Really depressed I didn’t just go on Ozempic - only maintained for a year

PCOS is considered a health condition so you can go on the injections with a healthy bmi and PCOS

You’ve done amazingly OP and maintaining that level of weight loss is also a huge achievement.
Actually, you don’t need to think about your friend’s situation. You have changed the way you eat and kept the weight off for a year, that is far more healthy and sustainable (and cheaper!) than weight loss jabs. What she did is not material to you and your situation.
Just an idea, but could you halve your portions of carbs just to nudge yourself back into calorie deficit? I bet it wouldn’t take much.
Lots of people on here will have huge respect for you and lots of respect for your position..

I’d cut out carbs completely if you want to lose weight, but when you reintroduce them don’t go for pasta and spuds - go for small portions of brown rice, quinoa etc.

Don’t go on it. The food noise comes back worse as does the weight.

I know everyone is giving you loads of advice but please listen to the people saying to take up proper strength training - get a bit of coaching then lift heavy!

Even if you halved your gym going time, doing heavy weights rather than cardio would make a real difference in how your body looks

It also gives you something to be proud of about yourself as the weights you can lift get bigger, instead of your body image being based on the mirror and which bits wobble

Eventually you might end up looking at your skinny friends and instead of wishing for WLI, thinking jeez I could snap her like a twig 😉

How tall are you? I’m 5ft4 and definitely skinny (size 8 in most places) and I’m between 120 and 125lb.

Until I turned 30 I was consistently between 115 and 120lb, but I have accepted the extra 5lb are here to stay now my metabolism is a bit older.

Is the 120lb you’ve set as a target possibly just unrealistic? I would need to radically diet to stick at 120lb and not waver between there and 125lb - and as I say, I’d be described as skinny/slender/thin.

You will never be thin enough to find happiness because it is clear from your negative feelings over a really big achievement that this is a psychological problem and food is just the symptom. This is why weight loss jabs aren’t the answer, even if you started on them and lost even more it is no substitute for exploring why you feel so negatively about yourself in the first place.

You do know absolutely every photo you see online is filtered? Celebrities don’t even consider liposuction as “plastic surgery,” just “maintenance”. Every EVERY woman over 20 has wobbly bits unless they’re a super gym goer. You lost 55 pounds, you’re at your goal weight, and you’re a healthy weight. You’re making an effort at the gym. Drink absolute shitloads of water. Maybe take that GLP-1 money and get in therapy to stop hating your body. I don’t mean it as an insult at all - I absolutely HATED my body, and I was unkind to it.

When you let go of that hate, you’ll treat yourself more kindly. You’ll go to the gym for the endorphins and your shape will change if that’s what you want. But the self-hatred is holding you back, not lack of GLp-1 access for a healthy weight individual.

These WLI's have made half this forum bonkers.

You're at your target weight. Why be jealous of someone who needed medication to lose weight?

It's incredibly hard to lose weight once you get to a healthy BMI. I want to lose 2 stone from 11st 5 which is a BMI of 24 for my height to 9st 5. ChatGPT recommended it take me 6 months to do this minimum at a pound a week. Which seemed so slow. Sometimes it's easy to have unrealistic expectations re weight loss. I think maybe you are disillusioned because you lost it easier before and it feels like you're failing when it's just because you are no longer overweight. You've done amazing so far!

Please consider dropping the cardio down and doing strength training OP x

“Rough with the smooth”

You’ve done incredibly well to lose the weight, especially with PCOS working against you. You should be immensely proud. I bet you look good too. Doing it the hard way means you’ve learned a lot along the way. Maintaining for a year is exceptional and means you’ve really cracked it.
Have you spoken to the GP about metformin for PCOS? It can assist appetite and carb cravings.

What makes you think it would be any different if you'd lost weight with ozempic?

Loose skin doesn’t kill you. Obesity does. No one is doing it at this level for vanity.

I’ve often wondered whether this is the case when I read mumsnetters saying they have lost mammoth amount . I suppose it’s the rough with the smooth. I wonder whether it put more off if living in a country that is much warmer year round than the UK and so revealing skin is more of a year round thing

I lost 8 stone with GLP 1 and I’m a mess of loose skin which gets me down constantly. Wasn’t happy before, happier now but still hate my body.

I think that poster may be referring to some newspapers which in turn sort of summarise an article by one Jennifer James. Which in turn has a misleading headline since in the body of the article, JJ says the same applies to dieting without weight loss medication!

theconversation.com/weight-loss-drugs-help-with-fat-loss-but-they-cause-bone-and-muscle-loss-too-245797

There is no shortage of GLPs. Diabetics can get them as easily as everyone else. It’s a medication approved for the disease of obesity as much as for the disease diabetes. Both are two of the four biggest non-communicable diseases in the UK - both are killers.

My understanding is that each time you reorder the medication, you have to provide details of your weight etc. And periodically you have to send pictures in a way that are difficult to fake to avoid precisely what you've mentioned

It sounds like you have body dysmorhia OP. Many of us can only dream of being under 10 stone

I was about to ask the same thing. A friend has recently lost a lot of weight and it seems to be addictive, her goal weight just keeps getting lower.

Do share this research…

Put on weight to 'cheat the system' and get weight loss medication you're not otherwise eligible for? No wonder these medications - or rather the people using them in this manner - give the medications a bad rap

(that's how I read it)