Reta making me extremely hungry

[guster]

Hey guys, little context.

Last year I used Mounjaro for 8 months. I started at 1 mg for one month, then 2.5 mg the second month, 5 mg for four months, 7.5 mg for one month and 10 mg for two weeks. I lost 30 kg. I never had the dramatic hunger suppression people talk about, but it made it much easier to say no, especially in the evenings.

I have been off for about a month and a half and recently started retatrutide.

I originally wanted 30 mg because of a New Year deal, but that was sold out so I received 40 mg instead. I first added 2 ml bacteriostatic water to the vial, drew out 1 mg, filtered it into a pen cartridge, then added another 2 ml of bac water through a filter into the same cartridge. So in total that should be 20 mg in 3 ml. During priming and some leaking I seem to have lost almost 1 ml, but the concentration should still be the same.

To start cautiously, I took 0.5 mg on Monday. On Wednesday I added another 0.5 mg. The next Monday I took 1 mg because I felt nothing, and that Wednesday I added another 1 mg.

Instead of reducing my hunger, it is making it worse. I have not been this hungry in a long time. I keep eating. Even after a balanced dinner with protein, rice and vegetables, I go straight to the fridge and eat more. I am suddenly craving sugary drinks and candy, which I normally do not even like.

Is this normal when starting retatrutide?
Only taking reta atm.

 

[woundcarping]

You were taking 10mg of Tirz for months, are now taking 1mg twice a week, and you wonder why you’re hungry…

Your reconstitution method is curious, and I assume has a typo.

 

[guster]

You were taking 10mg of Tirz for months, are now taking 1mg twice a week, and you wonder why you’re hungry…

Your reconstitution method is curious, and I assume has a typo.

Yes, I understand. During the almost two months I was off tirzepatide, I felt fine. However, right now I am actually experiencing more hunger than I did before ever starting a GLP medication.

My mixing process may seem unusual because I accidentally purchased a higher concentration than intended, 40 mg per vial. To avoid wasting product, I reconstituted and used only half, which equals 20 mg, and stored the remaining half in the freezer for later use.

 

[BNLFL]

40mg Reta and 4ml Bac is what I do. I started at 2mg and it really cut my appetite back big time from the get go.

 

[guster]

40mg Reta and 4ml Bac is what I do. I started at 2mg and it really cut my appetite back big time from the get go.

The pen cartridge I am using unfortunately only has a 3 ml capacity.

 

[woundcarping]

Recency bias is a thing, it seems unusual that Reta would increase your hunger signaling by itself.

What is your weight doing?

How are your sides?

What are you trying to accomplish/what are your goals?

Why the switch to Reta from Tirz?


The easy answer could be to push more Reta and see what happens.

 

[Sid the SeaGull]

Yes, I understand. During the almost two months I was off tirzepatide, I felt fine. However, right now I am actually experiencing more hunger than I did before ever starting a GLP medication.

My mixing process may seem unusual because I accidentally purchased a higher concentration than intended, 40 mg per vial. To avoid wasting product, I reconstituted and used only half, which equals 20 mg, and stored the remaining half in the freezer for later use.

Out of interest, I'm keen to know if you feel if the reconstituted Reta degraded after spending time in the freezer?

 

[woundcarping]

Considering he’s been on it for two weeks and has the worst hunger ever, he probably doesn’t have a baseline.

 

[guster]

Recency bias is a thing, it seems unusual that Reta would increase your hunger signaling by itself.

What is your weight doing?

How are your sides?

What are you trying to accomplish/what are your goals?

Why the switch to Reta from Tirz?


The easy answer could be to push more Reta and see what happens.

I went from 105 kg to an unhealthy 78 kg . after Christmasand During my Japan trip I gained back to 85 kg. I had zero side effects. I also never experienced side effects on tirzepatide.

I dropped from 32 percent body fat to 18 percent. My goal is to get under 15 percent. I switched to retatrutide because Mounjaro was costing me 600 euros per month.

I swim four times a week, go to the gym four times a week, play tennis, and ride my bike regularly.

I think I am going to move up to 4 mg.

 

[guster]

Out of interest, I'm keen to know if you feel if the reconstituted Reta degraded after spending time in the freezer?

Im not using the frozen reta. But the other half

 

[Graymaxxem]

I have read that hunger suppression on reta kicks in around 8 mg. Tried it myself for a few months and switched back to T. I liked R but wasn't losing, which was fine, I actually was trying to stop losing. (Feels batshit to type that! I wanted to stop losing! WTaF!) But R does not have the inflammation suppression that T does, and I need that.

 

[guster]

I have read that hunger suppression on reta kicks in around 8 mg. Tried it myself for a few months and switched back to T. I liked R but wasn't losing, which was fine, I actually was trying to stop losing. (Feels batshit to type that! I wanted to stop losing! WTaF!) But R does not have the inflammation suppression that T does, and I need that.

Ah ok, I was hoping that the third fat-burning mechanism of retatrutide would be a real game changer. I’m going to try it for a while and see how it goes. Part of me is wondering whether my batch might be bunk, because with Mounjaro, even at 1 mg, I at least felt something.

 

[Sid the SeaGull]

Im not using the frozen reta. But the other half

Doh ! That makes complete sense, when you get to it I'm keen to know. Research papers say it does not work so well after reconstitution then frozen. Some lab rats on the inter web say it degrades slightly . My lab rat will know the answer in a few months. I'll share experience on a separate post at that time , great to hear your experience too.

 

[Sid the SeaGull]

Ah ok, I was hoping that the third fat-burning mechanism of retatrutide would be a real game changer. I’m going to try it for a while and see how it goes. Part of me is wondering whether my batch might be bunk, because with Mounjaro, even at 1 mg, I at least felt something.

From what I've read the third receptor does not effectively kick in until +6mg , however others report less. I'm only at 3 this month , moving to 4 next month I expect

 

[guster]

From what I've read the third receptor does not effectively kick in until +6mg , however others report less. I'm only at 3 this month , moving to 4 next month I expect

dam thats a long time if you take the normal route. I’m planning to move up to 4 mg in week three. I suspect my previous tirzepatide use may have created some level of tolerance, but we’ll find out.

 

[Habibibi]

Im not using the frozen reta. But the other half

Do not freeze reconstituted retatrutide. Use the whole vial, reconstituted retatrutide doesn't suffer any substantial degradation, even at 60 days. I highly recommend you filter, since the main risk of using it past 4 weeks is bacterial growth.

 

[FlowerFairy]

dam thats a long time if you take the normal route. I’m planning to move up to 4 mg in week three. I suspect my previous tirzepatide use may have created some level of tolerance, but we’ll find out.

It takes your body a month to reach full potency in your body. If you’re increasing every 3 weeks you aren’t allowing it to reach full potency. Going by “feels” is a great way to get in trouble. Give it time to work.

 

[guster]

It takes your body a month to reach full potency in your body. If you’re increasing every 3 weeks you aren’t allowing it to reach full potency. Going by “feels” is a great way to get in trouble. Give it time to work.

And you dont think my body is used to glp thanks to mounjaro?

 

[FlowerFairy]

And you dont think my body is used to glp thanks to mounjaro?

It does not change the way these drugs work. It has nothing to do with your body getting “used to” glp drugs. It is the way they work in everyone. 🙄

 

[guster]

It does not change the way these drugs work. It has nothing to do with your body getting “used to” glp drugs. It is the way they work in everyone. 🙄

Yeah I get that’s how it’s supposed to work, but not everyone reacts the same. Some people feel something at 0.5 mg, others don’t notice anything until they’re at 8 mg and a few months in. Ill update when im at 4

 

[woundcarping]

It does not change the way these drugs work. It has nothing to do with your body getting “used to” glp drugs. It is the way they work in everyone. 🙄

You absolutely can move your concentration levels up quicker than taking a steady dose for 4-5 weeks.

I went from no Reta exposure to over 9mg accumulated peak in an easy 18 days while coming down from a 5.6mg peak concentration of Tirz. I’m now 7 weeks into Reta taking 4mg 2x weekly.

 

[lessthanhalf]

There are no really good pharmacology explanations for being more hungry on reta than being on nothing for 2 months. The glucagon agonism could theoretically make you more hungry but I don't see how it could with the gip and glp-1 agonism at the same time. Maybe you have some weird receptors.
Realistically you are still on a microscopic dose. Despite people saying the effects kick in at a certain dose with reta, it is actually the only one that produces a lot of weight loss at low doses , nearly 9% at 1mg/week over a year. Everyone on this forum says it is less effective at reducing hunger than tirz, the weight loss results do not agree with this. Yes it probably makes you use an extra 100-200kcal day of extra energy at higher doses due to the glucagon agonism, but if people were really eating more on reta, they would not be losing as much weight. 100kcal/day is only about 4.7kg of fat over a year ( 365 x 100 / 7700kcal/kg of fat tissue ). Interesting that that alone would be enough to explain the extra weight loss compared to tirz.

Assuming you do not want to give up on it and go back to tirzepatide, you are actually already using the one reasonably safe strategy to increase doses rapidly, quite similar to what I did to go from 0 to 15 mg of tirzepatide in a month. 1 mg per day and keep going with that until hunger goes down or you start getting side effects, and if you get to a week then 1.5mg per day. Given absorption takes about a day, you are fairly unlikely to get severe side effects suddenly as it should only take a day or 2 to have blood levels drop back down to the level they were at before the most recent dose. And if you start getting side effects stop the increases and stabilise. The fact that you tolerated 10mg of tirzepatide makes it very likely you would tolerate a roughly equivalent dose of reta, which if I had to guess I would put at about 7-8mg, so I think in someone who has already shown they tolerate glp's ok increasing doses rapidly by low daily doses is safer than average. I would not recommend this to anyone who has not been on glp's before or if diabetic or with multiple medical issues. But it would save you weeks to months of being extra hungry while waiting for it to start working. I would be extremely surprised if you did not start feeling a lot less hungry once you got to a week of 1mg doses per day. And once you work out a dose you like you can space it out to higher doses less often so long as they add up to the same number of mg per week.

 

[MFGamesta]

My experience. I switched cold turkey from 2.5mg of Zepboudn where I lost 30 lbs in 3 months to 2mg of reta. For 4 weeks I jus simplyl maintained...maybe gained 5 lbs. Then I went to 4mg of reta weekly. After the 2nd dose I got hungry and my body burned MORE fat! Shit just melting and my body fat went from 13% to 11%.! I went 5lbs below my goal weight in a week. I had no real hunger suppression but my goal was to loos weight and it worked. Now I'm backing down to microdosing for maintenance.

I'm a super responder I guess but most will find their sweet spot. Just don't rush it and chase it. Gradually titrate and wait until you have enough of the new dose in your system before you move up. Be patient!

 

[FlowerFairy]

You absolutely can move your concentration levels up quicker than taking a steady dose for 4-5 weeks.

I went from no Reta exposure to over 9mg accumulated peak in an easy 18 days while coming down from a 5.6mg peak concentration of Tirz. I’m now 7 weeks into Reta taking 4mg 2x weekly.

View attachment 16747

Just because you can do it does not mean you should. I’m sure there are ppl doing it. Does not mean it’s safe.

 

[guster]

From what I understand, retatrutide is a triple agonist that activates:

• GLP-1

• GIP

• glucagon


GLP-1 normally suppresses appetite, but glucagon increases energy expenditure and can sometimes increase hunger signals. Because of that, I’m wondering if there is a phase early in treatment where the glucagon effect is noticeable before the GLP-1 appetite suppression fully builds up.

In other words, could someone temporarily experience more hunger in the first weeks, especially if they previously used strong GLP-1 drugs like tirzepatide and may already have some tolerance to GLP-1 signaling?

I know the clinical trials mainly report reduced appetite overall, so I’m not claiming this is a proven side effect. I’m more asking about the mechanistic explanation and whether others have experienced something similar during the early weeks before the appetite suppression really kicks in.

Curious to hear if anyone else coming from tirzepatide or semaglutide noticed this.

 

[Winnifer]

I had increased appetite when starting on Reta, it settled down after a couple of weeks and now I get the odd very hungry day but I’m still loosing fat. I’m guessing it’s the effect of glucagon

 

[Sid the SeaGull]

Do not freeze reconstituted retatrutide. Use the whole vial, reconstituted retatrutide doesn't suffer any substantial degradation, even at 60 days. I highly recommend you filter, since the main risk of using it past 4 weeks is bacterial growth.

To late unfortunately it's already frozen, and unfrozen, I've added the bac and ready to pin my Rat in the next week or so ... let's see what happens....

 

[lessthanhalf]

Everything I have read is that repeated freeze thaw cycles cause peptide degradation. That being said one or a few percent loss from a single freeze/thaw is going to make basically zero difference, so I would not worry about it. Even if it is as much as 5%, and I doubt it is anywhere near that much, it is 4.75mg instead of 5mg in a dose, probably too small a difference to notice.

 

[Sid the SeaGull]

Everything I have read is that repeated freeze thaw cycles cause peptide degradation. That being said one or a few percent loss from a single freeze/thaw is going to make basically zero difference, so I would not worry about it. Even if it is as much as 5%, and I doubt it is anywhere near that much, it is 4.75mg instead of 5mg in a dose, probably too small a difference to notice.

Thanx that aligns with some of the advice I've read . If my rat lives to tell the tale I'm sure it will report back over the comming weeks

 

[BNLFL]

Thanx that aligns with some of the advice I've read . If my rat lives to tell the tale I'm sure it will report back over the comming weeks

You have a talking rat? 🤣