Most participants report improvements in HbA1c, blood pressure, lipids, inflammation, glucose, and other metabolic markers after significant weight loss on these drugs, whether through diet alone or with medication. A few note isolated negatives such as elevated resting heart rate, low sodium or electrolytes, borderline low folate/B12, or lower HDL while cutting. Some also saw testosterone rise or fall depending on the individual case. Overall the thread shows objective lab gains tied to weight reduction regardless of method.
What this discussion establishesNothing here is advice.
Everyone focuses on the positives but negatives rarely get mentioned. Has anyone experienced the downsides and how did they show up on blood tests?
I need you to explain what you mean by worse, since plenty of values just decline gradually with age anyway.
Not the slow age-related changes you mentioned. I mean getting labs before a three-month run of something, then testing again afterward and seeing a sudden shift in the wrong direction that you did not expect or that came from the protocol itself. Hope that clears up what I was asking.
I have dropped more than fifty pounds twice through diet alone and once using GLPs. I always retest bloodwork after big lifestyle shifts. The GLP results match what diet alone produced, maybe with a slight edge. Major weight loss improved my labs across the board no matter how I achieved it, especially HbA1c and blood pressure right away, plus inflammation and lipids to a smaller degree. My first diet attempt was basically me bargaining with my doctor to avoid starting blood-pressure medication. Having hard numbers that prove things are moving in the right direction feels good.
Four weeks on Reta so far and my blood pressure, which started out terrible because of my weight and family heart history, has gotten a lot better. Systolic fell 35 points, diastolic fell 29, and resting heart rate dropped 15 bpm. I am also down fifteen pounds. Even if some labs came back worse I would still see the gains in these areas as more important.
My labs jumped forward in a big way, sorry if that is not the answer you wanted. The single downside was resting heart rate climbing 12-15 bpm. It has eased off since but remains above my usual level.
Labs from last year compared with this year show a huge step forward.
Started compounded tirz in October and told my doctor in December. He was not enthusiastic and noted I was not obese at a BMI of 34.9 and 277 pounds, but he agreed to check labs every three months. From the October baseline through December and then February my testosterone rose from 770 to 850 to 1040. He disliked those figures and worried the pharmacy had added testosterone. He viewed it as worse even though everything else improved a lot. I told him to forget it and switched doctors.
Quite a few doctors use low-dose tirz on themselves even without obesity or diabetes. The data supporting it is strong, though it has not reached official guidelines yet. Keep that in mind when talking to physicians; plenty do things privately they will not openly suggest.
I have seen worse bloodwork before, but it came from orals stacked with everything else rather than from the peptides.
Right after gastric surgery my liver enzymes were high. I had NAFLD and a few months later they normalized along with other metabolic values. Some other numbers got worse with the weight loss though, including testosterone and IGF-1. The hernia could explain those changes.
Cholesterol and A1C both went down. I am due for another test and already have the paperwork from the doctor.
Same experience here. I finally got my yearly labs done earlier this month after putting it off since November. The doctor used exclamation marks because my cholesterol looks great now. The one marker that stays frustratingly low is WBC; it has been below range for years but not low enough for medication. It is odd that it has stayed that way for four years, which is why I started sermorelin hoping it helps as claimed.
Yes, now you can eat more gabagool.
Sodium, bicarbonate, and cysteine have stayed very low for eight months. Everything else held steady or got better.
Lol, that reference might puzzle anyone who missed late-90s crime shows.
Got it. I do not need labs to answer. There was a stretch when I was gaining on reta. It eventually balanced to zero net change, but I suppose that still counts as the wrong direction.
Folate dropped to borderline low so I am supplementing now. B12 slipped a little and I am supplementing that too. HDL has never been strong and while cutting plus starting TRT it has sat between 34-41 mg/dl when 40 is the bottom of the range. All the other weight-loss-related labs look solid.
See below. Sodium has been low on my last two blood tests. I was drinking too much water and flushing things out. Switched to Gatorade Zero or half a packet of Liquid IV, both giving 250 mg. Half a Liquid IV packet is the same amount. I can order the next test whenever I want.
Yes, I now limit daily water, eat plenty of salty foods, and hope for the best. Unflavored electrolytes taste awful to me and anything sweetened is out of the question. My current dose is still too high but I cannot change it because I am in a clinical trial and it was already lowered from 12 to 9 mg. Once the trial ends I will have more dosing control and things should stabilize.
Glucose, A1C, triglycerides, and cholesterol all improved after eight weeks on tirzepatide. Nothing clearly got worse. Some values that were already off stayed that way. The biggest shift was glucose falling from 106 to 83, moving me out of the borderline pre-diabetic range. That is the lowest reading I have seen since at least 2019, even though I weighed thirty pounds less and was in much better shape back then.
I add a pinch of Redmond or Baja Gold salt to my water. I average five 500 ml bottles a day of spring water and stopped using distilled. A tiny splash of Celsius gives it some flavor.
Hyponatremia is miserable. I ended up in the ER once because of it and that pushed me to learn about electrolytes.
Only two weeks on Reta but I had a doctor visit this morning. Blood pressure was fine and heart rate matched the previous reading. Still waiting on the blood labs. I hope the August follow-up shows better cholesterol so I can drop the statin.
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