It doesn't count if you didn't suffer for all to see
Taking myself out of dynamic I didn't know I was in
“The distinguishing characteristic between losing weight the ‘right’ way and losing weight the ‘wrong’ way is how much people see you suffering. People get very resentful of the idea that anyone, but particularly fat people, could become thin or lose weight without suffering. How much suffering and work went into it? If suffering doesn’t happen, we treat it as if it doesn’t count. Losing weight is a measure of how tenacious you are, of your work ethic. And taking a weight loss medication is skirting your responsibility … to torture yourself.” ~ Aubrey Gordon speaking with Matt Bernstein of the A Bit Fruity podcast, episode: The Celebrity Ozempidemic
If you haven’t noticed, I want to point out that while I am writing about being on a medication that is prescribed for weight loss, I am not writing about how much I weigh or how much I’ve gained and lost over the years, or in the past five months.
And that’s because for me (this time around), this isn’t about proving something to others or performing for them.
It’s not about how much suffering and work went into it. Because to be honest, there’s been no suffering and not a lot of work, at least not the kind of suffering and work people expect: rigorously tracking calories and macros and constantly tweaking to optimize every calorie, crushing it at the gym, having the discipline to resist the urge to binge, eliminating all sugar and flour, “go hard or go home,” “choose your hard,” etc.
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Taking Zepbound has taken me out of an either-or dynamic that I didn’t know I was in:
Over the course of my life, in regards to my body, I was EITHER…
...a self-loathing, binge eater who couldn’t control herself, sitting on the sidelines of life, shunned and invisible…
OR…
...a fat-phobic, calorie-counting, restrictive, keto/paleo/intermittent fasting/[insert diet of your choice here], “crush it at the gym” badass...
OR…
...an anti-diet-culture, health-at-every-size, body-positivity, self-acceptance activist.
All of those versions of me were living “in reaction” to others…performing for others to gain their approval and to belong somewhere. That dynamic kept me infantilized…always trying to prove that I wasn’t lazy, stupid, and unmotivated and always trying to explain myself.
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These words from Dr. Lucy McBride sum it up well:
“In essence, [these medications], when appropriately prescribed to the appropriate person, can elegantly help them more effectively engage in the process of 1) self-awareness 2) acceptance and 3) agency.
And for people struggling with obesity, this path commonly includes an unfair degree of suffering. Suffering (specifically, shame and self-doubt) is part of life, however when the suffering itself becomes its own barrier to better health, it’s time to address it (quite literally) head first.
Even if [these medications] did not elicit weight loss, it would be, to me, the most important pharmacological intervention of our time because of its ability to help people experience a sense of agency. Its pharmacology is so elegant that the mechanism of action alone is worthy of discussion.
"In other words, [these medications] not only reduce emotional burden, they liberalize precious brain space that can be spent thinking about other, more pleasant and relevant things. That reallocation of brain space is the very definition of agency."
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I will share that as of today, 23 weeks after I started taking Zepbound, I have lost 20% of my starting weight and “Ozempic face” isn’t an issue for me, even as a 61-year-old post-menopausal woman.
The top photo is me on my 60th birthday in November of 2022 and the bottom photo is me a week ago.