About a month ago I made a Tik Tok about wegovy & similar ‘weight loss’ jabs. I had seen a lot of people promoting them, giving advice on how to get them prescribed etc. These positive posts all had notable omissions. I wanted to address the missing information.

I am fully behind bodily autonomy & wouldn’t tell people what to do with their bodies. However, I think it is essential that we have all the information before making medical decisions. It’s impossible to consent to treatment if you aren’t informed of all the risks, side effects and so on.

The current information on medications of this type is that weight loss will be most significant in the first 6months. Loss will peak at 1year and regardless of how long you remain on the drug, you will start to regain after that point. Regaining any weight lost is not only a certainty, it will happen fast. In fact the data shows that the pattern of weight loss & gain is similar to other methods of intentional weight loss. You are likely to regain not only the weight lost, but a little extra on top too.

People who have these injections report many gastric symptoms. Extreme nausea, vomiting & diarrhoea sometimes for weeks or months at a time. For others those side effects never settle. Long term use increases the risk of gallbladder problems & pancreatitis. Both are very painful, the latter can be deadly if not promptly treated. It’s also important to note that these injections have not been licensed for more than 2yrs for use in non diabetics. They have also never been prescribed in such high doses. The truth is there are still many unknowns. What we do know for sure it that these medications have serious risks & promise only short term results.

So, why am I going over all this again? Today I got a notification of a comment on that video. Reading it broke my heart.

I understand that sentiment. I used to feel that way. I’d make jokes about smoking instead of eating; saying as long as I was a thin corpse I didn’t care. I know how painful it is to feel that way. What’s worse is I know that many of the professionals who swore an oath to ‘do no harm’ feel the same way. Fat phobia is so ingrained in the medical profession that Drs recommend harmful meds, diets & surgeries to fat patients. Rushed to market, poorly tested and even known to be ineffective interventions. It matters not, because they’d rather we be sick or even dead than fat.

We deserve better. We should be able to consult our Drs when needed without the dreaded weight loss chat. We are entitled to treatments & procedures without having to first agree to dangerous diets. We are as worthy of respect and compassion as any other patient. And, we can demand it.

There are so many amazing resources to help fat patients deal with medical weight stigma. Two of my favourite fat positive medical folks are Dr Asher Larmie & Dr Joshua Wolrich both have written extensively on the topic. I cannot recommend their work enough.

I also support the anti diet work of :

Gillian Wilson

Vinny Welsby

Fat Women of Colour

Dr Diana Gordon

I too am happy to help if I can. I’m not a medical health professional, but have learned many strategies for dealing with anti fat Drs. I’m always delighted to pass these on.

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