Peptalk: Peptides Unpacked

#7 Weight Loss Done Right: 11 GLP-1 Mistakes to Avoid for Lasting Results

• Dr. Kylie Burton & Jessica Briecke • Season 1 • Episode 7

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Weight can fall fast on GLP-1s—but why does it so often come back?

In this episode, Dr. Kylie Burton and Jessica Briecke pull back the curtain on the 11 mistakes that sabotage peptide results and show you the simple, sustainable fixes that protect your metabolism long after the vial is empty.

From quieting food noise to building a stronger, more responsive body, this is your practical guide to doing GLP-1s right—so the results actually last.

What We Cover:

  • The core truth: peptides are a tool, not the plan
  • A clear protein blueprint that preserves lean mass and how to plate meals so every bite counts
  • Why two to three short resistance sessions outperform marathon cardio for keeping your metabolic rate intact
  • Sleep and stress chemistry: how deep sleep drives growth-related signaling, why chronic cortisol blunts results, and the small daily resets that restore ghrelin and leptin cues
  • Hydration and minerals as unsung cofactors: magnesium, sodium, and zinc for peptide synthesis and receptor activity
  • Safety first: the risks of poor sourcing, the case for low-and-slow dosing to avoid receptor desensitization and GI side effects, and what a smart transition off GLP-1s looks like
  • Mindset and community: visualization to lock in goals, habit design that sticks, and a support system that raises adherence
  • Liver and gut support to keep your system clear and responsive
  • Practical maintenance plans that match real life

For Anyone Using GLP-1s (Or Thinking About It): If you want results that last, build the foundations while the signals are strongest. Your body isn't broken—it just needs the right message.

Want to connect more with the hosts? We'd love it! Connect with Jess at B2BwithJess.com or on Instagram @JessB_LMT_NC. Connect with Dr. Kylie at her other podcast Unshakeable Brain where new episodes are posted weekly.

Ready to explore peptide therapy for yourself? Visit the company we recommend for advanced peptide therapy and one-on-one support at drkylieburton.com/peptides

Want to offer peptide therapy in your business? Whether you're adding it to your existing practice or building something new, learn how to get started—and how we'll help you make the sales and marketing much easier—at drkylieburton.com/peptides

Legal Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always consult with a qualified healthcare provider before starting any new health protocol. Dr. Kylie Burton and Jessica Briecke are affiliates and may receive compensation for referrals. Individual results may vary.

You have the science. You have the tools. Now it's time to take the next step.

This is PepTalk: Peptides Unpacked—science made simple, results made real.

SPEAKER_01:

Peptides are powerful and often misunderstood. But we are here to change that. I'm Dr. Kylie Burton. And I'm Jessica Brickie. This is pep talk. Peptides unpacked. Science made simple, results made real. Here's a jaw dropper. Recent follow-up studies on GLP1 medications like semaglutide show that up to two-thirds of people regain most of their lost weight within a year after stopping. Not because the peptide stopped working, but because the foundations weren't fixed.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, exactly. Peptides can open the door to healing, but if you ignore things like sleep, protein, minerals, or gut health, the results are not going to stick. So today we're breaking down the most common peptide mistakes that we see every day from dosing missteps to missing the mindset piece.

SPEAKER_01:

We'll talk about why the rebound happens, how to prevent it, and how to build a plan that keeps your results long after the vial is empty. I'm Jessica Brickie. And I'm Dr. Kylie Burton. Let's unpack the biggest peptide mistakes and how to do it better. Here we go.

SPEAKER_00:

All right, let's jump right in. I think the first one that we are going to talk about right now is uh, I would say the most common thought process that people have, and that is that peptides are like this magical shot that's gonna solve all your problems, and you don't have to change anything else in the world. It's it's that's it. I mean, I don't know. I think about my whole life, even five years ago, and I would say, if only, if only where there was this medicine that we could take that would, you know, help me lose weight and have better control of my eating. If only, if I could invent that, I'd be a cajillionaire because everybody wants it. And look where we are now, right? So I say number one, the most common mistake is just assuming that peptides are the magical shot that we need that's gonna save the world. But peptides cannot outwork poor sleep or chronic stress or even nutrient deficiencies. And clinical data shows that up to two-thirds of users, as we mentioned before, are gonna regain weight within a year of stopping their GLP1 therapy when lifestyle changes were not in place to begin with. Peptides are really gonna amplify what's already happening in the body. So if the foundation's weak, so are the results.

SPEAKER_01:

I think the stories we have on this podcast explain that really well.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. If you're doing well, they're gonna make everything else better. If you're doing poorly, they're gonna amplify that.

SPEAKER_01:

They are not gonna replace a poor lifestyle. They will help a great diet and a great lifestyle, or even just a good one. They will help amplify what you're already doing. Yes, exactly. All right, one to there. Number two, not eating enough protein. GLP1's suppress your appetite. Many people eat less than 50 to 60 grams of protein per day without even realizing it. And again, if you go back into Carly's story, she mentions how her diet and her appetite had to change, and how she made when you're not as hungry and you get fuller faster, you have to make some changes and make sure every bite counts. Not eating enough protein, I think, is a common culprit for a lot of people, not just for those of them who are taking pop peptides. These studies show that adequate protein, 30 to 35 grams per meal, preserves muscle and prevents metabolic slowdown. Less protein equals less muscle loss, which equals rebound weight and fatigue once dosing stops. Now, Jess, let's make this simple. If you're to look at a plate, tell me how much of the plate should be protein. Just like as we were making, like a like a my plate, you know, like a my period.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I'm gonna say that protein is is probably a little bit more than a third of your plate. It's a pretty big portion of your plate if you as well. Yeah, if you need to break down what that plate looks like, let's say it's maybe uh not quite half protein. Maybe we're gonna go with um a weird amount. We're gonna take that other half, we're gonna split it, but not exactly 50-50. I would say maybe like two-fifths. Yeah, I would say so. And that's gonna be um carbohydrates in whatever form. And that can be some of it in the form of a green vegetable, maybe green beans, broccoli, whatever, and maybe the rest of that carbohydrate, that whole section, could be sweet potato or some other um more complex carbohydrate on the plate. And then that other tiny little piece that's left is gonna be a healthy fat. And but when we're eating, we want to start with that protein. And now with metabolic balancing, there's different ways to look at that in order to keep that um more stable. So some would say eat your fibrous vegetables first, like your green beans or your broccoli or whatever, then your protein, and then your starchy carbohydrate, right? Um, yes, that can influence the stabilization of blood sugar, but when we are on GLP1s, we really want you to be more protein and fiber forward. So I want you to be prioritizing when you're eating your protein first, in case you get full, because you will, and you push that plate away and you just can't have another bite. We want to make sure that you're nourishing all of the things in your body, all of your muscles, all of your tendons, your gut health, your brain, by making sure you're getting enough protein. So that is a good visual, I'd say, if you're thinking about protein, not quite half, but pretty darn close of protein on your plate. Um, the other thing is people ask me all the time, well, if I'm measuring, which I'm not a big fan of necessarily weighing and measuring your food, I think that when everything is, when you're choosing well, and especially if you are using peptides, your body's gonna naturally tell you when you've had enough, if you're listening. Um, but if you do want to track your macros and you're thinking about what that protein looks like, to make it easy, we're gonna say one gram of protein per pound of ideal weight. And what I mean by that is if you were sitting currently today at 200 pounds, but your ideal weight is 150 pounds, in theory, you're looking at about 150 pounds of protein a day. And that's a lot, especially when you're considering most people pre-peptide are getting a third of that. So I don't necessarily think that everybody's gonna always be able to hit those markers. That's a lot of protein. There's a lot of sneaky ways that you can get protein and increase that amount without necessarily killing yourself with the volume that you just don't have an appetite for. Um, but if we are shooting towards three meals a day with 30 or so, 30 to 35 grams of protein, we're in the right direction. If we're getting a hundred, a little over a hundred grams of protein a day, we're doing okay.

SPEAKER_01:

And I I don't even know what the numbers look like. I never scale, I never measure, but based upon a percentage of a plate, if you're over a third, if you're maybe even looking at a quarter or a half, a lot of times, you know, I I love my meat. Yes. I would be carnivore if I could. If I needed to go on a diet, it would be carnivore. So it's easily a one-third, usually a a half all the time for me. But that's meat. Yep. And then when I do eat salads like my my two-year-old and my five-year-old little girls, they love a little a good old Caesar salad. Um, but I make sure that they have chicken in every single bite. Yes, good. And so that's just a simple rule of thumb. Like make every bite count, and then part of that is protein. Make sure that's true.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. All right. The third common mistake people make is ignoring sleep. We've touched on this in other episodes. Um, and that is because growth hormone and the repairing peptides, they're secreted during the deep sleep, the non-rem, the non-REM sleep, the non-REM sleep. Um, and adults who sleep less than six hours a night have up to about 30% lower natural growth hormone output. And poor sleep is gonna increase cortisol levels, which directly suppresses the peptide signaling because all of these hormones and all of these peptides are in communication with each other. Um, anything that gets out of whack is going to be in part of this cascade that's gonna impact the next thing down the line. Sleep is is important, and a lot of people don't prioritize sleep.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Number four, staying in chronic stress mode. So in the last episode, we talked about things that impact your peptide production. And now this one's like they're pretty similar. They are impact, impact your peptide production, and why we are deficient in them are also the same reasons why people lose the weight and have great success, but then they don't keep it off, or they may not keep it off in the long run. Okay, chronic stress mode. I know you're gonna live in it. Find ways to get out of it, even if it's a short time period. Number five, stopping foundational supplements or hydration. It's a big one. Hydration. Hydration is one of those things that we all know, but yeah, struggle with.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. Yeah. Minerals like magnesium, zinc, and sodium are cofactors for peptide synthesis and receptor activation. Um, they're big communicators in our body. So I would go to say magnesium, for example. If we are low in magnesium, we might feel at night kind of a heart racing sensation or our sleep is going to be disrupted because we gobble that up under stress. And for a lot of other metabolic reasons that are happening, if we don't have these minerals in our body, there's so many jobs that are not doing that are not getting done properly. And once we go off the GLPs, if we haven't, if we're not making it a priority to get minerals and vitamins in our body, we're gonna be in big trouble. So hydration is twofold. It's one, of course, getting the water in, and two, making sure we have enough minerals that allow us to use that water and do all these other metabolic functions in the body.

SPEAKER_01:

Right. And we've dropped so many things about water. So if you haven't listened from the first episode on this series, go back and listen to the first one and walk your way through it. There's a reason why we're doing what we're doing in the proper order. Exactly. Number six, dropping calories too low. Rapid restriction tells the body to conserve energy, lowering thyroid and leptin. When GLP1 already reduces hunger, pairing it with extreme dieting to doubles the metabolic slowdown. I think Carly explains this the best. I don't GLP1 might, you know, quote unquote reduce hunger, or it just makes you aware of the communication more than reducing hunger. So one of the examples I think of when I think of this is Carly explains in a previous episode where she could eat like a full plate of food, and then others around her be like, oh, I'd eat half the plate or and have some left over, and then they just be, okay, I'm done, I'm full. Yeah. Where it's the communication that she didn't realize wasn't happening until she started her GLP1. And then the communication was there.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, we hear a lot of people talk about how the um how they don't have an appetite anymore. But the other part of that too is that the food noise is gone because the signaling for ghrelin, and I know we we said thyroid in here, but I think ghrelin and leptin is is what we we probably should talk about when it comes to signaling with our hunger cues. When are we hungry? When are we full? Um, and these tools are an opportunity for us to start listening to our body again and nourishing it the way that we should be. Um, so it's okay to push away a plateful of food when you didn't you didn't used to do that. Um, however, we don't we don't want to push it away without making every bite count. So we don't want to load up on a plate full of sweet potato and then we're too full to eat the piece of steak or chicken that's on that plate.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. I love it when you say food noise. It really is just food noise. And when that's gone, when that's crystal clear, and you can think clearly with a better relationship with food, that's really what the GLP ones are helping is.

SPEAKER_00:

They really are. I've gotten two texts this week from people that I'm working with. Um, one person, her words to me were, I have prayed for this every day of my life to not be so hyper-focused on my next meal as I'm eating a current meal, to not always have that chatter, to at the at night when I'm relaxing and watching television, not hear the pantry or the refrigerator whispering my name. I've prayed for this, and the fact that it is no longer ruling me is absolutely amazing. And then the other person sent me a message and said the food noise for her meant that she's slowing down to make better choices when it comes to meal prep and how she's nourishing her body. So instead of being ravenous and grabbing whatever is close by and usually carb heavy and processed, she's now able to take her time, plan out a meal, be thoughtful in her choices because that constant push to eat and think about food is no longer present for her. And it's a blessing for so many people that are struggling. But the point is you have to eat.

SPEAKER_01:

And right, you have to eat. And I and I feel like there's a hot topic of conversation here too, where I don't understand that. Right. I don't understand what it's like to have the fridge feel like it's talking to you. And so when we talk about the judgment of others, they don't have a right to judge.

SPEAKER_00:

Right.

SPEAKER_01:

Because you've never sat in their shoes. Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Now, prior to my using peptides, I didn't have that issue at all. You know, even if I got, you know, I was, I would say I was an emotional eater even at one point in my life. Like if I was upset, if I was sad, if I was whatever the emotion was, I might at the end of the night go grab a pint of Ben and Jerusalem be like, well, this is how I'm gonna solve my emotional crisis, right? Um, but I've had moments in my life where I probably wasn't dealing with stressors or whatever it was, and I could watch television and think about, you know, the kids have a bag of Halloween candy sitting in the shelf. They won't notice if I have a Rhesus peanut butter cup or two, you know, like and it talks to me and it talks to me. It wasn't something that I was experiencing when I started my peptide, so I can't talk to the change with signaling in that way now, but I can certainly relate to having experienced that in the past. So if you're somebody that just doesn't have that under control, this is a this is a gift, it's a tool for you to now make these other lifestyle changes that maybe you weren't able to before because you just kind of couldn't control it. And it's not your fault that you couldn't control it. There's something that's happening.

SPEAKER_01:

That's what I wanted to say. It's not you, it doesn't have anything to do with you and your strength. It's like chemistry in your body is not communicating as effectively as other people's.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, absolutely. Next mistake that people make number seven, ignoring resistance training. So muscle is metabolically an active tissue. It if you lose it and your caloric burn, your caloric burn is going to plummet. It needs calories in order to stay strong. Weight training is going to signal the release of the myocines, which I mentioned previously in another episode. It's muscle-derived peptides that improve insulin sensitivity and repair. So a lot of people have even heard like after dinner, go for a walk for 10 minutes, engage the muscles so that the body starts to use the food for fuel that we just put in there. Um, weight training is going to increase the way that our body is responding when we're eating. Even two 30-minute sessions a week can preserve lean mass during GLP1 use. So we don't have to be out there going to the gym like crazy and spending hours upon hours to do that to preserve our muscle while we're losing weight in this way. 20 minutes of full body using your own body weight three times a week, that's gonna do it. Alongside walking or riding a bike or swimming or yoga or whatever it is that you're doing, also will be beneficial. But weight resistance is crucial when you're using a GLP1. We want to make sure that we are preserving those muscles. And I will also say when they are done properly, when you are dosed properly, what you actually may see, and I know that it is my own personal experience, is that you will see an increase in your muscle mass just by doing three times a week, 20 minutes a day of weight resistance, because insulin itself is anabolic, meaning it builds muscle. If you've ever seen somebody that's been a lifetime diabetic, their muscle tone is phenomenal if they've cared for themselves. It's unlike anybody else. In this particular case, for me, once I started my GLP and all the other benefits that I have had, I have never had a response to workouts the way that I have since I've microdosing tiny little amounts of these GLPs. My muscles are amazing with little effort.

SPEAKER_01:

It's the massage therapist who understands muscles. I do. Number eight, poor or unsafe sourcing. Peptides bought online are often underdosed or contaminated. We could get into this whole space of online because it happens in every industry. Supplements, peptides, whatever it is, go to Amazon, go to wherever you want to go get these from and quote, save yourself a little bit of money, but you have no idea what you're actually getting. Yeah, we might look the exact same, but it is not the same thing inside the bottles.

SPEAKER_00:

Our next episode is going to be dedicated solely to this because this is such a huge important topic. So we're doing a whole episode on this next. Um, but it is a common mistake that you see people make all the time. Um, because peptides can be expensive, and I under I understand that I wish they were more affordable and I wish they were more accessible, they're becoming more accessible, um, but they are um an investment. People are looking for a way to get them cheaper, but like anything else, you're gonna get what you pay for, and that can be dangerous.

SPEAKER_01:

Yep, and it's your health that you're playing with.

SPEAKER_00:

Correct. Not something I would play with. Right. Uh, number nine, next error that I see people mistake that people make is dosing errors. Uh, more peptides isn't necessarily better. So overstimulating these receptors leads to symptoms like nausea, fatigue, but also receptor desensitization. So I I've spoken about this before where people aren't really talking about this much, but I do think that we are going to see with these standard high doses that people um are losing the, especially if they don't change their lifestyle, they're losing the opportunity for these peptides to come in and help them out. Um when we're doing too much too quickly and that overwhelms the body, then the receptor sites just are like not listening anymore. So it can just like insulin resistance, the same thing can happen here. Um, so clinical protocols emphasize go start low, ramp it up, right? This, in my opinion, is not the right way. What I think we should be doing is starting tiny and going slow. And you might need to get to standard dosing, but we want the body's signaling to start to work first. Remember what these peptides are and what their jobs were to in the body so it can do their jobs effectively and efficiently and not have those lousy side effects that often come with using too much too soon. Um, slowed gastric emptying is really can be very uncomfortable because it means number one, you're not pooping, and number two, a lot of people will experience things like GERD or burping or whatever because the food is sitting in the stomach longer. Um, so we want to go slow and low so the body can listen and use these things and respond accordingly. So dosing yours mistake number nine.

SPEAKER_01:

Number 10. No mindset or support system. Behavioral research shows habits drive 40 to 45% of daily actions. Without mindset change, old patterns return. We highly recommend community support or coaching improves adherence by over 60% in health programs. Peptides change physiology, mindset maintains transformation.

SPEAKER_00:

I would advise people if they haven't listened to the story with Jim Emery, when he talks about his story and the big um connection to his mental health. Um because he really had to work on changing some lifestyle factors. Initially, that was not a priority for him, and and he realized soon he needed to do that too, right? You often a lot of people that are overweight will use food as their medicine, as their coping tool. Um, and so they are now having to relearn when they don't have that signal signal. What is that coping tool? Like it's gonna make traumas or stressors show up bigger because now the thing that you used to numb it with really doesn't appeal to you anymore. Um and we want to change those habits so that when you come off the medication, you don't slide back into that. So this again is an opportunity for you to work on your mindset, work on your habit, change those things so that when you come back down to whatever your maintenance looks like. Some people it's never using it again, some people it's cycling, some people it will be a small weekly dose, whatever. Everybody's a little bit different, what they need later on. Uh, but if you don't change these habits, if you don't have a good support system to help you learn how to change those habits, you're gonna be in trouble when you're off.

SPEAKER_01:

I want to talk specifically about the mindset and how powerful a mind is. If you are listening to this, I want you to get someplace, whether it can be now or whether it be later, I want you to close your eyes and do this every single day for two or three minutes. That's it. Close your eyes and visualize what you want life to look like after your GLP once, after your pet peptide therapy. I want you to visualize whether it be the weight loss, whether it be the um, as Jimmy experienced the shoulder recovery, the organs functioning back 100% and uh the miracles that he's experienced in his life, what miracles are coming to your life? I want you to visualize that first. This is how powerful visualization is. Jimmy, uh Mr. Beast, as he is known on YouTube and all other platforms, is known to say many times that once he hits uh success level, he already created that in his brain a year prior. So whatever goals he has, he's mentally accomplished them before he ever accomplishes them. Before you're going to accomplish your goals, mentally accomplish them first. And that's a hack you can use in everyday life for just about anything. Take two or three minutes, close your eyes to get somewhere silent, maybe throw on a little bit of background music, whatever that looks like for you, and visually create the success in your mind first. And then watch as your motivation to get that to achieve that automatically changes simply because your brain is starting to believe what's possible. Your brain doesn't know anything different between reality and non not reality. So get it to believe reality first, and then it will come to pass. Your brain is powerful when you use it. It's like the powerful organ that it is. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00:

All right, so 11 expecting permanent results without maintenance. Once signaling stops, the body reverts to its baseline unless it's been supported. So transitioning peptides like BPC157 or GH GHKCU or whatever peptide you're using, help bridge the gap after GLP1 or growth-related peptides. Umgoing movement, minerals, protein, intake, keep the body responsive. So again, if you think that mistake number one, when we talked about thinking this is a magic shot without doing all the other steps along the way, and then you go off and expect permanent results without the maintenance, without prioritizing protein, without getting your sleep, without doing resistance training, all of these things and all the signal signaling that we've improved is going to revert back. What brought you to the place, setting aging aside, okay, because that's the one thing that we're all doing every second of every day. But setting aging aside, all these other things are things that we can influence for better or for worse. So if we're expecting a permanent result without using this as a tool to change our life, we are going to go right back into those awful habits and those awful responses that brought you to the place where you needed these peptides for therapy to begin with.

SPEAKER_01:

Think about peptides as an enhancement. If you're already doing great things, which I know several of you listening to this are, and you're just so flippin' frustrated that it's not showing up in the way you want it to show up, well, it's going to enhance all those great things. If you need to change your life to where you're doing more of those great things, well, it's just gonna enhance the results. Yep. Last but not least, forgetting our two favorite. No, that's not true. Forgetting the liver and the gut. The brain is my favorite.

SPEAKER_00:

So my liver and gut are probably my favorite. Together, we together we have uh a pretty darn good top three liver, gut, and brain. There you go.

SPEAKER_01:

And they all impact each other because they're all in one incredible body that has a multiple systems that impact each other, and every organ, every tissue is made up of cells, and so you when you heal the cells, you're just in affecting everything else.

SPEAKER_00:

So yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

We've talked about liver and gut many times before, but just know that if we're not improving those functions, well, the enhancement will show that. Correct. In short, peptides are powerful communicators, but they can't shout over stress, deprivation, or poor foundations. When you pair them with proper nourishment, movement, sleep, and safe sourcing, they deliver sustainable, life changing results.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So if you take one thing from today's episode, let it be this the peptide isn't the plan, it's a tool. And when you Use that tool to buy time while you fix these foundational pieces of sleep and nutrition and stress and all the things we've been talking about, the results are going to last. And when you don't, those results will fade.

SPEAKER_01:

Not about perfection, it's about partnership.

SPEAKER_00:

If this episode helped you, rethink your approach. Make sure that you're following Pep Talk, Peptides Unpacked, wherever you listen. You can find me at b2bwith.com or on Instagram at JessB underscore LMT underscore NC.

SPEAKER_01:

And you can find me at drkylieburton.com slash peptides, where you can begin your journey, or as a practitioner or anybody else who wants to offer this as a business opportunity, get started at drkylieburton.com slash peptides as well. You can also find me at unshakable brain, your podcast, wherever you get your podcasts. If this has resonated with you and if you know somebody who it can affect for the better, please share this podcast with them. You might even want to share it on your social media or your YouTube channel or wherever people can find you because you never know who's struggling, and that simple share could change their life. Your body isn't broken, neither is theirs. It just needs the right message. This is Pep Talk Peptides Unpacked. See ya on the next one. See ya.