Are There Natural Alternatives to Wegovy & Ozempic That Actually Work?

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I'm JJ Virgin, PhD dropout. Sorry, mom turned four time New York Times bestselling author. Yes, I'm a certified nutrition specialist, fitness hall of famer, and I speak at health conferences and trainings around the globe. But I'm driven by my insatiable curiosity and love of science to keep asking questions, digging for answers, and sharing the information I uncover with as many people as I can. And that's why I created the well Beyond 40 podcast to synthesize and simplify the science of health into actionable strategies.

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In each episode, we'll talk about what's working in the world of wellness, from personalized nutrition and healing your metabolism to healthy aging and prescriptive fitness. Join me on the journey to better health so you can love how you look and feel right now and have the energy to play full out at 100. Hey, jj, Virgin here. Okay, real talk. So often the holidays sneak up on me. Travel, gifts, hosting, you know, all the things, and suddenly it's like, wait, who spent what and where? And I know I'm not the only one who's looked at a bill in January and thought, wow, that escalated quickly. If you want to keep your finances under control this holiday season, you need to be using Monarch. It's rated the Wall Street Journal's best budgeting app of 2025. Monarch is the all in one personal finance tool that brings your entire financial life together in one clean interface. On your laptop or on your phone. Monarch lets you link everything and gives you real time visibility so you're not shocked later. Right now, I've been checking the holiday spending category so I don't accidentally start the new year with that dreaded debt hangover. And honestly, just seeing everything laid out is already helping me stay more aware. This season, Monarch does the heavy lifting. It links your accounts in minutes, gives you smart categorization and super clear visuals. Yes, that end of year reset could be a real goal. This time, don't let financial opportunity slip through the cracks use the code virginonarch.com in your browser for half off your first year. That's 50% off your first year@monarch.com with the code Virgin.

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Better satiety, Better blood sugar control and being able to finally lose the weight without suffering. These are the promises of Wegovian Ozempic, also known as Semaglutide, and Mounjaro, also known as Tirzepatide. Now, if you've been considering going on them but you're concerned about the cost or the side effects, here are some natural alternatives that you can use to create similar effects without any of the downsides, although there aren't a lot of downsides. And whether you opt to use these drugs or not, you're going to want to incorporate these alternatives into your plan, not only to improve your results, but also to help you when you're ready to start titrating off the drugs. But before we get into this, let's go over how these drugs actually work, because that's going to inform what we're going to do to mimic their action. Now, all of These drugs are GLP1 agonists, and that means they mimic the action of GLP1 hormone to produce a response when it binds to a specific receptor in the brain. GLP1 is glucagon, like peptide 1, and it is a hormone produced by specialized cells in the GI tract, particularly in the small intestine. GLP1 plays a crucial role in the regulation of blood sugar levels and metabolism and it's the released by your body when you eat food, especially carbohydrates. GLP1 receptors are located throughout the body. There are receptors in the pancreas those promote the release of insulin and glucagon to regulate blood sugar levels. And then GLP1 will bind to receptors in your brain and also trigger cascade of reactions that help reduce the cravings to better manage your appetite. And that's what you've probably heard a lot about is better satiety. Now among all these reactions, GLP1 prevents your liver from making too much glucose. It slows down the emptying of the stomach's contents into your small intestine. Okay? So that helps manage the rate at which blood sugar enters your bloodstream. And this is a super cool one. I actually didn't know this before. It browns your fat. And remember, when you can start to brown your white fat, that fat then is easier to burn off. It also helps lower inflammation in your gut. Now that is what is in semaglutide, right? That is the GLP one only. Tirzepatide or Mounjaro also has something called gip, a GIP agonist. Right. And GIP stands for glucose dependent insulinotrophic peptide or gastric inhibitory polypeptide. This one plays a role in regulating blood sugar levels and insulin secretion as well. It's produced by the small intestine when you eat carbs and fat. Now, the primary function of GIP is to enhance insulin secretion in response to the rise in blood sugar levels and to help maintain blood sugar homeostasis in the body. GIP can also inhibit gastric acid secretion and slow down gastric emptying, which is going to of course impact digestion and the absorption of nutrients. GIP works in conjunction with GLP1 to regulate insulin release and blood sugar levels. So in listening to all of that, the big takeaway is that the big levers here are better satiety and better blood sugar control. So the question is, how do we mimic these results? And again, I want to emphasize whether you're going on these drugs or you don't ever want to take these drugs, everything I'm going to talk about are going to make this all work better. So the first one is take and eat protein first approach to meals. When you choose foods higher in protein, and then of course you eat by the plate with fiber and healthy fats, your gut is going to release GLP1 in a steady, sustained manner. Now, what do we know about protein? Protein helps stimulate GLP1 secretion from the intestinal cells. If you're wondering how much protein should you eat, I hope you are. I've got a protein calculator that I've created to make sure you're getting the right amount of protein at your meals and overall. And it also comes with a seven day protein first meal plan. And you can grab that. We'll put it in the show notes below, but you can also grab it@jjvirgin.com the number seven day. Now, fiber, because I mentioned eat protein first and then some fiber. And of course we know that animal protein comes with some healthy fats. Why Is fiber important. It interacts with certain gut receptors and also helps trigger the release of GLP1. And then healthy fats can slow down stomach emptying and help keep food in your stomach longer, which also is going to trigger the release of GLP1. We also know that some fats, like omega 3 fats, can of course reduce inflammation and improve the function of the cells that secrete GLP1. Now, here's what you do not want to do. You don't want to have a high sugar impact meal because this can of course rapidly spike your blood sugar and that then may not have enough time to trigger the appropriate release of GLP1. And then when that happens, your body can't adequately trigger the release of hormones that can help regulate blood sugar levels, leading to higher elevated blood sugar post meal, which then of course, you can have higher blood sugar, higher insulin, and you lock the doors to your fat cells. You're not burning anything off and you're hungry. So it's the exact opposite of what we want to do. If you're going, oops, that's me. Sugar Impact Diet, my New York Times bestselling book is for you. All right, the next one. So eat protein first. The second is support your gut. We want a healthy gut, because when your gut is healthy, it's going to optimize the GLP1 release. If you've got a weakened gut barrier that I talk about in the virgin diet that lets unwanted substances pass through the intestinal lining right into that immune system that lies right below it and create inflammation, right? And wreak havoc, this can mess up the release of GLP1. And the other thing that's important about GLP1 and GIP is you've got to have the right balance of gut bacteria. So this is super duper important too. So I talk about how to have a healthy gut in the virgin diet. We also have the healthy gut support program and collagen. All of these things help here. And I've also got videos about how to stop bloating and digestive issues and finally heal your gut so that you know how to get started with that. So I'll put that in the show notes as well. The next one, strength training. Now, what I love so much is that eating protein first and, and resistance training here not only can work together to have a healthy body composition and of course improve insulin sensitivity, but strength training is shown in some studies to stimulate the release of GLP1. Plus, of course, what do we know about strength training? It is the fastest way to Help you become more insulin sensitive because in your muscles start to become more insulin resistant and that is not what you want and this is the fastest way to improve it. Plus, we know that your muscle mass is not only metabolic Spanx, holding everything in tighter and boosting your metabolism, but it's also a sugar sponge. It gives carbohydrates a place to go rather than going into your fat cells, which of course is super duper important. So I hope by now you're on a resistance training program. If you're not, I have a resistance training program video on YouTube with a weekly training program. So I will put that in the notes as well. You'll want to check it out. Next one up is sleep and getting great sleep because insufficient sleep can impair GLP1 release. And of course what's the other thing it can do? Increase your risk of insulin resistance. If you're insulin resistant, you are going to be hungry, you are not going to be able to burn fat. We also know that poor sleep can disrupt the balance of the appetite regulating hormones, leptin and ghrelin, which of course will also affect GLP1 secretion and its effects on appetite and blood sugar. Now, if you're waking up tired every day, you're going to want to watch my video on sleep. And the hidden reasons you're not getting the quality rest that you need, right alongside with sleep is stress. In fact, poor sleep of course is a stressor. Chronic stress can lead to insulin resistance, impeding the ability of other hormones like GLP1 to work efficiently and of course, stalling weight loss. When your cells respond well to insulin, hormones like GLP1 function better too. And managing stress can help support gut health, right? We know that stress can make your gut more permeable. So when you have great gut health, it promotes the proper release of GLP1 and its ability to regulate blood sugar. Now what can you do for stress? Meditation's a great one. High intensity interval training helps your sympathetic nervous system handles stress better. And my supplement, take 10 stress support and then next one. I think this is one of the coolest supplements out there that has been getting a lot of play recently, but it's kind of still not really known. And that is berberine. Now berberine is a star player for blood sugar because berberine activates an enzyme called amp, which is activated protein kinase. And this AMPK plays a crucial role in blood sugar uptake and metabolism of cells, including most importantly, your muscle cells. Now, animal studies show that berberine enhances AMPK activation as well as autophagy, something that we talk about for fasting, intermittent fasting, how you spring clean detox out your cells. Berberine also helps support healthy gut bacteria, which can in turn help improve insulin sensitivity. And berberine's impact on gut health can positively impact a wide range of conditions like obesity, diabetes, cancer and inflammatory disease conditions. It can improve cholesterol and triglyceride levels as well. And berberine also helps reduce liver glucose production and lowers overall blood sugar levels. Even when your blood sugar levels are already high, your liver can still produce more sugar through a regulatory process called gluconeogenesis. Berberine's liver supporting abilities include protecting against non alcoholic liver disease, fatty liver disease, you've heard it nafld where dangerous fat accumulates in your liver. Chronic inflammation, which always is gonna accompany insulin resistance. Remember, high insulin, high inflammation, high inflammation, you get insulin resistance and impaired blood sugar control. Plus, if that's not enough, berberine has anti inflammatory properties that help alleviate this inflammation and help better manage blood sugar levels. Berberine also has antioxidant enzymes that protect against oxidative stress, which then of course reduces cell damage and support your mitochondria. It also can help prevent development of atherosclerosis, type 2 diabetes, obesity, and lower the risk of insulin resistance and improve insulin secretion. So one of the things we've always thought about with berberine is that it's sort of nature's metformin improving insulin sensitivity. So again, if you're looking at better blood sugar control, if you're looking at better insulin sensitivity, and if you're looking for fat loss, you should be Berberine for the win. Now, one of the big concerns when you look at the downsides of the weight loss drugs, it's actually a downside of going on any kind of a diet. Anything where you're calorie restricted, there is a possibility of the loss of lean muscle and specifically skeletal muscle mass. And if you do that, what does it do? Tanks your metabolism and it puts you into a metabolic tailspin. Now, thankfully, this can be avoided by following the strategies I've outlined in my next video on what you must do before you go on a diet. Check it out.

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