Week one: paperwork, not pharmacology
The first week rarely involves any medication at all. You complete an intake covering your goals, medical history, current prescriptions, allergies and anything a prescriber would need to rule out. A licensed clinician reviews that file and either approves a protocol, asks follow-up questions, or declines.
People routinely underestimate how much the intake matters. Every contraindication a clinician can catch depends on what you disclosed. Omitting a medication because it seems unrelated is the single most common way an avoidable interaction gets missed.
Week two: the first shipment and the first dose
If a protocol is approved, the pharmacy prepares and ships it. What arrives is the medication plus the supplies needed to administer it — syringes, alcohol prep pads, a sharps container where applicable, and written instructions specific to your dose.
Inspect everything before the first dose. Check the product name and strength against what you were prescribed, check the expiry date, and look at the solution itself. Anything cloudy, discoloured, or containing visible particles should not be used. Contact the pharmacy instead.
Your first dose is almost always below the eventual target. That is deliberate. Starting low gives your body a chance to adjust and gives the clinician a data point before increasing anything.
Weeks two to three: the adjustment window
If side effects appear, this is usually when. With GLP-1 protocols specifically, nausea, reduced appetite, constipation or fatigue tend to cluster in the days after a dose and ease over the following weeks as the body adapts.
The practical advice that helps most: eat smaller portions more slowly, keep fluids up, and do not treat reduced appetite as permission to skip meals entirely. Under-eating protein while losing weight is how people lose muscle alongside fat.
Keep a short log. Date, dose, what you noticed, how long it lasted. It takes thirty seconds and it turns your next clinical conversation from "I felt a bit off" into something a clinician can act on.
Week four: the first review point
By the end of the first month there is usually enough information to decide whether to hold the current dose, increase it, or stop. That decision belongs to the prescriber, informed by what you report.
It is worth being honest if things are not going well. Protocols get adjusted all the time. A dose that is not tolerable is not a personal failure and it is not something to push through quietly.
What the first month does not tell you
Thirty days is enough to judge tolerability. It is not enough to judge outcome. Body composition, sleep quality and energy respond over months, not weeks, and they respond to training, protein intake and sleep at least as much as to any protocol.
This page is educational and is not medical advice. Your prescriber's instructions always take precedence over anything written here.