People who think weight loss injections are cheating

[AuntieDote]

I've seen this viewpoint over multiple threads recently, and I'm just really curious to understand it a bit more because it makes no sense to me whatsoever.

What do you think people using the injections are cheating at?

As in - what's the competition and who are they gaining an unfair advantage over? What do you think the rules of being allowed to lose weight are/ should be?

Is it more important to you that overweight people/ those struggling with obesity lose the weight, become healthier, reduce the burden on the NHS, stop taking up more than their allocated amount of space in the world, or just stop doing whatever it is that upsets people so much about the existence of fat people -- or is it more important that they struggle and suffer whilst doing so?

Or would you secretly prefer them to remain fat so you can feel superior?

Is it that you feel you've worked really hard to either lose weight, keep it off or never put it on in the first place, so nobody else should be allowed to achieve this without the same amount of struggle?

What do you think the weight loss injections actually do, and do you not recognise that those on them are also doing all the usual things people who are trying to lose weight e.g. modify their eating, exercise etc? Does it not count that they're doing these things because it's made easier in some ways by the drug?

What types of weight loss support or tools are not 'cheating'? e.g. I used hypnosis once and it worked for a bit, to the point that I felt pretty much the same way I do with the injections i.e. reduction in food noise and compulsion to snack etc. It didn't last anything like as long, but it worked for a time - was that cheating?

Would it still be cheating if they weren't as effective as they are?

FWIW, I really couldn't care less if people think I'm cheating - who cares? Who does it impact only me and my bank balance? If someone said here, press this button and you'll be a healthy BMI overnight and stay there forever I'd press it with both hands and not give a shit about how anyone felt about it.

But it's just the logic of it that baffles me - I've never seen it as a competition and have never felt like getting to or being a healthy weight only counts if it's done in a certain way - I suppose I'm not much interested in what size anyone else is or what they do to get that way, so I can't imagine for a second ever thinking another person was 'cheating' - only ever being happy for them if they're happy and hopefully healthy too.

Weight is a complex issue. People with very similar diets can be very different weights. I watched an interesting documentary about identical twins, one quite overweight, one very skinny. They did eat differently, but after all the medical tests they discovered that the skinny twin had a much healthier gut microbiome than the other. There's loads of research in this area atm and I think that eventually many cases of obesity will be treated with 'good' bacteria.
My two sons eat very similarly and are a similar height. Not twins, 2 years difference in age. One is literally twice the weight of the other. I really feel for him.

@Movinghouseatlast, what a psychologist you must be to have analyse my feelings, motivations and emotions in such detail without knowing me.

I could apply the same psychology the other way around. You say I'm jealous, I'm starting to wonder if obese people losing weight easily actually have a desire to see others being jealous of them because it must be nice to think they are envied for once!

It's pathetic isn't it? No I'm really not jealous. I dont need to compare myself to others to decide how happy I am about myself. I set my own expectations and I assume others do to.

If your OH can eat all he wants without having to restrain himself, then he is a lucky man. My sister is the same. That doesn't mean that slim people don't indeed rely on willpower to be so. I don't need a trophy, I don't think it makes me better than others. Why such defensiveness to pout out the undisputable, some people do have more willpower than other, just as others are more patient, or more studious, or more tolerant or more fun. None of these qualities means that others are the exact opposite or that it makes anyone more worthy.

Those of us on these medications start low and build up, lose the weight, and are encouraged in the process to change the things we eat to a higher protein/fat diet and to increase exercise levels. As we titrate down the doses after reaching target, I infer that the lifestyle changes we have made should support continued increased natural production of GLP1 so that as we reduce the dosage to zero, we have retrained our bodies to secrete it more efficiently. Now, many may ask, why not simply exercise and eat this way from the start and bypass the medications? I infer that obviously if you are carrying 5-12 excess stone as many of us were at the start of the journey, that it would be next to impossible to a) exercise to sufficient levels to get the beneficial post-exercise secretion levels and b) be able to eat the correct quantity of fats/proteins etc to also maintain the needed calorie deficit to do the same
Frankly, if that comes to be true, then I think this is a sensational drug. If it could mean that ultimately, anyone who suffers from unhealthy thoughts about food, whatever their current weight, can take that drug and manage it to the point that all can come off it and find ourselves fully able to manage our food intake, it will have a massive positive impact on all aspect of public health and personal happiness.

Sadly, I don't believe that will be the outcome because I don't believe it is solely about the hormone imbalance, but I genuinely really hope to be proven wrong soon.

Weigh loss injections are a tool to help people achieve their desired weight, people use tools all the time, washing machines, cars, vacuums, treadmills etc….

Women are more than objects, and weight shouldn’t be such a defining thing as it is in our society, but if people want to use weight loss injections to give them support in achieving a healthier weight, then literally why not?

I don’t see people judging women for using a washing machine rather than taking their clothes to the local river to wash them using blocks of carbolic soap!

I think there are lots of wonder drugs. Antibiotics in the age of Fleming. Insulin - diabetics died before its discovery. Smallpox vaccine, most vaccines, actually. The contraceptive pill paved the way for women to have control over their fertility in a user-friendly way. Statins fall into this category. The recent advances in HIV medication also. Yes, everything has a potential side effect but when the corollary is death or uncontrollable childbirth, I’d classify them as wonder drugs. The scientific establishment seems excited by the new class of weight loss drugs so in time, they may be wonder drugs too! We simply don’t understand risk and the statistics behind it in this country.

because I don't believe it is solely about the hormone imbalance

I don’t think anyone believes it is solely about this- nothing biological is ever only one factor. But if this wasn’t a central/ primary issue then the drug wouldn’t be so effective for so many people in facilitating weight loss,

They're also as Insulin to diabetics. That's their main purpose. 😬

This post is absolutely brilliant, hit the nail on the head!!! The only people that have negative comments are either jealous because they can’t afford to do it or because it wasn’t available when they went through a weight loss journey. On the other side you often see a naturally skinny person whose quite pretty often can’t stand their overweight friend losing weight and getting attention - usually insecure. Jealous jealous jealous

I don't begrudge anyone do using but do resent I can't get them with an overweight BMI yet people get prescribed them until they reach a healthy BMI.

Does anyone actually believe that naturally skinny people are jealous of obese and overweight friends who lose weight. Why do people tell themselves this.

I hear you. I guess the thing is, at 5ft 3, the overweight category only spans about 2 stone. If they prescribes within that, they could be giving a long term medication to someone who potentially only has 1/2 a stone to lose.
It's rubbish, but I guess there has to be a cut off for prescribing, but if you started as obese, it's daft to stop when you're not at a healthy weight. :/

So. That post I made yesterday about the fact that I feel that clinicians will soon begin to explore prescribing these medications for non weight loss purposes, including mood, ADHD etc?

Today’s, Telegraph:

Could Ozempic ‘microdosing’ boost brain health and fight cancer?

www.thetimes.com/article/f9d5b3fb-159d-487e-904a-de770494b7c9?shareToken=31f5d6547858f99ba124c07b2fb5b8a9

But it seems lots of them are? Lots of obese people seem to find that they lose a lot of friends after losing a lot of weight 🤷🏼‍♀️

Well its hard not to believe it happens when the same people who enjoy telling you you're fat and unhealthy, go on to tell you you're getting skinny the wrong way.
I mean, it's hard to believe that racism or sexism happens until it actually happens to you...

That’s really interesting but it’s not about mood?

This is Mumsnet, nothing would surprise me...

Incidentally I have also noticed that my desire for alcohol has massively decreased since starting, but also I did have one night where I drank a lot at a party and had really bad side effects the next day so that equally could be what’s putting me off

😂

Well yes, people have stated on this thread that they are slim.because they practice self denial/ iron willpower and so resent people who become slim without the pain they go through to stay slim. They've never been fat but the effort required has been huge.

No. I think the actual point has got lost in the vitriol of this thread. And others like it.

What this is about is group dynamics and social hierarchies. All relationships are transactional: we fulfil roles and functions within individual relationships and within social groups. Look at the stereotypes of these which form the fodder of teen horror movies: the jock, the queen bee, the nerd. The sense of who we are and the function we perform evolves over our lifetimes and bleeds into friendship groups.

Slim, pretty girls subconsciously absorb the benefits of ‘pretty privilege’, the fact that people attach more weight to their opinion, subconsciously deem them more successful etc. This operates because other people within the social groups are less pretty, deemed to be less successful… so when a troubled, depressed, fat friend no longer performs this role - because she is now optimistic, happy, active and attractive - it displaces the slim pretty friend. It’s not about jealousy, or anything consciously malicious, it’s about the balance of relationships being off-kilter. With any luck it will re-balance, but often it doesn’t. Only time will tell in OP’s case.

I said in my previous post and referenced ‘non weight loss purposes, including mood, ADHD etc.’

No need to be a jerk.

And, damn, it was The Times 🤦🏽‍♀️ [just in case someone wants to pick holes in that, too].

Some people have said that, yes but I was referring to naturally skinny / thin people. Those putting in a huge amount of effort aren’t naturally skinny.

No need to be a jerk

😡

This is an interesting article about the relationship between mental health and weight loss drugs. https://www.statnews.com/2024/02/19/weight-loss-drugs-glp1s-wegovy-suicide-risk-mental-health/
Interestingly the article - written by an endocrinologist - refers to these drugs as medications that treat the physical aspects of weight management, but also emphasises that there is an impact/ relationship with mental health, although these impacts are still unclear/ being explored.