My brain fog has been really terrible lately, so here I'm just pounding out some thoughts as I'm thinking about putting together a few more concise pieces. Also, I know that weight loss and glp-1 medications aren't everyone's cup of tea, so please feel free to skip these posts if they aren't for you. I decided to keep more of these in the Truthurts side of things because the way the medical community and our culture treats fat people and lipedema/lipo-lymphedema patients is still a justice issue. Had the medical community taken me seriously at even 140 pounds instead of writing me off as a fat and lazy teenager, we wouldn't even be here talking about these things and I wouldn't be dealing with disability.
The longer that I am on these tirzepatide injections, the more I see this medication becoming such a major part of my healing and improved mobility. It's an interesting time to be alive, and it's interesting to see what a hot topic any of these weight loss injections can be.
The other day, Lizzo posted a video on Instagram, commenting a bit how she's been losing weight by weight lifting and putting herself into a calorie deficit.
The video garnered lots of different reactions, particularly because she included a screenshot from a commenter asking if her weight loss was due to Ozempic or coke (cocaine).
Lizzo interestingly referred to that comment as “ozempic allegations,” suggesting that lots of folks have been assuming her weight loss must be happening from a drug like semaglutide or tirzepatide.
She didn't mention the cocaine allegations.
Honestly, I have so many mixed feelings about these conversations. Lizzo has been at the center of so much unnecessary body criticism, and nobody owes anyone an explanation for their body or any of its changes.
At the same time, Lizzo has been so vocal about living in a fat body, and accepting fat bodies, that it also feels disingenuous for her to pretend that people won't have strong feelings about her weight loss. Furthermore, by hearing a body positive influencer like Lizzo bring up “ozempic allegations” and contrasting them with diet and exercise is equally frustrating to those of us who are trying out these drugs.
If Lizzo is using a drug like Zepbound (tirzepatide) or Wegovy (semaglutide), she wouldn't be the first celebrity to hide it or feel as if she should hide it. Just the fact that most people seem to use the name Ozempic for all weight loss injections has also provided some awkward plausible deniability for those who take something else, like Zepbound or even one of the new drugs currently being trialed by Eli Lilly or Novo Nordisk.
It sucks for everyone that people feel the need to hide a medication that genuinely helps them, but the same thing used to occur more frequently with weight loss surgery, too. People would deny having surgery and claim they had lost their weight “the hard way,” instead—and as if undergoing bariatric surgery isn't hard and complicated.
Unfortunately, there's been a ton of stigma suggesting that these injections are somehow “cheating.” That if a fat person loses weight on one of these drugs, they're cheating “by not doing it the hard way through diet and exercise.” Or that those who lose their weight through diet and exercise without the aid of an injection are the only ones who've “done it the right way.”
That mindset represents a fundamental misunderstanding of the way these medications work, and of course, the way humans become obese. The pervasive mindset today is that fat people become fat through laziness, ignorance, or a lack of willpower, but always (ALWAYS) through irresponsible overeating. Always by being weak and doing something wrong.
I've been saying for a very long time that it really isn't that simple. Surely, the research genuinely shows it's not that simple, but a lot of people don't like to hear that, perhaps because our culture puts so much morality into the conversation. Some people are very angry that these medications even exist because fat people getting thin is supposed to be a very painful endeavor. If thinness becomes easier for more fat bodies to attain, that must somehow cheapen the reward.
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