Reta Adventure Begins - First Hand Experience

[dragonwar54]

What happens when someone who is overweight, new to peptides, and bought several months worth of Reta to experiment with? I guess we will all find out in the coming months!

This forum has been a great guide for myself with countless people providing invaluable information that beginners should take time to digest. Endotoxins? Yup, they’re a real thing with plenty of medical literature for people to read up on. This helps you judge your level of risk since the market has no guarantee of their current levels. Filtration? Another thing that people may take for granted and it appears to have mixed reviews on the efficacy home labs can attain.

A little background information:
I am 6’1”, 276lbs, and 33 years old (sorry to everyone who uses the metric system). Just a few years ago I had cut weight from 250lbs down to 190! This actually didn’t take that much time in the grand scheme of things; I consistently tracked my calories in and calories burned via free calorie trackers and my fitness watch.

Starting at 250lbs and being almost completely sedentary, I decided to make a change by just walking around the block once a day. This slowly evolved to a mile walk, then a 7 mile loop. I am very thankful to have a wonderful walking path that got me out into nature and boosting my 2000 daily steps to over 10,000 daily. I knew that walking wouldn’t be enough for the goal I had set for myself so I started to incorporate running. This started off with a brief 20 minute fitness test. I did 5 minutes of warmup and cool down followed by 10 minutes at a pace that I could run without stopping a ton. Well, that didn’t happen (the not stopping part). I’m sure I walked about as much as I ran in that 10 minute span, but hey, it was a start of something bigger.

Fast forward a few months and I’m running consistently 5 days a week (and still walking my 7 mile loop on my off days). I started to see progress and was hooked on the time I had to myself. I’d listen to audiobooks and podcasts to become a better person. I ended up running several 5K races during this stint and was increasingly becoming faster. I LOVE watching UFC fights, and was an athlete in my younger years, so I figured I’d take up boxing because boxers need to run too, right? I spent a year boxing (absolutely loved it!) before life hit really hard. Ended up having several seizures (this was prior to boxing and no brain damage was shown, so the doctors don’t know what caused them) and my father passing away.

I quick doing pretty much everything I should have kept doing for my health, but I fell back into comfort and worrying about things other than myself. I slowly ballooned back to 250lbs over the course of a few years, then kept going until we sit here today, at 276lbs, writing this post.

Today my package of Reta came into the mail and I was extremely excited to start this journey because of all the positive feedback on this forum and the fitness industry as a whole. I want to showcase to other members what I am doing, what pros and cons I see as I go through this process, and keep myself accountable again.

Current protocol:
Looked at the testing page under this forum to verify the product wasn’t one that fell under the endotoxin scare and matched what the company said.

I mixed up the Reta10 with 1ml of water, took 20 units today (total of 2mg) for a starting dose. I slowly mixed the peptide with my BAC, and verified the vial still looked clear and didn’t have anything floating in it. As you can already tell, I did not filter my peptide prior to this, but I’m sure one bad experience can change this quick? It is late right now and I have already have my food for the day, so I figured this would help (taking it before bed and full). I hope this gives my body some time to digest the peptide and we can start strong tomorrow.

I want to stay transparent with everyone as I go through this journey and help others who may be looking at starting their own peptide journey. Please do your research and understand what you’re getting into, if you are just starting. This forum is a wealth of knowledge and I spent significant time, before joining as a member, reading the posts and trying to take in just 0.01% of the knowledge these people have.

I know this has been a long post, so if you’ve made it this far; I appreciate you and look forward to talking with you!

 

[idontlikeneedles]

Best of luck!

 

[professorpeppy]

What happens when someone who is overweight, new to peptides, and bought several months worth of Reta to experiment with?

Great things.. check out my signature

 

[BNLFL]

Sounds good so far.

 

[dragonwar54]

Best of luck!

Thank you!

 

[Not_Your_Dad]

Love me some Reta! 6 mg every 84 hours.

Congrats on getting started!

 

[dragonwar54]

Great things.. check out my signature

That’s great! How long have you been using these peptides for those results?

Love me some Reta! 6 mg every 84 hours.

Congrats on getting started!

Thank you! How long do you plan on running it and do you plan to titrate back down when you decide to come off it?

 

[Not_Your_Dad]

That’s great! How long have you been using these peptides for those results?

Thank you! How long do you plan on running it and do you plan to titrate back down when you decide to come off it?

I'm 3 months in on Reta after 15 months on Tirz. Stalled out on Tirz and the sides were brutal for me beyond 12.5 mg. I'll probably keep this aggressive dose going for at least another 40# of loss, as that should put me in a "normal" range for my height. I'll taper eventually. Whether or not I'll need to be on it indefinitely, I really don't know. I have 1000 mg in the freezer right now, and I'll keep buying 60 mg kits every few months when I find a good price on them, just in case I need it forever.

 

[dragonwar54]

I'm 3 months in on Reta after 15 months on Tirz. Stalled out on Tirz and the sides were brutal for me beyond 12.5 mg. I'll probably keep this aggressive dose going for at least another 40# of loss, as that should put me in a "normal" range for my height. I'll taper eventually. Whether or not I'll need to be on it indefinitely, I really don't know. I have 1000 mg in the freezer right now, and I'll keep buying 60 mg kits every few months when I find a good price on them, just in case I need it forever.

From my running days, I know it’s definitely the last leg of the journey that is the most difficult. You can lose 50+ lbs but once you start getting closer to your goal weight, the requirements to match that initial weight loss increase exponentially. I had to run longer and faster just to achieve those same 2lbs/week.

Do you currently track overall calories and macros as well as follow a fitness routine? I’m very analytical so having numbers in front of me help tremendously. It wasn’t the most fun weighing out EVERYTHING, but it absolutely helped. Add a little creamer to your coffee? Add it to the tracker after you measure it. Use a little oil in your cooking pan? Add it to your calories for that meal.

It sounds like you have a great grasp since you’ve been on this journey for a while now. Hopefully you can get to the point where you don’t need the peptides and are at your goal!

 

[Not_Your_Dad]

From my running days, I know it’s definitely the last leg of the journey that is the most difficult. You can lose 50+ lbs but once you start getting closer to your goal weight, the requirements to match that initial weight loss increase exponentially. I had to run longer and faster just to achieve those same 2lbs/week.

Do you currently track overall calories and macros as well as follow a fitness routine? I’m very analytical so having numbers in front of me help tremendously. It wasn’t the most fun weighing out EVERYTHING, but it absolutely helped. Add a little creamer to your coffee? Add it to the tracker after you measure it. Use a little oil in your cooking pan? Add it to your calories for that meal.

It sounds like you have a great grasp since you’ve been on this journey for a while now. Hopefully you can get to the point where you don’t need the peptides and are at your goal!

Well, I've been overweight for 35 years. I had an abusive relationship with food much in the same way I had an abusive relationship with narcotics. Problem being, we can beat chemical dependence (you don't need oxy to survive), but we can't stop eating.

At my heaviest, I was 297 lbs, which is a lot on 5' 8". Size 44 waist was snug. Everything hurt all the goddamn time. Food was an easy way to medicate some of the pain away. I could measure my sugar consumption in pounds per week, would routinely eat 3k - 6k calories a day (at least 1k of those were from whatever I was drinking), etc. I literally could not stop thinking about food and would always, every single time, go and eat whatever I was thinking about.

I hurt my back again in 2024. It was the most intense pain I've ever felt. And I'm a chronic pain patient with a back injury for almost 30 years. No joke, contemplating suicide type pain. It took probably 5 days for that pain to subside a bit, all the while I was taking gabapentin measured in full grams to try and function. Walked with a cane for about a month afterwards. That was the first wake-up call. Realized I'd end up dead or unable to walk if I kept this up. Cut out the energy drinks (who knew 4 a day was bad? I could actually feel the arrythmia if I sat still for a while). Tightened up the diet. Lost 20 lbs. this way, which was great. Had a lot less pain (I think inflammatory response from all the sugar which quieted right down when I stopped eating so much of it). Couldn't beat the food noise thought. Mrs. NYD had been on Tirz for 5 months at that point and wanted me to give it a try. She was genuinely concerned that I'd leave her a widow and my kids without a father, and I was too. I was a poster boy for a massive cardiovascular event. Started compounded Tirz, was on for a few months, then everything went to shit with Mochi, and moved to grey at that point.

Tirz was a life-changer! I lost 50 lbs on Tirz, which again, absolutely fabulous, but I still had 50-ish lbs. to go. That's when the long stall and the sides from the high dose hit, and prompted the switch to Reta. GLPs absolutely eliminate food noise for me. I'm Free, and I mean Free from food. I eat in order to survive, and that's all. I'm perfectly happy that I can go most days only eating 300 calories by 4pm, and then have a larger meal at dinnertime, which I enjoy. I can drive by all my former favorite fast food places and not even give them a second thought. It's nothing short of a miracle, and I am so fucking grateful that these medications exist. I'm not sure I'd be sitting here typing this if they didn't.

So, after my long and rambling explanation thus far, my answer to you is: no, I don't generally track every calorie and macro. I know there's lots of people who do, they love it, it works for them, and that's great! It just ends up making me angry. I'm cognizant, e.g., of how much creamer I put in my coffee (spoiler: a lot!), so, I make a pot of coffee at home twice a week, have a couple cups how I like them, and just ballpark the 250 calories for the day. The rest of the time I'll get some caffeine from something carbonated with zero sugar. I know almost for certain I don't hit a protein goal daily, probably not even weekly. It's absolutely exhausting for me to eat that much, and that much protein too. I've been successful at a steady 1-4 lbs week once I hit 12 mg on Reta, and I'd doesn't drive me insane to maintain it, so I'll keep doing what I've been doing. When I hit goal, I realize I'll probably need to get more diligent about tracking and recording things, but I'll cross that bridge when I get there.

 

[dragonwar54]

At my heaviest, I was 297 lbs, which is a lot on 5' 8". Size 44 waist was snug. Everything hurt all the goddamn time. Food was an easy way to medicate some of the pain away. I could measure my sugar consumption in pounds per week, would routinely eat 3k - 6k calories a day (at least 1k of those were from whatever I was drinking), etc. I literally could not stop thinking about food and would always, every single time, go and eat whatever I was thinking about.

I’m glad you were able to cut the 50lbs and have the resources needed for success! It’s definitely hard if you have a problem, to your point, you can get away from other addictions but food is one that can never just be gone.

I do see the meticulous approach I take as something most people don’t want to do. It’s a ton of work tracking everything but it puts things into perspective, for me, about what my plate SHOULD look like rather than what I WANT. When I was cutting previously, I was never super hungry. I made sure I had plenty of veggies since they are low calorie foods that will fill you up. I need to make sure I incorporate those changes again otherwise I fear the rebound is inevitable.

I love me some zero sugar pop. It scratches that itch without the extra calories (which definitely add up). I would drink a ton of the full “diesel” versions without thinking twice. The sad part is, this was my main liquid intake and still is. I really need to transition to water and tracking hydration levels, but that is going to be a battle in itself.

Do you worry that 1-4 lbs per week may be too quick? Like dropping that quick is nice for the weight goal, but it may be excessive if you’re hoping to minimize loose skin? I’ve heard 2 lbs is a good target to minimize loose skin, but I also understand (having stretch marks myself) that I may have made that bed when I decided to put on that excessive weight in the first place. I had stretch marks prior to my first cut and didn’t end up with loose skin (losing 1-2lbs per week), but I also was not shredded. I had a little budge and minor moobs, but I feel like lifting could have filled everything back out.

If you do want advice or someone to help keep you accountable with tracking, lmk! It’s significantly easier taking on some of these tasks when you have someone else fighting that battle with you.

 

[thebonus]

What happens when someone who is overweight, new to peptides, and bought several months worth of Reta to experiment with? I guess we will all find out in the coming months!

This forum has been a great guide for myself with countless people providing invaluable information that beginners should take time to digest. Endotoxins? Yup, they’re a real thing with plenty of medical literature for people to read up on. This helps you judge your level of risk since the market has no guarantee of their current levels. Filtration? Another thing that people may take for granted and it appears to have mixed reviews on the efficacy home labs can attain.

A little background information:
I am 6’1”, 276lbs, and 33 years old (sorry to everyone who uses the metric system). Just a few years ago I had cut weight from 250lbs down to 190! This actually didn’t take that much time in the grand scheme of things; I consistently tracked my calories in and calories burned via free calorie trackers and my fitness watch.

Starting at 250lbs and being almost completely sedentary, I decided to make a change by just walking around the block once a day. This slowly evolved to a mile walk, then a 7 mile loop. I am very thankful to have a wonderful walking path that got me out into nature and boosting my 2000 daily steps to over 10,000 daily. I knew that walking wouldn’t be enough for the goal I had set for myself so I started to incorporate running. This started off with a brief 20 minute fitness test. I did 5 minutes of warmup and cool down followed by 10 minutes at a pace that I could run without stopping a ton. Well, that didn’t happen (the not stopping part). I’m sure I walked about as much as I ran in that 10 minute span, but hey, it was a start of something bigger.

Fast forward a few months and I’m running consistently 5 days a week (and still walking my 7 mile loop on my off days). I started to see progress and was hooked on the time I had to myself. I’d listen to audiobooks and podcasts to become a better person. I ended up running several 5K races during this stint and was increasingly becoming faster. I LOVE watching UFC fights, and was an athlete in my younger years, so I figured I’d take up boxing because boxers need to run too, right? I spent a year boxing (absolutely loved it!) before life hit really hard. Ended up having several seizures (this was prior to boxing and no brain damage was shown, so the doctors don’t know what caused them) and my father passing away.

I quick doing pretty much everything I should have kept doing for my health, but I fell back into comfort and worrying about things other than myself. I slowly ballooned back to 250lbs over the course of a few years, then kept going until we sit here today, at 276lbs, writing this post.

Today my package of Reta came into the mail and I was extremely excited to start this journey because of all the positive feedback on this forum and the fitness industry as a whole. I want to showcase to other members what I am doing, what pros and cons I see as I go through this process, and keep myself accountable again.

Current protocol:
Looked at the testing page under this forum to verify the product wasn’t one that fell under the endotoxin scare and matched what the company said.

I mixed up the Reta10 with 1ml of water, took 20 units today (total of 2mg) for a starting dose. I slowly mixed the peptide with my BAC, and verified the vial still looked clear and didn’t have anything floating in it. As you can already tell, I did not filter my peptide prior to this, but I’m sure one bad experience can change this quick? It is late right now and I have already have my food for the day, so I figured this would help (taking it before bed and full). I hope this gives my body some time to digest the peptide and we can start strong tomorrow.

I want to stay transparent with everyone as I go through this journey and help others who may be looking at starting their own peptide journey. Please do your research and understand what you’re getting into, if you are just starting. This forum is a wealth of knowledge and I spent significant time, before joining as a member, reading the posts and trying to take in just 0.01% of the knowledge these people have.

I know this has been a long post, so if you’ve made it this far; I appreciate you and look forward to talking with you!

Hey man, did you copy my story? Because I'm also in the Baltimore area, though I'm a bit older than you.. I'm about 240-250ish, been on Semaglutide and now Tirzepitide for about a year. Lost about 45 lbs, but stalled. I literally just took 2mg of reta after buying a 10mg kit, and then a 24mg kit, and a few other kits.

I did filter my peptide, though, but if you ever want to bounce ideas or maybe combine forces for a group buy at any point, hit me up. Always good to have local folks trying the same things.