How understanding the hormone Leptin got me off a GLP-1

Real hunger, hormone balance, and what changed when I stopped Mounjaro

Photo by Giuseppe Famiani on Unsplash

A lifetime of mixed signals

For most of my life, I used food for comfort, celebration, distraction, and sedation. And I was often told by medical professionals and pop culture that eating frequently would “keep my metabolism going” or “prevent a blood sugar crash.” So I followed the advice. Breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner. Maybe dessert. Probably another snack.

Fear of hunger

For a long time, I feared hunger. I saw it as something to be avoided. If I felt the tiniest twinge of an empty stomach, I reached for something to eat. I even used to joke that I wished I could remove some of my taste buds so I wouldn’t want food so much. That kind of thinking felt normal to me. It was how I lived for decades.

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The turning point

But during my most recent leg of this health expedition, a stretch of therapeutic fasting that started in earnest in early 2024, I started to change how I thought about hunger. I learned that true hunger builds gradually. It doesn’t yell. It doesn’t spike with urgency and then disappear with distraction. I began to notice that what I had thought was hunger for so many years was often just habit, stress, emotion, or blood sugar fluctuation. And when real hunger finally showed up, it was calmer than I expected.

Eventually, I began to associate that calm hunger with something else: healing.

Hunger as a signal of healing

Hunger became a sign that I was in a fasted state, burning fat, and lowering insulin. A sign that my body was doing exactly what it was designed to do. Instead of fearing it, I started to welcome it. Not always, but often enough to recognize how far I’d come.

Understanding Leptin

Here’s what else helped me get there: understanding leptin.

Leptin is a hormone made by fat cells. It helps regulate energy balance by signaling to the brain that you’re full. But when you have excess body fat, especially visceral fat, your body can become resistant to leptin’s signal. That means the brain keeps thinking you’re hungry, even when your body has plenty of stored energy available.

Want to dive deeper into leptin resistance? Check out “Carbohydrates: Why Quality Trumps Quantity” by Chris Kresser. He explains how inflammation, insulin resistance, and hormone imbalance interfere with leptin signaling.

It’s not just willpower

This is one of the reasons people living with insulin resistance or obesity can feel so hungry all the time. It’s not just willpower. It’s biochemistry. That’s also why GLP-1 medications are so popular. They help regulate appetite by enhancing satiety signals.

There’s another way

Therapeutic fasting, metabolic healing, eliminating processed foods, no snacking, no alcohol, balancing blood sugar, and lowering insulin levels can all help restore hormonal balance, including leptin sensitivity. It’s not always easy. But it is possible. I am living it.

My endocrinologist’s prediction

In January 2024, my endocrinologist told me I’d need to be on a GLP-1 for the rest of my life. A few years earlier, I probably would’ve just gone along with that plan. But I saw it as a challenge. By then, I’d already started to understand that healing was possible. And I was learning how to manage hunger, weight, and blood sugar with food, timing, and support, not pharmaceuticals. I’m so relieved I found another way.

Trusting real hunger

And now? I don’t eat when I’m not hungry, or just because it’s there. That doesn’t mean I never feel tempted. I still have moments where I want to eat that thing, even when it’s not my food or not mealtime. But now I sit with it longer. I pause. I give it 15 minutes. And most of the time, the desire passes.

Not because I’m forcing myself. But because I no longer have the same false hunger signals I once did. When real hunger shows up, I can trust it.

Reframing the message

I used to think hunger was the enemy. Now I understand it as a message.

And most days, it says: You’re doing just fine.