Despite losing 74kg in my twenties through sheer willpower – even undergoing surgery to remove excess skin – I eventually regained most of the weight. The pattern was relentless; periods of extreme restriction followed by overwhelming compulsion around food.
While therapy and seeing a dietitian provided insights, they couldn’t address the fundamental issue, which was my body’s intense, addictive response to certain foods. The advice to avoid labelling foods as “good” or “bad” felt hollow when consuming them triggered days or months of obsessive behaviour.
Going to the GP
A few years ago, I found a new GP as my weight was my main health issue, and they said I should try running. I was so overweight that even just walking put a lot of stress on my knees. I realised the gap in her understanding of my situation. So, I decided to find a different GP. I told her on the first appointment that I was looking for a GP who understood the complexities of being overweight and how I wanted help, but willpower alone doesn’t work for me.
Rather than the familiar, “calories in, calories out” lecture, she talked about the biochemical reality of food addiction and how many old-school doctors have a very dated view on weight. She said she was very sorry I had gone through that and that there was lots of evidence that, through chemical imbalances, hormones and genes, some people’s bodies are destined to be overweight. I went through the list of things I had tried in the past: food restrictions, exercise, and therapy. She suggested I try Ozempic. She thought it could be a tool to interrupt the addictive cycle that was controlling my eating. She said it wasn’t a magic bullet, but it might mentally free me up enough to then implement things I had learned from seeing a dietitian in the past. She also mentioned that if I lost some weight, my knees would feel better, which in turn would make exercise more feasible.
The transformation was immediate and profound. Within days, food no longer dominated my thoughts and was no longer the only way to celebrate a good day or comfort me on a bad day. My waking thoughts weren’t hijacked by an inventory of what was in my kitchen. The constant mental noise around eating just stopped.
The realisation
The mental relief revealed something crucial. My struggle wasn’t a character flaw or failure of willpower… it was chemistry. This realisation lifted years of accumulated shame and self-hatred. What I’d internalised as personal weakness was a physiological imbalance, no different from a broken leg needing a cast.
This understanding brought unexpected anger. I grieved the decades of self-punishment, the energy wasted on self-blame, the opportunities missed while consumed by self-consciousness and fear of ridicule. The stigma surrounding medications like Ozempic felt particularly cruel, with judgement directed at people seeking treatment for a medical condition.
“It was a reminder of how unhealthy our culture is about the idea of beauty and success.”
My experience compelled me to speak openly about my treatment to anyone who would listen. Every dismissive comment about, “taking the easy way out” reinforced my conviction that sharing my story matters. The narrative that weight management is purely about willpower isn’t just wrong, it’s harmful to people struggling with food addiction. It’s like telling an alcoholic to just stop drinking.
Feeling grateful
Retrospectively, my intuition had always suggested that my relationship with food was fundamentally different from many others. In every other area of life, I demonstrate resilience and self-discipline. The difference wasn’t moral, it was biological.
Today, I’m profoundly grateful that drugs like Ozempic exist. Ozempic didn’t just help me lose weight, it freed me from a prison I’d been trapped in since childhood. I have told friends and family about my experience, which in turn has also helped some of them get medication for their own struggles. It has allowed me to develop a relationship with food based on joy, socialising and nourishment, rather than compulsion.
