When I realised that I'd need to loose masses of weight to drop from being morbidly obese to just obese it was a bit depressing. So instead of having such an impossibly distant goal I worked out that 10% of my current body weight would be 16kg and set that as my first goal. Each time I hit the goal I had a little celebration, then recalculated 10% of my new body weight and set that as the goal.
As time goes by the number of kgs I need to loose to hit the next target goes down, and if I didn't have type 2 diabetes I would have hit the target of no longer being classified as morbidly obese when my BMI dropped below 40. Some stinky rotter has decreed that people with "co-morbidities" including type 2 diabetes remain morbidly obese until they get below a BMI of 35.
I've managed to sneak in a few more celebrations along the way, like when I hit the halfway mark between my starting weight and the highest "normal" weight for my height. The next one, which I hope to meet either next week or in 5 weeks time (I only weigh myself every 4 weeks) will be if I manage to get below 100kg for the first time since 1989.
If I can keep up the weight loss there are 3 milestones coming up, first the 100kg, then the next point where I've lost another 10% of my body weight, and then half a kilo after that my BMI will be 34.9 and I'll finally join the happy ranks of the no longer morbidly obese.
Resetting the 10% of my current body weight calculation each time allows me to have more little celebrations than if I based the calculation on my starting weight. So far I've lost 36 percent of my starting weight, but I've been able to celebrate loosing 10% of my body weight 4 times.
The weight loss has slowed down now that my body mass has decreased. I've had to try and limit my calorie intake to 2000/day after only loosing 1.1kg at the last 4 weekly weigh in, when the target had been 2300kcals/day.
As a diabetic I've been on liraglutide for years. Originally in a prescription that included slow release insulin, but since I lost weight and started fasting for 18hrs/day the slow acting insulin started knocking my blood glucose dangerously low during the night, so I managed got the prescription changed to liraglutide without insulin earlier this year. Last month, instead of sending me 3 injection pens the chemist sent 2 pens and an IOU for the third. That happens now and again, but normally they'll deliver the remaining item in the next few days. This time the third pen didn't arrive, so when I ordered this months prescriptions I reminded them that they still owed me a pen from last month, and asked if they'd be sending 4 this time.
The chemist replied that they had been unable to get hold of any liraglutide at all for several weeks, so that they wouldn't be sending any at all, and I should consult with the prescribing physician about alternative medications.
When I phoned the diabetes clinic the nurse said she wished the chemists would stop telling people do to that, because she'd had people crying and screaming at her down the phone several times a day for the past fortnight. She said that private weight loss clinics had bought up all the semaglutide injection pens from the manufacturer in Denmark, and once the pens ran out they started buying up the less effective tablet form of semaglutide, and all the liraglutide too. Which is why there was nothing left for diabetics trying to get their medicine on the NHS. She said the shortages were expected to last until December next year, and in the meantime diabetics who have been managing without insulin will have to go back to counting the carbohydrate grams in every meal, and measuring out doses of insulin to take before eating.
That's a real pain in the arse, because it removes all spontaneity from meal times. No grabbing an extra slice of bread if you've only injected enough insulin for one slice, and no leaving stuff on your plate if you don't want to have a hypo later.
If you get the dose wrong and take a bit too much insulin it makes you ravenous for stodgy carbs and sweet things. Last week, while still trying to calculate how many units of insulin my new body size needs per gram of carbs I overdid it a bit and found myself eating an entire packet of almond cantuccini that had been sitting neglected in the cupboard since last Christmas. I was only going to have one, but couldn't stop once I started, adding an extra 690kcals to that day's total.
I searched for liraglutide from online pharmacies and found that quite a few weight loss clinics were selling it at £75/pen. I seriously considered signing up to one of them, just to get one pen to give myself a third of the usual dose for another month, until I realised that you have to pay for a "private consultation" first which costs a couple of hundred quid, and no guarantee that they'll have any liraglutide left by the time you've been assessed.
Last year the diabetes consultant said they'd move me onto semaglutide in February this year, because there were "temporary" shortages that meant they couldn't prescribe semaglutide to new patients, but the Danish factory was building out the production line, and were expecting to have solved the shortage problem by December 2022. When I phoned in February they said the restrictions on prescribing to new patients were still in force, the new production line was running, but demand had increased so much that it was even more difficult to find the injection pens for their existing patients.
Apparently there are now shortages of bog standard insulin too. Which is even more concerning. It is going to cost the health services a fortune in amputated feet and care for newly blind people if it continues.