Why are we not being vocal about the miracle of weight loss jabs. ?

[AboutVattime]

I started Mountjaro in April at 15 stone 10
I am now 11 stone . Which is my goal weight for my 5'10 frame. I have maintained that for 2 months having started regular exercise that I really enjoy - as well as ZOE healthy eating /cooking which I enjoy equally.

When people say to me 'Wow ! You look amazing (I'm not daft - they mean you don't look fat anymore) .. how have you done it . I am truthful and say 'fat jabs' .. and expand if they don't understand.

However , I have noticed on all the gazillion threads in here about weight loss injections, people are reticent to be honest . .. "my DH knows but haven't told anyone else " .. is a common remark . But WHY ???

Obesity is a life threatening condition. Like Dementia , cancer , liver failure etc etc .. if anyone had one of those conditions and found a drug to help , would they keep quiet or shout it from the bloody roof tops . ?

Or is the old adage true . Fat is a feminist (female) issue ? and we need to pretend it isn't ?

I think this is really true. I am skinny and have pretty much always been and the honest answer is that I DO have trouble understanding why other people can’t stay at a healthy weight because it’s never been difficult for me. Objectively I know the reasons and understand part of my ability to stay healthy is luck (can afford food, not disabled, have time to cook and think properly about making sure every day I have a balanced diet etc). i think my judgment towards other people stinks but if I am honest with myself, is IS there.

So you judged her for being overweight and now judge her for losing weight?

Losing a significant amount of weight will change how your face looks. That's a fact.

I think because there is a way to lose weight without unnecessary chemicals with unknown long-term side effects, so maybe people feel a bit guilty knowing this and still taking the jabs. My sister is taking it, has put on a huge amount of weight in just 2 years, yet even though she's taking it she's still eating shit and not exercising. So I think she thinks it's just a magic injection and she's somehow cheating the system and having her cake and eating it too (literally). So I can see why she wouldn't want to be super open about it.

I would honestly just be happy if they could be talked about neutrally like most other medications and people didn't feel like they had to hide it away from people because of ill informed judgement and jealousy⁸, nor feel responsible for divulging their medical information if they didn't wish to.

The truth is it isn't miraculous for everyone and I think advertisement and management of this medication needs to be done properly and the system could be improved upon nor is it the devil's work that causes short medium and long term damage in everyone. For some it quite literally has been the missing piece to a disease most fail to recognise as anything other than a lack of willpower.

Media reporting will never not have a bias though, so I am asking for too much for the information freely available and mass publicised to be factual and neutral.

They have been used for years for diabetic people. Not non diabetics. That's very new.

You know what, I see both sides of this argument.

I used to be slim until 2022, then gradually put on weight to technically reach obesity in 2024. I fully admit I became fat of my own doing - I was in the process of taking my employer to an employment tribunal and stressed. I stopped leaving the house and exercising, plus I ate more and it wasn’t healthy food. There is no hormonal imbalance or other health conditions at play, aside from stress destroying my willpower.

As I was technically obese, I managed to get a Mounjaro prescription above board, although I managed to get my BMI to “overweight” very quickly. I’m now 5kg away from a healthy weight, less than 3 months later.

So yes I understand that eating less and exercising would have eventually sorted my obesity, and that it’s totally possible for me to have done that without medication. But the truth is I didn’t have the willpower - work destroyed my mental health and I wasn’t in a position to take control of willpower with my personal stressors. I wasn’t sleeping properly etc. The injections have taken one thing off my plate, so I have 1 less burden to carry around, and I’ve been able to get my life together. I’m exercising again, and I am eating much less anyway due to the injections. So I definitely think they have a place in society. I haven’t had side effects either.

That's your sister though.

Take a look at the threads on here. It's full of women lifting each other up to change their lives.

I bought them, reread the side effects and threw them in the bin tbh.

I was overweight enough to qualify for them but I've lost weight successfully in the past. For me the small print like increased risk of thyroid cancer etc was just not worth it. I know these things are a balance so the net benefit health wise outweighs the risks of using these drugs but I think it's better they're kept for a last resort.

Also my problems with over eating and interoceotion mean I'd probably put it all back on again as soon as I stopped so I'm focussing on building muscle and creating healthier habits, learning to eat intuitively.

I am so happy that so many people have found a solution that works for them.

He is who they were designed for. People don't take heart meds if they don't have heart problems? I don't understand it at all.

WandaFishy99 I have an appointment in about 10 days to find out!!

Except they’re also licensed to treat obesity, not just diabetes.

Medications can be used for many different health conditions. Viagra was a blood pressure medication ...

I'm one of a very small number of people prescribed semaglutide for weight loss by the nhs.

GLP1 medications have been used for over 20 years for diabetes. The risk to health from obesity is much larger, so large that the nhs will find wegovy as a weight loss medication as it is cheaper than dealing with the consequences of obesity.

Obesity is simply not about being lazy, or eating too much. It's the starvation you feel if you have not eaten for 3-4 hours, it's the binge eating in the evenings because you feel ashamed, the secrecy of your weight and your diet.

I was SO ignorant to all of this until my life came crashing down, I nearly died in my kitchen and ended up with 2 emergency heart surgeries. I was pumped full of steroids to save my life, and I absolutely ballooned. I put on 7 stone in 4 years. And the bigger I got, the hungrier I was. There was no way diet alone was going to work for me. I'm so grateful that I have this as an option rather than having surgery.

Don't be so quick to judge others, because as I found, unless you have walked in their shoes, you really have no clue about their suffering.

Yep. I know a single father who just had to fill in a questionnaire. Pay. Got sent a drug to pump into his body. No blood pressure, heart rate checks. Nothing. Madness. Worries me to death that he is able to access this drug and self administer when he is the only parent to this child. 😞

And I think some people believe people who take the jab are eating takeaways every day and it's somehow magically melting the fat away even though they are eating 3000 calories a day or something.

I'm on MJ and I probably eat more healthily than 90% of the people on this thread! I haven't had a cake or chocolate or sweets or anything like that in five weeks. I don't snack. I don't eat UPF and I don't drink alcohol. I eat lean proteins, eggs, vegetable, fruit etc. MJ just makes it easy to eat the right amount of those things because I feel full after a 'normal' portion.

I'm eating around 1200 calories a day, which I've done plenty of in the past, but the willpower to eat 1200 calories a day for weeks on end when you feel ravenous the entire time is more than I possess. I am a horrible person when I'm hungry. MJ lets me eat my 1200 calories and feel like I am satisfied.

I've lost almost 20lbs and it's been easy, even pleasurable. I haven't feel deprived, I've eaten more healthily than ever before because I am not being driven by hunger and cravings, I can choose what to eat based on what will nourish me.

I don't know what will happen if I reach goal weight. I like to think that it's easier to eat like a slim person when you are a slim person but I'm open to the possibility that the jabs might have to be a part of my life for the foreseeable.

Yes, here we go with the 'ill and drawn'

Losing weight, loses fat from your body, including your fatty fat face. I only had 'cheekbones' because it was all fat. Now there is none

Thats how I would have looked without putting on all the weight in the first place because I now look like my dad who has never been overweight!

In fact on a bad day I look like my grandad!

No, but people take heart meds for erectile dysfunction,

People take aspirin as a blood thinner.

People take the contraceptive pill for acne or period pains.

People take codeine for coughs.

You don’t ’understand’ because you don’t want or because you’re stupid - I put my money on the former.

Plenty of drugs act on many different conditions.

I don’t look ill and drawn now I’ve lost the weight, I look exactly like I did before I put on the weight, just older!

Tbh I do think it's a cheat, and a dangerous one at that. I'm 5"4 and a size 14/16 after having two babies via c section, I hate being the size I am compared to what I was. But I'm not willing to add unnecessary chemicals that I don't NEED into my body just because I WANT to be slimmer. I think there will be many people who just put the weight on when they stop the jabs because they go back to old habits.
So yes I will take 6-12 months of healthy eating, plenty of walking and exercise to go back to what I was over injections, will it be harder and take longer - yes, but will it be easier to maintain in the long run, safer, healthier - also yes. Easy decision for me.

@Flopsy145 that's your own bias and clearly you've ignored the experience of women on this thread who are on these injections.

And that’s a perfectly valid decision to make for yourself.

They do take heart meds (insert any other meds, Im using that as an example) for non heart issues, if they happen to treat those other issues as well.

Lots of medications have several uses and treatments.

The premise is the same

There are over 1100 different genes that have been identified so far that are linked to obesity, most of which affect appetite, food seeking behaviours, satiety after eating and compulsion to eat

So.not a genetic predisposition to obesity but a genetic predisposition to overeat. I imagine the number of naturally slim people who can take or leave food is very small. Most of us have to control our appetite. I've had an eating disorder most of my life - I was bulimic/anorexic as a teenager, had a complex relationship with food in adulthood and now, in my 60s, I still have to practice strict self control around food. Sometimes I totally lose control (emotional eating - I had a thread about it) but mostly I control it. It's not easy, it's hard, so sorry but I don't buy that nobody is responsible for being obese.

You don’t have to ‘buy’ anything, your opinion doesn’t change the science.

Ah the c word: 'cheat'

That's what a lot of it comes down to, really. An ingrained belief that people are fat because of a moral failing and to do anything to change it other than what is deemed acceptable is cheating. I'm not sure who exactly is being cheated, but that word always comes up on these threads.

It has to be hard work or it's cheating.

But why?