Mounjaro transformed my body…but then I came off it

A mother who saw instant success on the ‘King Kong’ weightloss jab Mounjaro said she was left looking like ‘Skeletor’ when she stopped using the injections. 

Ellen Ogley, 42, from Yorkshire, weighed 16st 12lbs and was a size 18 at her heaviest.

While she lost 3st on an ‘unsustainable diet’, she turned to the weight loss medication Mounjaro in May last year to try and transform her body.

The mother-of-three said it had an instant effect and stopped her incessant raiding of the snack cupboard.

‘I thought it was going to be another diet trend but the food noises got switched off,’ said Ms Ogley, who used the injections for five months.

‘As soon as I went on it I realised “I’ve not touched the snack cupboard”.’

This change helped her make healthier choices in other aspects of her life and she started exercising.

Soon the nursery manager had lost a further 3st, taking her down to a total body weight of around 10st. 

However, she said the process of weaning off the drug came with a worrying side effect.

Ms Ogley recalled how, in coming off the jab, she became obsessed with getting as ‘skinny as possible’.

‘I got trolled, they called me Skeletor. I was being told I looked like a 60-year-old,’ she said. 

Skeletor is the name of a skull-faced villain from the 80s children’s cartoon He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. 

Losing muscle mass is known side-effect of weight loss jabs as well as other rapid weight loss methods.

While dieters lose fat, they can also shed muscle if they consume very few calories and fail to perform muscle-building exercises. 

It was nasty social media comments, alongside Ms Ogley’s husband’s concerns that she looked ‘ill’,  that gave the wake-up call she needed.

Ms Ogley took up weight training and said this – combined with some healthy swaps– had a made a world of difference. 

‘I have abs at 42 – it blows my mind,’ she said. 

‘I have hacks in place. If I’m craving sweets I have [high protein] Greek yoghurt, berries and granola.’

‘I still have takeaways but I exercise portion control.

‘We make chicken kebabs as fakeaways instead of ordering them as takeaways.’

She said making these swaps and cutting back on alcohol had helped prevent the weight from coming back. 

A study, published last month, warned that many patients using weight loss jabs risk piling the pounds back on within ten months of quitting the injections.

Scientists at Oxford University discovered the effects of GLP-1 drugs like Wegovy are short-lived if patients do not maintain a healthy lifestyle afterwards.

Ms Ogley said she hopes her example shows others they can maintain their weight loss if they stop using the drugs. 

 She said she’d battled comfort eating and binge drinking after being diagnosed with cervical and ovarian cancer in 2023.

‘I’d have two to three takeaways a week. My drinking was excessive,’ she said, adding that she’d often share three bottles wine with her husband on an evening out.

‘It helped numb everything.’

As part of her cancer treatment, she was forced to undergo a hysterectomy – a major surgery to remove the uterus – but it was recommended she lost weight before going under the knife, to reduce the risk of complications.

‘I said to myself “if I come out the other side I will try and take control of my health”,’ she said.

While she started with an highly restrictive fasting diet that helped her lose 3st she knew it wasn’t sustainable.   

‘I was doing it in not a very healthy way,’ she said. 

‘I was almost starving myself.’

This was when she turned to Mounjaro. 

As of Monday, obese patients in England will be able to access the ‘revolutionary’ weight-loss jab Mounjaro free of charge directly from their family doctor. 

Mounjaro, also known as tirzepatide, will be offered to around 220,000 people over the next three years under new NHS prescribing rules. 

GPs can now prescribe the drug to patients with a BMI over 40 – classed as severely obese – and at least four obesity-related health conditions, such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure or sleep apnoea. 

Mounjaro is a weekly jab that can help patients shed up to a fifth of their body weight in a year. 

More than a million people in the UK are already using it via private clinics, where it costs around £250 a month. 

However, until now, only a limited number of patients could access it on the NHS via specialist weight-management services.