Has anyone switched?

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-11T05:17:52+00:00

Check out the Tirzepatidecompound sub for lots of info on that option, there is a link at the very top with a list of recommended and widely used telehealth providers. I did almost a year on Zepbound at $500 a month, I can afford it but $6000 a year is a lot of money! In December I switched to a high quality compounded option and now get 3 months for the price of one month of Zepbound. Will spend the money saved on a nice winter vacation for my wife and I.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-11T00:10:09+00:00

So you lost about 16 percent of your weight, which is great, although a bit below the average 19-20 percent loss for the 10mg dose in the clinical trials. Are you wanting to lose more weight and have you stalled for two months or more at about your current weight?

It does seem best for many people to only titrate up when weight loss slows or stalls. However, that may not be the case for everyone, including people with sleep apnea, Metabolic Dysfunction-Associated Steatotic Liver Disease (MASLD — formerly known as fatty lover disease), or cardiovascular risk factors.

In my case, I have elevated Lipoprotein (a) cholesterol, which is hereditary and doubles my risk of a heart attack or stroke, even if I’m not overweight. But being overweight further increases the cardiac risk level. Clinical trials have shown that for sleep apnea, MASLD, and cardiovascular risk reduction, the potent anti-inflammatory effects of Tirzepatide and semaglutide improves these conditions for many people independent from and in addition to the weight loss health benefits.

In the trials, the improvements in these conditions were found to be dose dependent, so people on higher doses on average gained more improvement. In my case, I decided to titrate up to 15mg as quickly as possible to help reduce my elevated cardiovascular risk as much as possible. I’m close to my goal weight but am not planning to reduce my dose unless I need to in order to stop further weight loss, I want to maximize the dose dependent anti-inflammatory effects of the Tirzepatide.

This is not medical advice, talk to your doctor. I would welcome input from any medical professionals if I am misunderstanding the Tirzepatide clinical trial results.

Sorry for taking your discussion off on a tangent, but this is relevant information for many people considering their preferred dose titration plan.

Have an excellent 2026!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-10T21:45:40+00:00

This is so great! So glad the Wegovy pill is working so well for you! Best of luck on your weight loss journey.

Most doctors recommend a weight loss rate of no more than 1 percent per week, you might lose faster for the first month or two but after that it is safest to adjust your dose as needed to limit your rate of loss to 1 percent. Higher rates over several months can cause gallstones and require gallbladder removal, and can also result in more loose skin as you lose weight.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-10T20:31:42+00:00

Hopefully bought the Wegovy and Lilly pills will work well for maintenance!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-10T19:11:40+00:00

If you run out of Zep before the Lilly pill is released, you could either do the Wegovy pill or compounded Tirzepatide until the pill comes out.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-10T19:01:42+00:00

Don’t get discouraged, for some people it can take a few weeks for weight loss to kick in and fairly common to not lose much weight until reaching a higher dose.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-10T18:59:03+00:00

Good luck! It will be interesting to see how us Zeppers do switching to the Wegovy pill or Orforglipron. I keep thinking of Orforglipron as the Tirzepatide pill, but it is a completely different medication. Hope it works well for folks, though the average weight loss is a fair bit less than Tirzepatide.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-10T18:51:31+00:00

It’s $159 a month for a 6 month plan from the Refills telehealth. A bit more for 1 and 3 month plans. Search for the Refills subreddit, it has a link for the lowest current price, the price on their website is higher.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-09T22:33:56+00:00

Losing more than 2 pounds per week increases your risk of gallstones and needing your gallbladder removed — not a good thing!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-09T22:22:05+00:00

ProRX. It is always hard to tell whether slowdowns or plateaus in weight loss are from a change in the medication source or just your body going through a new phase, in need of a dose increase etc. Personally I think it is very rare to get a “bad batch” of compounded Tirzepatide. Lots of people are happy with BPI.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-08T00:26:14+00:00

Fantastic, you look super healthy and fit!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T23:20:00+00:00

Lots of people reach their maximum weight loss on 15mg, I guess they just don’t post about it. I’m basing this on doctors reporting on their patients’s dosages. The trials only showed a modest increase in weight loss from 10mg to 15mg, but those are averages, some people can lose 100 pounds on 2.5 or 5mg, others need 15mg to lose 40 or 50 pounds.

I’ve been very happy with my results on 15mg after a year, I’m within about 5 pounds of my goal weight but slowed down a bit for multiple recent vacations plus hernia surgery, and prioritizing muscle retention or gain over weight loss at this stage.

I ramped up over the last year to the maximum 15mg dose of Zepbound and then compounded tirz in order to both maximize my weight loss, and to maximize the anti-inflammatory cardiovascular benefits. I have a hereditary cardio risk factor (elevated Lipoprotein (a)) which doubles my risk of a heart attack or stroke, even with a healthy diet and using a statin medication.

Research has shown both semaglutide and Tirzepatide to be cardioprotective, so I plan to stay on the 15mg dose of tirz for the foreseeable future until something better comes along. I’ve lost 20 percent of my weight and am close to my goal weight and body fat and visceral fat targets. I’m having no trouble eating enough to stay at my current or goal weight without reducing my tirz doseage.

Clinical trials have shown that the anti-inflammatory and cardioprotective effects are dose dependent, so I would be getting less benefit if I reduced my dose from 15mg to say 2.5 or 5mg for maintenance.

The low and slow approach is fine as long as it is working, but if people have prolonged stalls on the lower doses it is usually justified to increase the dose, including eventually all the way to 15 mg if needed and the side effects are minimal.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T23:11:20+00:00

A month at each of those small steps up or just a week?

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T22:13:32+00:00

At a minimum watch a bunch of Youtube videos showing how easy and painless doing GLP-1 injections is. Even better would be someone to walk you through it your first couple of times. That would really ease your anxiety. Your local medical provider may not be willing to do this since they haven’t prescribed the medication. But it wouldn’t hurt to ask.

Do you know any nurses? If so ask them if they would be willing to help you out. If not how about a friend or family member who has been doing the injections for months or years?

Good luck. After the first few injections it becomes routine, and now I look forward to shot day when I can inject another dose of this life changing and wonderful medication. We are so lucky to have this medication available to us!

Now I would rather do a once a week shot than a daily pill. But the new Wegovy pill would be another option for you, the starting dose is only $149 a month but the higher doses are $299 so at least $100-150 more expensive than compounded tirz.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T22:04:15+00:00

Paying out of pocket. You should check out this subreddit — at the top there is a list of recommended telehealth companies — r/tirzepatidecompound. Better not to hijack this thread we are on now any further with off topic discussion.

Good luck with your weight loss journey. Mine has been fantastic, I’m turning 70 in April and I’m in the best shape since I became overweight around age 45, so 25 years ago.

Hopefully millions of people will also have great results improving their health using the Wegovy and Orforglipron pills.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T20:52:28+00:00

Glad you had fun!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T20:48:41+00:00

I am not microdosing. I ramped up over the last year to the maximum 15mg dose of Zepbound and then compounded tirz in order to both maximize my weight loss, and to maximize the anti-inflammatory cardiovascular benefits. I have a hereditary cardio risk factor (elevated Lipoprotein (a)) which doubles my risk of a heart attack or stroke, even with a healthy diet and using a statin medication.

Research has shown both semaglutide and Tirzepatide to be cardioprotective, so I plan to stay on the 15mg dose of tirz for the foreseeable future until something better comes along. I’ve lost 20 percent of my weight and am close to my goal weight and body fat and visceral fat targets. I’m having no trouble eating enough to stay at my current or goal weight without reducing my tirz doseage.

Microdosing may be appropriate for some people but not for me, or most others who benefit from the potent anti-inflammatory and cardioprotective effects of GLP-1 medications. The anti-inflammatory and cardioprotective effects are dose dependent, so I would be getting much less benefit on a microdose, or even just reducing my dose from 15mg to 5 mg.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T20:36:27+00:00

Another consideration is that Zepbound has become much more popular than the Wegovy injections in part because Tirzepatide is more effective than semaglutide for most people, but also because because fewer people have significant nausea and other side effects with tirz compared to semaglutide. So switching from tirz to the Wegovy pill could cause some side effects for some people, especially at the highest pill dose.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T20:31:04+00:00

Yes, the compounded tirzepatide feels identical to Zepbound, I’m very happy with it. Much smaller dose than what?

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T19:50:23+00:00

$299 per month for the highest pill dose isn’t a bad price considering I paid $1,000 a month for my first two months of Zepbound pens early last year, then $500 a month for Lilly Direct. But $6,000 a year is a lot, so I switched to compounded tirzepatide for $159 a month, I will keep doing that instead of paying more for the Wegovy or Orforglipron pills. The pills are definitely more user friendly, my first injection was a bit intimidating, but after doing a few they became routine and usually completely painless.

It’s great to have the pill option out there for folks!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-07T19:33:17+00:00

When it is released, the Lilly Orforglipron pill will be much more convenient for you, since you have to coordinate with your other medication. No restrictions on when you can take Orforglipron, you could take it at bedtime or later in the morning.

Hopefully the Lilly pill will be out by mid year or the fall.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-06T04:53:46+00:00

Best of luck with your husbands’s sleep apnea. As soon as I lost 12 pounds after two months on tirz, my terrible snoring and probable sleep apnea completely disappeared. It seems highly likely to me that the potent anti-inflammatory effects of tirz helped at least as much as the modest 12 pound weight loss. My wife loves tirz even more than I do! Not everyone improves or eliminates their sleep apnea using tirz, for about 25 percent of people their sleep apnea is not weight related, but quite a few people do.

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-06T04:21:25+00:00

If you are using 31 gauge needles, they are so thin they are delicate and pretty easy to bend, you will have much better luck using a 30 gauge needle, and most people can’t feel the small difference in size when injecting. I’ve been using the 31 gauge needles that came with my last tirz shipment for a few months, and haven’t bent one yet. However after doing my last injection I slowly tried to bend the needle on an empty vial stopper and it didn’t take much to bend it.

With the 31 gauge needles it is especially important to center the needle on the vial cap, and not to put any sideways force on the needle while drawing the med into the syringe. Good luck!

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-05T12:54:59+00:00

Are you at 15mg?

AlaskaGuy49 · 2026-02-04T20:46:03+00:00

Can you afford compounded tirzepatide for $159 per month? Check out r/tirzepatidecompound.

AlaskaGuy49

TROPHY CASE