I’d like to know how that compares to people on other kinds of diets. Cutting out alcohol is like, step 1 of every diet plan. Does it also kind of feel like an advertorial for Ozempic? At...
I’d like to know how that compares to people on other kinds of diets. Cutting out alcohol is like, step 1 of every diet plan.
Does it also kind of feel like an advertorial for Ozempic? At $1200/month, is this truly a threat to alcohol sales or is this more of a pitch piece to attract more off label use by alcoholics who are trying to quit?
Lol, my friend who's a doctor had several "seminars" (sales presentations) for Ozempic and the salespeople just kept saying Ozempic is the solution to all diet-related problems, not just for...
Lol, my friend who's a doctor had several "seminars" (sales presentations) for Ozempic and the salespeople just kept saying Ozempic is the solution to all diet-related problems, not just for alcohol. We really didn't learn anything from the OxyContin sales corruption.
I’d like to offer my own anecdote as someone who is an atypical user of the drug. Context: I do not see a provider, I purchase it as grey market item and DIY my dose, and have for ~1 year. I was...
I’d like to offer my own anecdote as someone who is an atypical user of the drug.
Context: I do not see a provider, I purchase it as grey market item and DIY my dose, and have for ~1 year. I was not obese, but overweight. My usage is controversial, risky, and I do not recommend anyone doing it without seeing a doctor.
I like to experiment with my body, so I started taking it and had no intention on changing my diet or alcohol intake just to see how effective this drug was for weight loss.
I used to be a daily drinker between ~1-5 beers daily. Most days just one or two beers spread apart, like with a meal or in the shower. Some days a few in a row to get a buzz after work. So like, I’m technically an alcoholic, probably, if we look at it objectively.
Ozempic really did put an end to my daily drinking habits. Not because I wanted to or tried to.
I would still open a beer daily for a while. But after a month of dumping out my unfinished beer from the opened can I decided maybe I should only open one if my actual intention is to catch a buzz. It didn’t make me sick or anything, I just…didn’t feel like drinking the whole thing.
So unintentionally, I’ve become exclusively a social drinker and now I opt for a cocktail instead. I still enjoy alcohol greatly, but I probably only drink once a week or so if that. Tolerance has decreased, so I need way less to party as well.
I suspect that those who have a more emotional relationship with alcohol, such as those who need to drink to feel numb might not have the same outcome as me.
So to answer your question… this absolutely could be bait for more off label usage. But can we take this information gained to further research this topic and use it to benefit people? I really hope so.
I'm on ozempic and still have alcohol cravings just fine. This legitimately feels odd to me... Also, I only pay $160 for 6weeks worth here in Australia.
I'm on ozempic and still have alcohol cravings just fine. This legitimately feels odd to me...
Also, I only pay $160 for 6weeks worth here in Australia.
I wish they would do that here in the UK - my wife can't get the normal dose of her diabetes medication because it's being sucked up by people wanting a quick and easy weight loss pill, so she's...
I wish they would do that here in the UK - my wife can't get the normal dose of her diabetes medication because it's being sucked up by people wanting a quick and easy weight loss pill, so she's having to take a lower dose for now and watching her blood sugars remain higher than they should be 🤬
It's only available on prescription here as well - the government just needs to say "no more off label prescribing until the supply issues are sorted"
The solution isn’t to deny it for people who need it for weight loss it’s for the government to remove the monopoly on a drug that’s helping to cure an epidemic of obesity and significantly scale...
The solution isn’t to deny it for people who need it for weight loss it’s for the government to remove the monopoly on a drug that’s helping to cure an epidemic of obesity and significantly scale up production. The government are more than capable of doing that for a national health emergency and I don’t know of one that would qualify more than this.
100% with this comment. I'm on ozempic once weekly and my alcohol cravings are not at all reduced. My a1c is great but if I didn't eat keto and intermittent fast I don't think it would be good for...
100% with this comment. I'm on ozempic once weekly and my alcohol cravings are not at all reduced. My a1c is great but if I didn't eat keto and intermittent fast I don't think it would be good for anything. When I didn't consciously diet I just gained weight while taking ozempic
At $1200/mo, that's prime opportunity for sketchy manufacturers outside the first world to make the chemical and sell it for cheaper. Ignore international IP agreements and provide local chemistry...
At $1200/mo, that's prime opportunity for sketchy manufacturers outside the first world to make the chemical and sell it for cheaper. Ignore international IP agreements and provide local chemistry jobs. Distribute via online pharmacies or medical tourism.
It’s only $1,200 in the US. Novo Nordisk (the official manufacturer and patent holder) are more than willing to sell it for the equivalent of $95 in bulk to other developed countries, and even on...
It’s only $1,200 in the US. Novo Nordisk (the official manufacturer and patent holder) are more than willing to sell it for the equivalent of $95 in bulk to other developed countries, and even on a private prescription I’m seeing prices in the £150 - 250 ($190 - 315) range.
I worked in a primary care practice for a bit. Patients without sufficient co-morbidities to get it covered by insurance could frequently get it though Canadian pharmacies for very close to the...
I worked in a primary care practice for a bit. Patients without sufficient co-morbidities to get it covered by insurance could frequently get it though Canadian pharmacies for very close to the lower price range you mentioned.
To be very clear, i never saw a prescription ordered by these providers that was without significant need. But i did see lots of people asking about or for ozempic/wegovy/semaglutide
I know there are a lot of doubters in this thread, and I think that's fair, especially given the source and clickbait title. I will say this though - Sublocade (a different drug for a different...
I know there are a lot of doubters in this thread, and I think that's fair, especially given the source and clickbait title.
I will say this though - Sublocade (a different drug for a different addiction) saved my life. I was a drug-addicted kid right when the fentanyl started and I was going to die. Suboxone got me off the heroin but it had so many side-effects and highs/lows.
Then Sublocade came out for $1200 a month. Luckily my insurance covered it. I can't even begin to describe what it was like to feel normal. No cravings, no ups and downs. And I stopped taking my Sublocade back in January. So far, the withdrawal (if you can even call it that) has been mild - mild is too strong of a word really.
Anyway, I just hope medicine can continue to improve for people with other addictions.
Edit: to clarify, Sublocade is different than this drug and allegedly treats a different addiction. I'm only trying to say that medication assisted therapy was successful for me and I hope this drug works for alcoholism the way Sublocade works for opioid dependency.
Yeah, it's a totally different drug. I was just saying that sometimes medicines work for addiction and I'm hopeful that this one will work for alcohol.
Yeah, it's a totally different drug. I was just saying that sometimes medicines work for addiction and I'm hopeful that this one will work for alcohol.
Six years clean today. Well, I guess yesterday since it's after midnight for me. I'm doing great. Professional career, house, wife, dogs, and a baby on the way. My life was a fucking mess six...
Six years clean today. Well, I guess yesterday since it's after midnight for me.
I'm doing great. Professional career, house, wife, dogs, and a baby on the way. My life was a fucking mess six years ago. I was going to die and was ready to do so.
I think it would be great if we have a safe drug to combat addiction, but weight loss isn’t just physical, you have to sustain a new lifestyle to stay fit - being able to stick to the plan is also...
I think it would be great if we have a safe drug to combat addiction, but weight loss isn’t just physical, you have to sustain a new lifestyle to stay fit - being able to stick to the plan is also psychological.
Ozempic cuts cravings. It doesn’t burn calories for you. It solves a problem you can control without drugs, your mind is capable of cutting cravings on its own, it just takes more patience and perseverance. In my experience after a few weeks of ignoring stomach grumbles, your stomach grumbles less and you feel less hungry. It picks up again any time you go on a food vacation from your routine, but it just becomes habit to ignore and get used to eating less again.
This is the same logic that people use to dismiss drugs for any mental health illness, and I worry that it comes from the same place as "Why use antidepressants? Did you know exercise helps with...
It solves a problem you can control without drugs
This is the same logic that people use to dismiss drugs for any mental health illness, and I worry that it comes from the same place as "Why use antidepressants? Did you know exercise helps with depression?" More concretely, what makes you think Ozempic and similar drugs are "just physical"? They effect our reward systems, which effects behavior, which in some manner of thinking is just another way of saying "who we are".
It's well-meaning, but can be dismissive of people's actual experiences. The fact is, Ozempic and similar drugs do allow people to be effective in meeting goals that they haven't been able to meet without it. It's not for anyone else to decide whether they "could have".
You’re putting words in my mouth. It may be a similar argument, but it’s not my argument. Antidepressants are used for mental health, there are people that depend on it. No argument. Do drugs need...
You’re putting words in my mouth. It may be a similar argument, but it’s not my argument. Antidepressants are used for mental health, there are people that depend on it. No argument. Do drugs need to be used to address weight loss? Even though mental health and obesity can be related, I think they should still be addressed somewhat separately.
I see that this is dismissive of a lot of experiences, but I don’t mean to dismiss without cause. Maybe there is a healthy mix of taking weight loss medication that addressed cravings while taking antidepressants, but to me at least it seems that addressing the mental health aspect could lead a person to a place where they can move more and eat less, solving the secondary issue.
You definitely picked a tough example where my argument breaks down though. I was thinking of mentally fine yet overweight individuals when I wrote the original comment, because that was my experience.
I didn't intend to put words in your mouth; sorry if I came across that way. My point basically boils down to everybody's experience is different, and some people may be obese due to factors that...
I didn't intend to put words in your mouth; sorry if I came across that way. My point basically boils down to everybody's experience is different, and some people may be obese due to factors that are very difficult or impossible for them to control (even if you can control them). Some, even most, of those factors are in the brain. These drugs effect a person's brain's response to food, thereby changing (generally improving) their ability to eat according to their own goals.
When people say other people don't need drugs to do that, they're essentially saying "I know how hard it is for this person." That's undeniably false. Maybe it's 10x harder for that person to deny their cravings. Maybe you have 10x stronger willpower. We don't and can't know. But to claim it's solvable without medication as a blanket statement is a little bit disrespectful and assumptive.
Beyond that - what's so wrong with using medication? Maybe a leg amputee could get around without a mechanical leg, using a wheelchair or crutches or whatever, but I still celebrate advances in technology that make their lives easier and allow them to be who they want to be. I don't see this as very different.
Some people might be able to to, and good for them, but I want to burn your comment and flush it down the toilet - this horseshit belief on mental health has cost me years of my life. No, it's not...
It solves a problem you can control without drugs, your mind is capable of cutting cravings on its own, it just takes more patience and perseverance.
Some people might be able to to, and good for them, but I want to burn your comment and flush it down the toilet - this horseshit belief on mental health has cost me years of my life. No, it's not just a matter of willpower.
I know mental and physical issues are related, but I thought attacking the problems of losing weight and mental health can still be decoupled to some extent. If the reason for weight gain is...
I know mental and physical issues are related, but I thought attacking the problems of losing weight and mental health can still be decoupled to some extent. If the reason for weight gain is mental health, then obviously that needs to be addressed first and of course that can mean taking a prescription. I’m worried that this drug is just a shortcut to skip mental health and get to weight loss, which can be addressed the old fashioned way of eating less and moving more.
I do admit, I was not thinking of mental health at all when I made the original comment. I was just thinking of my own experience of losing 15kg. I don’t think there’s harm to share that experience, maybe I should have provided more context though for my opinion.
I'm a huge ozempic skeptic. I worry about any drug that makes such drastic claims (or has such claims made about it by the media) and also that people who need it medically can't get it....
Exemplary
I'm a huge ozempic skeptic. I worry about any drug that makes such drastic claims (or has such claims made about it by the media) and also that people who need it medically can't get it. Historically weight loss drugs get approved with insufficient testing and a lot of negative side effects and this "magic drug" raises more concerns with every claim to me.
However, it is clear that the idea of "eat less and move more" is insufficient and operates on a lot more assumptions than we think. Something like 93 percent of people on any given weight loss plan will regain the weight or more after 2 years. Millions of Americans yo yo from diet to diet, eating fewer calories than what is recommended for an active toddler while having to continue to go to work and other daily tasks. And then bodies tend to return to a "norm" point which does not typically get lower after all of that work.
We don't even have a better measure for calorie than "energy released while burning" which is not what happens within our body.
The impact of all that on mental health, while being told by society to just work harder at it, because if you don't you're just lazy, because it's just exercise, is immense. There's even a proposed eating disorder where the fixation is on following diets.
I don't believe that weight deserves near the role that many place on it in our health, but if it does, I've always said they need a solution that actually works, not one where the vast majority fail over and over again or where you get a 5-10 percent benefit at best, which probably doesn't help the people most at need.
The idea that what makes this medication "bad" is that it's taking some sort of easy route instead of working hard is still the same thing that @PuddleofKittens was referencing. It's pretty a toxic and ableist narrative. I have conversations with people who don't want to take mental health meds because they should be able to do it alone. " If your pancreas doesn't make the right hormones it's ok to take them, same with your brain." And this isn't different. If you can't make your own, store bought is fine. I think the evidence is clear that our weight is not a simple subtraction problem but is generally a very complicated systemic issue.
Even as a skeptic, maybe especially as a skeptic, I think this language is harmful framing and bootstrappy and frankly harms more people's mental health than it helps motivate while also being fundamentally false for most people in the real world. It ignores the concerns about whether these are safe uses for a drug already in short supply for diabetics that need it to maintain a safe and steady glucose level in favor of it being "too easy".
I don’t live in the US anymore. I suspect there are more outside factors in the US that someone trying to lose weight can’t address. I walk and bike everywhere, not for fun but because it’s the...
I don’t live in the US anymore. I suspect there are more outside factors in the US that someone trying to lose weight can’t address. I walk and bike everywhere, not for fun but because it’s the easiest way to commute. I know in the US, most people need to drive to work and have less time off, which affects both mental and physical health.
So, take that as my disclaimer - my real world probably is easier to be healthy in from the get-go. For others, day-to-day can be more of an obstacle. I didn’t mean to sound bootstrappy, I recognize that my surrounding makes a lot of things easier for me - I do rely on a good community, friends and environment for healthy development as a person.
Lifestyle is only one singular piece in the rather complicated calculus of our bodies systems. It can be easy to conflate our personal experiences with those of others. But society (and not just...
Lifestyle is only one singular piece in the rather complicated calculus of our bodies systems. It can be easy to conflate our personal experiences with those of others. But society (and not just American society, I see plenty of criticism about fat Americans online from non-Americans) puts 99 percent of the blame on the individual.
And even within the individual we don't actually understand how to help most people lose weight. We have the broad strokes but in individual practice those breakdown for the vast majority. Which means we're probably misinterpreting those broad strokes like my myopic self looking at an impressionist painting without my glasses.
I'm overweight and not trying to lose weight, and yet despite that in the past few months I've in multiple combinations, increased my physical activity, decreased my food intake, essentially did "intermittent fasting" inadvertently, increased my external and internal stress, reducing my appetite and.... this here body ain't shifted a pants size in five years. I'm managing a huge mental workload and physically caring for a paralyzed person. I have been in PT for over a year for some of my own chronic lain. But my body seems quite certain that this is its happy place.
I might be healthier at a different weight, maybe, but my mental health would tank if I added weight loss to my required tasks. And yeah a lot of this is fucked by America's plethora of systemic issues. But anecdotally, I'm way better off if I can just get medical care without being told I need to add yet another "project" and daily stressor (and be hungry and miserable and obsessive about numbers on top of it. ) I'm probably a great candidate for ozempic but I have zero desire to take a second medication that screws with my appetite as it stands.
Sorry for the long posts, I get your intent was not to spread the "just work harder" narrative but I think it's important to look at both the data and the experiences of those pressured by society to "just move more and eat less".
This is an ableist comment. Not everyone is able to just cut cravings or whatever with their minds. There is a reason it's called addiction. Just because you were able to do it without medication...
This is an ableist comment. Not everyone is able to just cut cravings or whatever with their minds. There is a reason it's called addiction. Just because you were able to do it without medication doesn't mean others can. I can't just not want to off myself without my ssri. I can't just pay attention without my adderall.
For people on Tildes that are using Ozempic or any of the similar drugs - how is it working for you? I hear great things but those are probably biased towards the best success cases.
For people on Tildes that are using Ozempic or any of the similar drugs - how is it working for you? I hear great things but those are probably biased towards the best success cases.
It has been absolutely life changing. I'm on Mounjaro, which I see get talked about less but is very similar in it's mechanisms as I understand. I went from diagnosed diabetes with an A1C of about...
It has been absolutely life changing. I'm on Mounjaro, which I see get talked about less but is very similar in it's mechanisms as I understand. I went from diagnosed diabetes with an A1C of about 6.5 after a year or so of regular diabetes medication - which is really not that bad but still definitley in the diabetic range - to 5.3 after 6 months of Mounjaro. That level is outside both the diabetic and pre-diabetic ranges.
I'd lost about 20-30lbs over the course of a year or two, and then lost another 40 in 6 months of Mounjaro. I'm currently around 20lbs overweight by BMI standards which means I'm arguably perfectly healthy weight wise. I don't know if that's ever been true in my entire life before now. It's certainly never been true in my adult life, in which I generally was between 80 and 100 lbs over weight.
On the back of all the excitement of finally feeling capable of being closer to who I've always wanted to be, in the last 4 months or so, I have been able to maintain a workout schedule at 2-3 times a week (these days at the gym, but it started at home), running 3x a week, and doing something physical (even just a walk or a few pushups) every single day. I ran my first 5k about a month ago. I just recently started tracking my food (for the first time in this whole process) because my aesthetic and exercise progress has started to slow down and I'm impatient. I have been a little bit concerned I'm not eating enough generally or enough protein, so I decided to start tracking it. One of the paths I'm considering is reducing my Mounjaro dosage so that I can eat more (!!) in order to continue improving in the gym.
All that to say, I am in the best shape and health of my life, but that's a massive understatement. I'm an entirely new person. And while Mounjaro wasn't the only factor in that it was absolutley an important component.
Really interesting stuff, will be very interesting to see the underlying mechanisms here. There has to be some sort of underlying connection between blood sugar (and therefore diet) and addictive...
Really interesting stuff, will be very interesting to see the underlying mechanisms here. There has to be some sort of underlying connection between blood sugar (and therefore diet) and addictive behaviour/craving. Obviously sugar is addictive, but seeing an effect of a GLP-1 agonist on alcohol cravings is very cool.
I’d like to know how that compares to people on other kinds of diets. Cutting out alcohol is like, step 1 of every diet plan.
Does it also kind of feel like an advertorial for Ozempic? At $1200/month, is this truly a threat to alcohol sales or is this more of a pitch piece to attract more off label use by alcoholics who are trying to quit?
It certainly does, and it's Bloomberg so the chances go up even further.
Lol, my friend who's a doctor had several "seminars" (sales presentations) for Ozempic and the salespeople just kept saying Ozempic is the solution to all diet-related problems, not just for alcohol. We really didn't learn anything from the OxyContin sales corruption.
I’d like to offer my own anecdote as someone who is an atypical user of the drug.
Context: I do not see a provider, I purchase it as grey market item and DIY my dose, and have for ~1 year. I was not obese, but overweight. My usage is controversial, risky, and I do not recommend anyone doing it without seeing a doctor.
I like to experiment with my body, so I started taking it and had no intention on changing my diet or alcohol intake just to see how effective this drug was for weight loss.
I used to be a daily drinker between ~1-5 beers daily. Most days just one or two beers spread apart, like with a meal or in the shower. Some days a few in a row to get a buzz after work. So like, I’m technically an alcoholic, probably, if we look at it objectively.
Ozempic really did put an end to my daily drinking habits. Not because I wanted to or tried to.
I would still open a beer daily for a while. But after a month of dumping out my unfinished beer from the opened can I decided maybe I should only open one if my actual intention is to catch a buzz. It didn’t make me sick or anything, I just…didn’t feel like drinking the whole thing.
So unintentionally, I’ve become exclusively a social drinker and now I opt for a cocktail instead. I still enjoy alcohol greatly, but I probably only drink once a week or so if that. Tolerance has decreased, so I need way less to party as well.
I suspect that those who have a more emotional relationship with alcohol, such as those who need to drink to feel numb might not have the same outcome as me.
So to answer your question… this absolutely could be bait for more off label usage. But can we take this information gained to further research this topic and use it to benefit people? I really hope so.
I'm on ozempic and still have alcohol cravings just fine. This legitimately feels odd to me...
Also, I only pay $160 for 6weeks worth here in Australia.
They’re denying PAs here in the US unless you have diabetes due to an apparent shortage. I tried 2 healthcare systems and was denied. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I wish they would do that here in the UK - my wife can't get the normal dose of her diabetes medication because it's being sucked up by people wanting a quick and easy weight loss pill, so she's having to take a lower dose for now and watching her blood sugars remain higher than they should be 🤬
It's only available on prescription here as well - the government just needs to say "no more off label prescribing until the supply issues are sorted"
The solution isn’t to deny it for people who need it for weight loss it’s for the government to remove the monopoly on a drug that’s helping to cure an epidemic of obesity and significantly scale up production. The government are more than capable of doing that for a national health emergency and I don’t know of one that would qualify more than this.
100% with this comment. I'm on ozempic once weekly and my alcohol cravings are not at all reduced. My a1c is great but if I didn't eat keto and intermittent fast I don't think it would be good for anything. When I didn't consciously diet I just gained weight while taking ozempic
At $1200/mo, that's prime opportunity for sketchy manufacturers outside the first world to make the chemical and sell it for cheaper. Ignore international IP agreements and provide local chemistry jobs. Distribute via online pharmacies or medical tourism.
It’s only $1,200 in the US. Novo Nordisk (the official manufacturer and patent holder) are more than willing to sell it for the equivalent of $95 in bulk to other developed countries, and even on a private prescription I’m seeing prices in the £150 - 250 ($190 - 315) range.
I worked in a primary care practice for a bit. Patients without sufficient co-morbidities to get it covered by insurance could frequently get it though Canadian pharmacies for very close to the lower price range you mentioned.
To be very clear, i never saw a prescription ordered by these providers that was without significant need. But i did see lots of people asking about or for ozempic/wegovy/semaglutide
Sounds like “Big Alcohol hates this one weird trick!”
I know there are a lot of doubters in this thread, and I think that's fair, especially given the source and clickbait title.
I will say this though - Sublocade (a different drug for a different addiction) saved my life. I was a drug-addicted kid right when the fentanyl started and I was going to die. Suboxone got me off the heroin but it had so many side-effects and highs/lows.
Then Sublocade came out for $1200 a month. Luckily my insurance covered it. I can't even begin to describe what it was like to feel normal. No cravings, no ups and downs. And I stopped taking my Sublocade back in January. So far, the withdrawal (if you can even call it that) has been mild - mild is too strong of a word really.
Anyway, I just hope medicine can continue to improve for people with other addictions.
Edit: to clarify, Sublocade is different than this drug and allegedly treats a different addiction. I'm only trying to say that medication assisted therapy was successful for me and I hope this drug works for alcoholism the way Sublocade works for opioid dependency.
Pretty sure sublocade is a completely different drug.
Yeah, it's a totally different drug. I was just saying that sometimes medicines work for addiction and I'm hopeful that this one will work for alcohol.
Six years clean today. Well, I guess yesterday since it's after midnight for me.
I'm doing great. Professional career, house, wife, dogs, and a baby on the way. My life was a fucking mess six years ago. I was going to die and was ready to do so.
I think it would be great if we have a safe drug to combat addiction, but weight loss isn’t just physical, you have to sustain a new lifestyle to stay fit - being able to stick to the plan is also psychological.
Ozempic cuts cravings. It doesn’t burn calories for you. It solves a problem you can control without drugs, your mind is capable of cutting cravings on its own, it just takes more patience and perseverance. In my experience after a few weeks of ignoring stomach grumbles, your stomach grumbles less and you feel less hungry. It picks up again any time you go on a food vacation from your routine, but it just becomes habit to ignore and get used to eating less again.
This is the same logic that people use to dismiss drugs for any mental health illness, and I worry that it comes from the same place as "Why use antidepressants? Did you know exercise helps with depression?" More concretely, what makes you think Ozempic and similar drugs are "just physical"? They effect our reward systems, which effects behavior, which in some manner of thinking is just another way of saying "who we are".
It's well-meaning, but can be dismissive of people's actual experiences. The fact is, Ozempic and similar drugs do allow people to be effective in meeting goals that they haven't been able to meet without it. It's not for anyone else to decide whether they "could have".
You’re putting words in my mouth. It may be a similar argument, but it’s not my argument. Antidepressants are used for mental health, there are people that depend on it. No argument. Do drugs need to be used to address weight loss? Even though mental health and obesity can be related, I think they should still be addressed somewhat separately.
I see that this is dismissive of a lot of experiences, but I don’t mean to dismiss without cause. Maybe there is a healthy mix of taking weight loss medication that addressed cravings while taking antidepressants, but to me at least it seems that addressing the mental health aspect could lead a person to a place where they can move more and eat less, solving the secondary issue.
You definitely picked a tough example where my argument breaks down though. I was thinking of mentally fine yet overweight individuals when I wrote the original comment, because that was my experience.
I didn't intend to put words in your mouth; sorry if I came across that way. My point basically boils down to everybody's experience is different, and some people may be obese due to factors that are very difficult or impossible for them to control (even if you can control them). Some, even most, of those factors are in the brain. These drugs effect a person's brain's response to food, thereby changing (generally improving) their ability to eat according to their own goals.
When people say other people don't need drugs to do that, they're essentially saying "I know how hard it is for this person." That's undeniably false. Maybe it's 10x harder for that person to deny their cravings. Maybe you have 10x stronger willpower. We don't and can't know. But to claim it's solvable without medication as a blanket statement is a little bit disrespectful and assumptive.
Beyond that - what's so wrong with using medication? Maybe a leg amputee could get around without a mechanical leg, using a wheelchair or crutches or whatever, but I still celebrate advances in technology that make their lives easier and allow them to be who they want to be. I don't see this as very different.
Some people might be able to to, and good for them, but I want to burn your comment and flush it down the toilet - this horseshit belief on mental health has cost me years of my life. No, it's not just a matter of willpower.
I know mental and physical issues are related, but I thought attacking the problems of losing weight and mental health can still be decoupled to some extent. If the reason for weight gain is mental health, then obviously that needs to be addressed first and of course that can mean taking a prescription. I’m worried that this drug is just a shortcut to skip mental health and get to weight loss, which can be addressed the old fashioned way of eating less and moving more.
I do admit, I was not thinking of mental health at all when I made the original comment. I was just thinking of my own experience of losing 15kg. I don’t think there’s harm to share that experience, maybe I should have provided more context though for my opinion.
I'm a huge ozempic skeptic. I worry about any drug that makes such drastic claims (or has such claims made about it by the media) and also that people who need it medically can't get it. Historically weight loss drugs get approved with insufficient testing and a lot of negative side effects and this "magic drug" raises more concerns with every claim to me.
However, it is clear that the idea of "eat less and move more" is insufficient and operates on a lot more assumptions than we think. Something like 93 percent of people on any given weight loss plan will regain the weight or more after 2 years. Millions of Americans yo yo from diet to diet, eating fewer calories than what is recommended for an active toddler while having to continue to go to work and other daily tasks. And then bodies tend to return to a "norm" point which does not typically get lower after all of that work.
We don't even have a better measure for calorie than "energy released while burning" which is not what happens within our body.
The impact of all that on mental health, while being told by society to just work harder at it, because if you don't you're just lazy, because it's just exercise, is immense. There's even a proposed eating disorder where the fixation is on following diets.
I don't believe that weight deserves near the role that many place on it in our health, but if it does, I've always said they need a solution that actually works, not one where the vast majority fail over and over again or where you get a 5-10 percent benefit at best, which probably doesn't help the people most at need.
The idea that what makes this medication "bad" is that it's taking some sort of easy route instead of working hard is still the same thing that @PuddleofKittens was referencing. It's pretty a toxic and ableist narrative. I have conversations with people who don't want to take mental health meds because they should be able to do it alone. " If your pancreas doesn't make the right hormones it's ok to take them, same with your brain." And this isn't different. If you can't make your own, store bought is fine. I think the evidence is clear that our weight is not a simple subtraction problem but is generally a very complicated systemic issue.
Even as a skeptic, maybe especially as a skeptic, I think this language is harmful framing and bootstrappy and frankly harms more people's mental health than it helps motivate while also being fundamentally false for most people in the real world. It ignores the concerns about whether these are safe uses for a drug already in short supply for diabetics that need it to maintain a safe and steady glucose level in favor of it being "too easy".
I don’t live in the US anymore. I suspect there are more outside factors in the US that someone trying to lose weight can’t address. I walk and bike everywhere, not for fun but because it’s the easiest way to commute. I know in the US, most people need to drive to work and have less time off, which affects both mental and physical health.
So, take that as my disclaimer - my real world probably is easier to be healthy in from the get-go. For others, day-to-day can be more of an obstacle. I didn’t mean to sound bootstrappy, I recognize that my surrounding makes a lot of things easier for me - I do rely on a good community, friends and environment for healthy development as a person.
Lifestyle is only one singular piece in the rather complicated calculus of our bodies systems. It can be easy to conflate our personal experiences with those of others. But society (and not just American society, I see plenty of criticism about fat Americans online from non-Americans) puts 99 percent of the blame on the individual.
And even within the individual we don't actually understand how to help most people lose weight. We have the broad strokes but in individual practice those breakdown for the vast majority. Which means we're probably misinterpreting those broad strokes like my myopic self looking at an impressionist painting without my glasses.
I'm overweight and not trying to lose weight, and yet despite that in the past few months I've in multiple combinations, increased my physical activity, decreased my food intake, essentially did "intermittent fasting" inadvertently, increased my external and internal stress, reducing my appetite and.... this here body ain't shifted a pants size in five years. I'm managing a huge mental workload and physically caring for a paralyzed person. I have been in PT for over a year for some of my own chronic lain. But my body seems quite certain that this is its happy place.
I might be healthier at a different weight, maybe, but my mental health would tank if I added weight loss to my required tasks. And yeah a lot of this is fucked by America's plethora of systemic issues. But anecdotally, I'm way better off if I can just get medical care without being told I need to add yet another "project" and daily stressor (and be hungry and miserable and obsessive about numbers on top of it. ) I'm probably a great candidate for ozempic but I have zero desire to take a second medication that screws with my appetite as it stands.
Sorry for the long posts, I get your intent was not to spread the "just work harder" narrative but I think it's important to look at both the data and the experiences of those pressured by society to "just move more and eat less".
That's fair. It's a topic I'm sensitive about.
This is an ableist comment. Not everyone is able to just cut cravings or whatever with their minds. There is a reason it's called addiction. Just because you were able to do it without medication doesn't mean others can. I can't just not want to off myself without my ssri. I can't just pay attention without my adderall.
For people on Tildes that are using Ozempic or any of the similar drugs - how is it working for you? I hear great things but those are probably biased towards the best success cases.
It has been absolutely life changing. I'm on Mounjaro, which I see get talked about less but is very similar in it's mechanisms as I understand. I went from diagnosed diabetes with an A1C of about 6.5 after a year or so of regular diabetes medication - which is really not that bad but still definitley in the diabetic range - to 5.3 after 6 months of Mounjaro. That level is outside both the diabetic and pre-diabetic ranges.
I'd lost about 20-30lbs over the course of a year or two, and then lost another 40 in 6 months of Mounjaro. I'm currently around 20lbs overweight by BMI standards which means I'm arguably perfectly healthy weight wise. I don't know if that's ever been true in my entire life before now. It's certainly never been true in my adult life, in which I generally was between 80 and 100 lbs over weight.
On the back of all the excitement of finally feeling capable of being closer to who I've always wanted to be, in the last 4 months or so, I have been able to maintain a workout schedule at 2-3 times a week (these days at the gym, but it started at home), running 3x a week, and doing something physical (even just a walk or a few pushups) every single day. I ran my first 5k about a month ago. I just recently started tracking my food (for the first time in this whole process) because my aesthetic and exercise progress has started to slow down and I'm impatient. I have been a little bit concerned I'm not eating enough generally or enough protein, so I decided to start tracking it. One of the paths I'm considering is reducing my Mounjaro dosage so that I can eat more (!!) in order to continue improving in the gym.
All that to say, I am in the best shape and health of my life, but that's a massive understatement. I'm an entirely new person. And while Mounjaro wasn't the only factor in that it was absolutley an important component.
Really interesting stuff, will be very interesting to see the underlying mechanisms here. There has to be some sort of underlying connection between blood sugar (and therefore diet) and addictive behaviour/craving. Obviously sugar is addictive, but seeing an effect of a GLP-1 agonist on alcohol cravings is very cool.