Longtime lurker, 47, finally saying hi

Week 3 is still onboarding; the scale is basically noise at that point. For anyone running 4 lifts/week at 2,200 kcal, bench can actually drop 10 lb by week 6 if the whole thing gets treated like a standard cut. The part that gets overlooked: fewer rest-day calories makes zone-2 feel like a job, and that soccer brain will overdo intervals every time. Keep lower days heavy and judge recomp by waist + bar speed, not DEXA yet.

Sleep was my hidden variable: 7.5 hours vs 5.5 changed my hunger on GLP-1 more than any macro tweak.

At week 3, the labs that mattered for me weren't lipids—it was fasting glucose, hs-CRP, and a ferritin that tanked from 140 to 38. On 2,200 kcal with 4 lifts, my TSH also drifted. Might be an unpopular opinion: a perfect DEXA at week 12 can wait; low ferritin made zone-2 feel awful and looked exactly like 'bad conditioning' until I checked.

180g protein is a breeze when appetite's normal — two 40g shakes plus cottage cheese and nothing's being forced. Once appetite drops off, that math gets a lot less friendly.

At week 3, my top squat single was down 15 lb even though my waist was already down 0.75 in. The weird part: I didn’t lose strength from the appetite quiet, I lost it from stacked recovery debt. Four lifts plus two zone-2 sessions had me doing enough total work that my main lifts got sloppy. I cut zone-2 to one 30-minute session and kept the same 4 lifts, but trimmed accessory sets from 4 to 2 on anything that wasn’t a main lift. Ten days later my squat was back within 5 lb, bench actually up 5, and waist kept moving down. What rarely gets said out loud is that GLP-1 recomp often rewards doing less volume, not more. You can’t out-train a bigger energy deficit if your recovery is already maxed. I’d rather keep 4 quality lifts and walk more than add another hard cardio block.

The $267 I paid for month one was the cheapest part of this whole thing. The expensive part was the five-week prior-auth delay, two extra visits, and a deductible reset in January. What surprised me was that the cash-pya conversation wasn’t automatically cheaper once I added labs and follow-ups; the real number depended on whether my plan applied it to deductible or not. The contrarian take: don’t just compare sticker price per month. For recomp, the total cost includes a gym membership you actually use and the possibility of needing a dose change that resets your supply timeline. I tracked every dollar for 12 weeks and the “cheap” option was only cheaper until the first dose adjustment. If you’re in the US, call your plan and ask for the PA criteria in writing before you assume anything. That one phone call saved me more than any coupon.

My $25 smart scale said I gained 1.2 lb of muscle in 10 days, which was obvious nonsense because I was in a deficit. The gadget that actually helped was a $6 tailor tape and a notes app: waist at navel, morning weight, and top-set reps logged in the same note. The tape trended down while the scale bounced, and that kept me from changing the plan every 48 hours.

Week 3, I tried to PR my deadlift after accidentally skipping lunch because the appetite quiet is no joke. Got to the gym, warmed up, and realized my “pre-workout” was a cold brew I’d nursed since 7 a.m. and half a rice cake. Pulled 10 lb under my usual top set, then spent 20 minutes looking for a lost earbud instead of doing accessories. Recomp is humbling.

Week 3 labs check-in: fasting glucose down 9 mg/dL, LDL up 14 points, ferritin 38. The appetite-quiet stretch that everyone reads as a green light for recomp is the actual reality check. The thing nobody mentions: early weight loss in this world is mostly glycogen/water/GI emptying, so DEXA at week 3 is close to useless for recomp. Keep training hard-ish but not maxed — 4 lifts + 2 zone-2 on 2,200 kcal is plenty. Bad sleep tanks recovery and you'll mistake inflammation for fat. Dropped one zone-2 session for a 30-min walk and lifts improved. 180g protein at 218 lb is fine, spread it out, don't chase 250. Recheck DEXA at 12-16 weeks, same scanner, same hydration. Week 3 is just onboarding.

180g at 218 lb is fine; I'd spread it in 3-4 meals and stop forcing shakes if digestion slows.

Week 3 insomnia hit me hard even with appetite gone; fixing electrolytes and earlier dinners did more than any macro tweak.

I'll be the contrarian: week 3 recomp is mostly marketing; the drug quiets appetite, but your lifting progression does the actual recomp.

Three weeks into this training block: bench stayed flat, squats jumped 15 lb. Under-eating kills strength way more than appetite suppression ever does.

Week-3 CMPs are the ones that scare people — creatinine up 0.2, eGFR down 8 points — and most of the time it's underhydration from low food volume, not anything structural. The real surprise on those early panels is LDL up 22 points while weight is down 9 lb. A1c barely budges until week 10, and ALT normalizes before the scale does. So week 3 looks messy on paper even when lifts are holding and waist is down 1.5 inches. Takeaway: baseline plus 8–12 week bloodwork is what shows the actual trend, because early GLP-1 changes tend to be hydration, glycogen, and inflammation noise. Also worth flagging — ferritin can tank when protein goes up but red meat goes to zero, and that hits recovery way harder than the scale does. One data point, not a protocol.

Copay math after prior auth: $265 down to $25, and that's the number everybody talks about. The line item people forget actually matters for recomp is groceries, not the copay. Four lifts and two zone-2 rides a week means buying more salmon and Greek yogurt than a normal fridge is built for, and that bill doesn't care what the pharmacy charged. There's also a pattern worth noting — the $25 months tend to be the stall months, because getting cheap about food shows up as under-eating carbs around lifts. Budget for food first, everything else second.

I logged 11 workouts before realizing my watch double-counted zone 2 as lifting volume—app said peak week, legs said week 1.

Week 6 observation: top set of trap-bar deads dropped 40 lb before it clicked that the training block was still written for someone eating 3,000 kcal. Less appetite doesn't kill strength on its own — recovery is what quietly goes first. Cut volume 20%, kept the same 4 lifts, added 30g carbs pre-session. Numbers came back over about two weeks. Recomp is weird like that: less appetite is not the same as better recovery.

@mark_40 said: The GLP-1 didn’t kill my strength; my recovery did.

Yeah, that line hits. 180g protein was my target too, and by week 4 I was hitting 140g most days because solid meals felt impossible. What flipped it for me was dropping the giant chicken-and-rice meals and using smaller, protein-dense stuff: Greek yogurt, cottage cheese, lean deli turkey, egg whites. I still chew real food first, then use a shake only if I’m short. The part that gets glossed over is that liquid calories don’t fix the “I need to actually eat” feeling, and my 2 zone-2 rides got rough when I skipped carbs around training. I’m not anti-low-carb, but for 4 lifts a week I need some carbs near sessions or my performance tanks. Hitting protein is easier when I stop treating it like one massive meal.

Week 3 is close to meaningless for recomp. The part people forget: the scale can sit flat for 5 weeks while the waist drops 2 inches and lifts hold steady. And the contrarian bit — GLP-1 doesn't selectively torch fat, what it actually does is make a deficit quiet enough to live in. Worth knowing before you compare options: at 218 lb running 4 lifts and 2 zone-2 sessions, 2,200 kcal can be aggressive enough to shrink you before the body recompensates. Judge progress by waist, lifts, and sleep — not week-3 weight.

Resting heart rate went from 48 to 58 bpm around week 4 — that was the first clue the "quiet appetite" thing can mask under-recovery. What worked: a 30g carb snack before bed, and hard lower days moved away from the point where appetite suppression peaks. Sleep score went back up and top sets stopped feeling like sandbags. Recomp is still mostly a recovery contest, not just a deficit contest.

My fasting glucose dropped 12 points by week 5, but my LDL climbed 18 mg/dL at the same draw, which nobody warned me about. I was eating way less saturated fat, so my guess is the rapid weight loss and dehydration skewed things, but it still freaked me out. I started logging electrolytes, fiber, and actual meal timing instead of just calories. By week 10, LDL came down 9 points and HDL held steady. For recomp, the labs I keep an eye on are A1c, lipids, CMP, and hormones—not because every shift means disaster, but because you want to know what’s noise versus trend while your appetite is muted.

Paperwork's its own sport. Prior auth can eat 9 days, and the copay landing at $25 is usually the only reason that timeline keeps moving at all. The part people forget is the week of refreshing the portal instead of sleeping — that doesn't help anything, and the Wednesday session after it tends to feel like trash. If you're recomping, budget your mental load too, because insurance gymnastics can tank recovery faster than a missed meal. And check the formulary before assuming anything.

4 lifts + 2 zone 2 at 2,200 kcal sounds less like recomp and more like a slow cut.