Risking a flaming but jealous of those on weight loss injections

[Notmyfinesthours]

I’ve specifically not put this in the weight loss section as I’d rather hear from those who aren’t dieting or thinking about it. Might help me find perspective better.

I am not overweight. I never have been.
I have however had what feels like a lifetime of making sure this is the case.

I suspect many women feel like me. Brought up to fear being fat or greedy or ‘let myself go’ as if it were the worst sin.

Ive skirted close to or actually been in the midst of orthorexia for most of my adult life. Always saying no to pudding, finding the latest food that will fill me up but not have too many calories and fixating on it before I find the next one. Exercising most days, fitting it in by missing lie ins or nights in front of the fire.

Fretting in pregnancy, menopause and any ill health leading to immobility that it might trigger weight gain.

you get the picture? Self flagellation is big driven by an instilled fear of being fat given to many in my generation (I’m 58) (and yes I know I should address this first- I am trying but the media doesn’t help)

Several of my friends and family are big eaters, always seem to have the toastie and cake when we are out and by their own admissions do little exercise. They have often jokingly talked about being slimmer but say they like food too much and ‘have no willpower’ and can’t be bothered to deny themselves for the sake of a few dress sizes.

I know it’s more complex than that but they basically enjoy life in the way it should be enjoyed to my mind and accept they will be a bit larger bodied. I’ve actually always really admired this as an attitude or at least been a bit jealous of it.

But with the new weight loss injections several of them have dropped weight significantly and are so slim and delighted.

I just feel so cheated. Like I’ve been so careful for so long and they haven’t but they get to be slim just with an injection.

I know it’s more complicated, I know it costs them money, might have risks etc but it’s clear so many celebs are doing the same and it feels like it’s not going to be more commonplace.

Why is this making me feel cheated and am I just an awful person?

I get it. But you'll have benefitted from years of healthier choices across a number of areas and will continue to do so. Nutritious foods are still nutritious foods.

Ridiculous analogy.

2/10.

You're not an awful person at all. You don't even care about their weight or their bodies, you care that they are able to be happy whether or not they're carrying extra weight and want that same joy and ease to come naturally to you. You attach value to thinner bodies. FWIW, I have similar feelings about my friends who are handed tons of money by their parents while mine have none to give me; doesn't feel fair, but there it is.

Here's what it looks like from my side, if this context will help you at all: I have cried on more occasions than I can remember about WHY I struggle so much with food addiction and compulsive overeating when other people just don't. Like multiple times a week since I was 11, or maybe earlier. Decades worth of tears and misery. Why can't I be one of those people who is disinterested in food? Why am I spending thousands of pounds and hundreds of hours in therapy that has never worked for me? Why was I born like it (because even as a kid in primary school I was eating compulsively)? Why do I have to be obese? Why is managing food and eating so hard for me when it comes with seemingly no effort to others? Why can't I be one of those people who eats what they like and never seem to put on weight?

I feel like my eating problem/disorder has literally stolen my life and my happiness, because the dominating feeling I have always had is that if I wasn't so fat and if I didn't struggle so much with compulsive binge eating, my life and who I am would be so different. Not least because I wouldn't feel ashamed every day just for existing in my own body because of my own shame and the judgement you mention in your own OP.

I would swap with you in a heartbeat. I can tell you that weight gain in my case HAS stolen a lot of my happiness, but I can also tell you that food and eating just work differently for me than they do for others. It has a pull for me that it just doesn't for everyone. If you haven't experienced it, you do not get it and cannot understand it. As an analogy, I am indifferent to alcohol, but there are plenty of people out there who can only wish that was true for them because their lives revolve around it - for whatever reason, their body and brain respond to alcohol like nothing else. I am the same way with food and as far as I can tell, I was born like it. It's just how my body and/or mind is.

I can't say WLD have been life-changing for me; I'm losing weight, but I made several changes when I started including lifting weights 3x a week, trying with everything I have not to binge (a fight I have daily and am trying to win most of the time) and to not eat any UPFs and instead fill up on fruits and veg and protein. Is it the WLD causing my weight loss or is it all the other changes I am making and giving my everything to stick to (I am not betting on the WLD because I've lost weight at exactly the same rate within the last 12 months without the WLD, I just struggle to stick with it and hoped WLD might be some kind of magical answer that would "fix" me. Not sure it's working out quite like that). I could waste time being jealous of people who take WLD and the weight falls off with no effort, because why the fuck isn't it that way for me? But I'd only be stealing my own joy and happiness. It is what it is.

You aren’t saying it out loud if so don’t fret. Unlike that poster who has said that you are awful. One not charitable thought doesn’t make you awful. I think that poster may need to look at themselves before saying someone is awful rather than perhaps saying that’s not a nice view in my opinion.

You're not able to read and comprehend. That's fine. I'll leave it there but it's you who is being spiteful. Get some help.

No it's not even slightly like those two examples. The cabs v Uber situation, the Uber drivers are taking business away from the cab drivers, they are in competition with each other. What business or opportunity are obese people using weight loss injections taking away from people like the OP?

Ditto for the job example, what role or opportunity are obese people using weight loss injections taking away from people like the OP? What does she now have to share or compete with obese people for that she didn't have to previously?

"we can now eat without worrying about excess fat storage." - no, that's not how these weight loss injections work. You can't eat what you want, you eat less because your appetite is suppressed and you feel fuller longer when you do eat. You also tend to not want fatty, sugary, low nutrition food.

Because looking ‘older’ is of course the worst thing in the world for a woman 🙄. Far worse than the health risks associated with obesity.

I understand binging disorders, and that the injections quieten the noise and there are no cravings. This is great. It gives opportunity to work on oneself without the constant food noise.

But what about people with bulimia? They're generally not overweight, but they have the same binging patterns as those who are obese and are being diagnosed the medication. I think this medication could work for those too, to quieten the noise.

This is a scary thought, as generally there is less weight to lose, or none at all, but something I have been thinking about.

I have to fight the noise every day of my life. Counselling and treatment for bulimia is similar to that for binge eating. I'm sitting just below 'overweight' on the bmi scale, but I'd like to quieten the noise.

But if they weren’t struggling to lose weight they wouldn’t pay the money out. If they realised it was impacting their healthy, they a rent happy at that weight. Because it’s impacting their helath.

If they had always been happy at the weight they were and it wasn’t that they had issues around eating, then they would have tried eating better without injections.

Op seems to be convinced they haven’t tried losing weight before.

I don’t believe they are happy at the weight they are, then decided a change and didn’t try traditional route first. It’s highly likely they have tried and failed and/or being unhappy for a while.

lots overweight people do try and appear happy to try and counter the judgement they expect.

Op isn’t right. She has seen what they allow her to see and assumed she knows all about them.

But unless they can find someone to prescribe it for them indefinitely, they are eventually going to be taken off the injections and all that food noise will return and put them in the same position you are in. You shouldn't envy them losing weight because that isn't your own issue. You've never had to lose weight. Your issue, and their future issue, is not gaining weight.

I think this is really perceptive and you're quite right that it isn't just about weight. It's a mindset that very many of us experience somewhere in our lives, if we're honest, and it's incredibly common. It's also really toxic. It's the same mindset that leads to the perpetuation of hazing, or indeed of really harmful practices like genital mutilation (obviously I'm not saying the impact here is the same). It's completely natural to find it really upsetting if people can have what you have without suffering as you have to get there, but it is a mindset that can never achieve anything for anyone because it actively resists things getting better.

Also...Side effects include...

• Gastrointestinal issues
• Nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea,
• constipation,
• bad gas,
• bloating, stomach pain,
• heartburn,
• stomach flu
• Headache, dizziness, and fatigue

Not to mention long term effects we know nothing about yet!

I'll pass ta very much. Very happy to eat less, eat healthier, and exercise more.

I know, radical right?!

In the US it is widely accepted these are lifelong medications.

@willsandnoodle - I think even if these drugs cannot help bulimia then they at least lay a new path in science for drugs that can. Cerainly, there have been very promising early indications of the benefits of these drugs on addictions and compulsions and so, with luck, there may be something soon that can help support you in your recovery.

I agree. I’ve a relative who thinks the good service she’s had on the nhs is because she’s “healthy” so she sees herself as superior, this is for a condition that is not affected in any way by her weight her diet or how fit she is but she’s convinced she has a rapport with the surgeon presumably as he can see just how threat she is for an elderly person and that’s why she’s getting the treatment (which is absolutely bog standard )she is. Bonkers

@LikeWhoUsesTypewritersAnyway good to see you again!

Still not acknowledging that these drugs have been used for decades in diabetics are we?

That was a powerful read.

But how do you know that these people are happy or comfortable being overweight? My cousin is morbidly obese. She will claim she doesn't care, always order the cake and make jokes. But if you really got to know her you'd find out that she's been dieting since she was 13, spent thousands on different diets, clubs and supplements and it's only caused more weight gain.

If all these people were truly happy being bigger then they wouldn't take WL injections, would they? So I imagine it's taken the same amount, if not more headspace than the rest of us.

I also can't imagine why anyone would think it's the easy way out. I don't think I could inject myself or cope with the side effects.

It’s not a ‘ridiculous analogy’ at all. I see you haven’t taken in any of the information you were given on the last WLI thread you spouted off on.

On the one hand @Notmyfinesthours I applaud you for saying what so many people think but dress it up as concern or other disingenuous crap. On the other hand I feel really sad for you.

You have made a lifetime of choices for yourself that have clearly led to excellent weight management. However, you now seem to resent your choices because others who made different choices, also having a shot at being slim.

I'm sure you know that you can't stuff your face on weight loss injections and be slim, you still have to make healthy choices and be in a calorie deficit, as that is how weight loss works. So those friends, who were once chubby or fat, will now be eating like you have always done, but instead of that making you pleased, somehow it makes you jealous or envious. If those friends had really liked being fat, I can't help wonder why they are on weight loss medication now. Maybe they didn't like being fat but found dieting impossible, like so many do.

Despite all the advice about eating less and moving and the myriad of diets that have been advocated as "the last diet you'll ever need to do" the WHO reports that obesity has tripled since 1975. Clearly, the 1 in 8 who are obese have been unable to make the choices that you have. People are obese or overweight for many reasons. In my case childhood abuse has led to a dysfunctional relationship with food. I have been on and off diets since I was 11 years old - for over 40 years. Like you I have forgone, restricted and endlessly worried about what I ate, unlike you I have never been able to do that consistently. Instead in the fat bits of my life I have self-loathed, self-harmed and generally hated myself, although you would never have known that if you met me. Are you still feeling resentful?

Mounjaro is helping me to right my relationship with food, to make healthy choices consistently and without the endless torture of food noise, the feeling of denial etc. As a result, I will be healthier and less of a burden on the health services. I will also be slimmer, which is a wonderful side effect in our appearance obsessed time on this planet.

For all the strange souls who think Mounjaro (tirzepatide) is cancer causing, you have to wonder why NICE has approved it for those with T2 diabetes and obesity via the NHS?

For those who think it is 'cheating', I ask if you think you will be 'cheating' if you take HRT to cheat menopause symptoms, paracetamol to cheat a headache, your partner uses Viagra to cheat erectile dysfunction, you took the pill to cheat conception etc. etc. etc! We take plenty of medication for non-life threatening conditions and no one thinks that this is 'cheating', so why on earth would you think it is cheating to take a medication that will help you fight obesity, which is life-threatening!!!!

@Movealongfolksplease and @ObsidianTree Thank you for your concern.

I have a feeling this thread came about at just the right time. It's made me do a bit of thinking over the last hour and I will continue to do so for the next while.

I have always had excuses for why I did or didn't eat x,y,z. An allergy I didn't have was a big one. I've been able to keep my weight low but not scary/typically anorexic looking all my life. So people just assume I'm naturally thin.

I have multiple autoimmune conditions which are often treated with high dose steroids and I panic when I'm on them as I will not allow myself to become overweight, and as you can probably guess my idea of overweight isn't actually overweight. Being honest I'm probably making them worse by not getting good nutrition. I don't eat crap, but I eat larger volumes of veg and fruit to make it look like I'm eating a lot....basically a big plate of low calories.

It's all very very fucked up thinking. The weird thing is DH has a food obsession and disordered thinking the other way. He is constantly hungry and can never stop thinking about food. Whereas I can happily not think about it for days. Which I suppose makes it slightly easier to fool him as I can make him feel he is pushing too much food on a "normal" person......even though I definitely am not. If he didn't have disordered thinking too I would have been caught out before now.

I need to change this, its not healthy, its not helpful, it's something very dangerous I've been doing for far too long. The amount of time I spend thinking about how to reject food is ridiculous.

I'm glad this thread came up today, I do need to speak to someone about this. I will start with DH tonight and go from there.

Resonates with me, I’m heavier than i am normally but within the healthy bmi. Seriously considered lying just to get the meds however am going down the calorie reducing route. I know that thought process though

This is really fascinating.

I wonder what modern-day triggers are causing this wholesale complex change in so many of us? If we look back generations I don't think this was an issue - unless it always was but we didn't have the processed foods we do now to really magnify the issue, and give it the external manifestation of the internal imbalance?

The whole thing is so complex and interesting.

I think you are exactly the sort of person the injections work for.