'I Microdosed a GLP-1 for 3 Months Without Needing to Lose Weight – Here’s What Changed'

In the past two weeks alone, I’ve been encouraged to microdose the following: psilocybin for lightening my mood; Accutane for shrinking my oil glands (and, supposedly, my pores); doxycycline for treating my rosacea; and plyometric jumps for supercharging – apparently even shortening – the objectively worst day at the gym.

I’m generally happy to humour people when they tell me how to optimise my body or my mind, but there are limits to what I’m willing to do. Some light tripping on my daily commute? I’m listening. Plyo jumps? Get real.

There is, however, one microdosing bandwagon I’ve hopped on, and I’m not sure whether – or how – to get off.

I’m one of those people with chronically elevated inflammation markers and no obvious reason why.

Inflammation is essentially your immune system’s alarm system. When you cut your finger or catch a virus, your body releases inflammatory chemicals to fight off the threat and begin the repair work. That kind of short-term inflammation is useful – even necessary.

But when inflammation persists, it can become chronic, and chronic inflammation has been associated with a range of health conditions, including cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes.

I’ve known that mine has been stubbornly high since I turned 40 and started paying attention to a line item in my blood tests called high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, or hs-CRP. It’s a protein the liver produces in response to inflammation, and doctors can use it as one marker of inflammation and cardiovascular risk.

For years my numbers have been ‘something to keep an eye on’ – thanks, doc! – and although I’ve been tested for pretty much everything that might cause it, there’s no good explanation.

I’ve tried the usual low-hanging fruit – diet, sleep, exercise, etc – and none of it has worked.

Then, early last year, a friend of mine – very fit, supersmart, aggressively sceptical of wellness BS – told me that his inflammatory markers came down after he started taking a very small dose of a GLP-1.

You probably know these drugs through brand names such as Ozempic and Wegovy, and they’re best known for their use in type 2 diabetes and weight management.

But researchers have also observed reductions in some inflammatory markers among people taking GLP-1s.

Some of that may be related to weight loss, while research is also investigating whether GLP-1 receptor agonists have effects on inflammatory processes independent of weight loss.

Which is why I asked my doctor.

Crucially, though, ‘microdosing’ GLP-1 medication specifically to reduce inflammation isn't an established or approved treatment. The evidence is still developing, and these are prescription medicines that should only be used under appropriate medical supervision.

The same doctor who has spent years tracking my CRP with mild concern told me the research was still early and that much of it involved people with diabetes, obesity or cardiovascular disease – there was very little good data on someone like me.

Plus, the drugs aren’t without trade-offs: nausea, gastrointestinal problems and, alongside fat loss, the potential loss of lean mass.

Still, after discussing it with my doctor, we decided it might be worth a try.

I started with a weekly injection of a very, very small dose, before ramping up to a weekly injection of a merely very small dose.

The most immediate effect was, as predicted, feeling full all the time – like, really full.

Nausea is too strong a word. It was more like the feeling after eating considerably more Sunday lunch than you intended: the visceral certainty that another bite of anything would be a very bad idea.

The effect on my relationship with food was interesting. I still enjoyed what I ate, but the constant mental chatter about food – the ‘should I have a snack?’ voice – basically disappeared.

When I went out for dinner, I ordered normally, ate until I felt satisfied and then just… stopped. No heroic willpower required. The plate would still be half full and I’d think, Yeah, I’m good.

Because I wasn’t eating as much and I was being super intentional with the food I chose, I did lose a little weight. Nothing drastic, but enough for people to feel entitled to comment on how I looked. (Thanks! And: rude.)

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Thanks to my trusty InBody scale, I could track the changes, and I took some comfort in seeing that I appeared to be losing more fat than muscle.

I didn’t experience any of the other major side effects. I’d been especially worried about the various forms of anhedonia some users report – the so-called beige-ing of the world – but I felt pretty much okay.

The sensation of feeling stuffed all the time subsided, too, and I settled into a pattern of eating smaller meals and rarely snacking. There are worse ways to live.

After three months I went in for blood tests, and my hs-CRP had dropped by 73 per cent compared with the previous year.

I am not a doctor, but even I can see this is not a subtle change.

What I can't say is that the GLP-1 definitely caused it. This was my individual experience, not a controlled experiment, and hs-CRP can fluctuate for numerous reasons.

Which leaves me with an interesting problem.

Subjectively – day to day, hour to hour – I feel the same.

In a way, this makes GLP-1 microdosing a bit of an outlier in the self-optimisation game, which tends to value speed, sensation and visible results.

Cold plunges feel invigorating. Nootropics promise mental clarity. Even a new workout programme announces itself immediately through new and unfamiliar soreness.

This, by contrast, is optimisation by way of a lab report.

If your biomarkers improve but your experience of being alive does not, what exactly have you optimised – other than a statistical version of your future self you may not meet for decades, if ever?

Is that worth an injection once a week, potentially for the rest of your life?

I’m still deciding, and maybe I’ll start to feel the impact of the diminished inflammation as my body keeps ageing. (God willing.)

Richard Dorment

Editorial Director

Richard Dorment is the editorial director of Men’s Health and Women’s Health.