Maintenance

Weight Loss Maintenance Phase **

• So you’ve lost weight on semaglutide or tirzepatide, and you're ready for maintenance or preparing to go completely off the meds, but you don't know what to do next.

• Typically, you do not want to stop the medication cold turkey, or your appetite will possibly come back with a vengeance.

• Some people will be able to slowly go off semaglutide or tirzepatide once they hit their goal weight. However, some people choose to stay on a maintenance dose of the medication.

• Option 1: Slowly taper off the medication by decreasing the amount of medication weekly until you come off to allow your hunger to slowly return and they psychologically know how to mitigate those feelings. Then you maintain a healthy lifestyle, including healthier food choices, and change physical activity.

• Option 2: Stay on the medication on a maintenance dosage to help maintain weight loss. Some people choose to stay on the medication for the health benefits of microdosing. These medications are not just for weight loss, they help reduce cholesterol, lower blood pressure, reduce anxiety, improve hormones, balance insulin, help keep PCOS symptoms at bay, help people who suffer from autoimmune diseases, and so much more. The goal is to slowly decrease the current dosage by reducing the amount weekly. Maintenance looks different for everyone. You can choose to take the meds weekly at a very low dosage, or a larger dosage bi-weekly. I recommend slowly decreasing your dosage until you find the right dosage for you.

• It's critical to make lifestyle changes while you are on the medication that you can sustain when you are off the medication. Do not make drastic lifestyle changes that you cannot maintain when you go off the meds. STOP STARVING yourself. Please reduce your dosage of medication if you can't eat. It's important to change eating habits and practice mindful eating. If you are an emotional eater or a binge eater, I recommend therapy to learn what your triggers are and learn how to navigate through the challenges in a healthy way.