attached image shows percentage of people that maintained weight loss on tirzepatide 10/15mg vs tirzepatide 5mg vs placebo.

Click to expand...

Yes, thank you! The chart you posted is important, it tells us that about 20% to 30% were unable to maintain even at their weight loss dosage. This would suggest not titrating down as a strategy.

But what the chart doesn't address is if the 70% or 80% of folks who were able to maintain (10mg and 15mg group) really needed the full weight loss dose. That we don't know.
 
This is where I am at too. I am grateful for GLP's but when you start out morbidly obese (like me) I keep hearing this is a forever thing for maintenance...so, highly interested in the longer term data that comes out with that.
 
My wife has been on .25 Semag maintenance dose for 2 years now. My maintenance dose of Tirz is 1.5, lol. Guess I am a GLP-1 lightweight, I just cannot endure the gastric sides of even 2.5mg of Tirz and I don't see ever going up.I still need to lose 33 lbs, but I am still losing. 27 lbs already gone 33 to go.
 
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