Remember that feeling when you were a teenager, of finding out that your group of friends had hung out without you over the weekend? Or an end of year party was happening and you hadn’t got an invite. That feeling of being left behind, of fun memories being made from which you were sorely excluded? Later, it would be dubbed FOMO, or the “fear of missing out”.
At 41, I don’t get social FOMO anymore. I’m more likely to have JOMO (the joy of missing out). But FOMO is the only way I can explain the complex feeling of realising that more and more people around me are quietly taking GLP-1’s and losing weight fast – while I remain the same.
An estimated 1.6 million adults in England, Wales and Scotland used drugs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro to help lose weight between early 2024 and early 2025, according to a study by UCL researchers earlier this year. Of course, the number could be even higher, as private prescriptions are not public information.
Certainly, over the past year I have noticed it becoming a big part of conversations amongst friends and colleagues. Everyone knows at least two or three people who are taking it. And those people couldn’t hide it if they wanted to: they look different.
I don’t judge anyone who has taken a GLP-1 to lose weight, and I don’t think they should hide it. I don’t think there should be any shame in it. My issue is actually that I feel like I should be on it too. I feel left out of all the body transformations I am witnessing. I feel envious of the weight loss I see everywhere. Anyone who has ever carried extra weight has probably felt the same.
I gained a significant amount of weight over several years, around three stone, mostly thanks to having two babies, in 2022 and 2024. Prior to that, in 2018, I discovered that I had an underactive thyroid which had also led to weight gain. Two years have passed since my last baby, and my thyroid levels have settled to their lowest since I was diagnosed and, crucially, I’ve returned to the gym for the first time with any regularity in four years.
As a result, I have lost weight: just under two stone. But, it’s been a slow and arduous process, particularly for someone whose metabolism is working against them for various reasons (an underactive thyroid mixed with midlife metabolic function is no joke).
I was a size 12 at my thinnest. I am now between a size 14 and 16, having peaked at a size 18 after my babies. During the wave of body positivity that fleetingly enveloped social media around five years ago, I probably would have felt OK with how I looked. Instead, “skinnytok” is trending, celebrities and influencers are shrinking, and it feels as though everyone is celebrating smaller bodies in the way they were when I was a teenager in the early noughties.
And yet, I still haven’t caved and signed up for GLP-1 to speed my weight loss along. Why? There are a few reasons: the first is cost. A private Mounjaro prescription, for example, can range from £120 to £350 per month depending on your dosage. With two small children and nursery bills to pay, plus the fact I recently left full time employment to go freelance, adding a significant monthly bill to our cost of living doesn’t seem feasible.
It’s not just the money, though. I am uneasy with the thought of taking medication I don’t strictly need, although I am also aware that the health risks of being overweight are not to be ignored. While people who are on the drugs generally rave about them (I would do too if I’d dropped a significant amount of weight), I have heard horror stories about hair loss, organ malfunction and “Ozempic face”, the term to describe the effect fast weight loss can have on your facial structure.
‘If you are not naturally thin, your entire consciousness can be tied up with people’s perceptions of your size’ (Photo: Gavin Crilly)I suppose there’s also some stubbornness. I have decided I want to do this the “old fashioned way”, which shouldn’t feel as revolutionary as it does. I enjoy going to the gym and eating the right food, and how that combination makes me feel after years of putting myself last while I was either growing babies or breastfeeding them. While I have always eaten healthily, I did often resort to comfort food when I was exhausted, and couldn’t find the time or the energy to exercise when they were both very little.
I feel like I am in the minority, however. I am seeing people I know and online that I used to think were around my size suddenly dropping weight. And formerly “curvy” (I hate that word, actually) celebrities looking thinner and thinner. It makes me feel like I’m a real schmuck, plugging away having salads for every meal when it could all be so gloriously simple.
Despite my weight being absolutely no business of anyone else’s, I also find myself feeling the need to explain to people why I haven’t turned to GLP-1s. When you are overweight, even if it’s only slightly, you feel as though it’s the top of everyone else’s minds – even though it’s unlikely anyone has spent any time considering it whatsoever.
If you are not naturally thin, your entire consciousness can be tied up with people’s perceptions of your size. Even when I was comparatively slim, in my teens, twenties and early thirties, I was convinced I was fat. I spent years worrying about being bigger than my slim friends, trying to hide myself in photographs and hating my thighs. Working at women’s magazines for much of my career certainly didn’t help: I was once scoffed at by a fashion editor when I asked if any brands might lend me a dress for a big event. A size 12, she laughed, was unlikely.
Now, I am much bigger than I was back then, but I think the reason I have decided to do things my own way is because I have gained something in motherhood, and in my forties, I never thought I would: a sense of acceptance in who I am. Would I like to be thinner? Yes. Is it taking over my whole life? No.
My children have silenced some of that self-obsessed noise, I’m far more obsessed with them. That’s not to say I don’t still hear it, and I am dedicated to losing weight and becoming healthier. I’m just trying very hard to do it in a way that feels realistic and maintainable for me. I suppose GLP-1s will always be there if I totally lose my momentum. For now, I want to see how far I can get on my own – I just need to put the weight loss FOMO to one side.
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