Beth Rubin liked to be thin. And after losing her 40 pounds for about 14 years, she enjoyed her slender figure.
“My happiest day,” a recently retired Wall Street executive told Post, “that was when I handed out’big’clothes.”
Then a pandemic occurred. Her calorie intake has increased and her weight has increased again. After gaining 10 pounds of her weight, Rubin knew she had to do something — and the traditional diet stopped working.
“In December I said I needed help from a weight loss doctor,” Rubin, 59., Said. “I knew what I had to do [to lose weight] But I was always hungry. My doctor told me that my body is looking for calories. “
With the advice of doctor Dr. Catherine H. Sanders, Rubin turned to a new strategy: the diabetes drug Ozenpic. It contains semaglutide, a compound targeted at people with obesity and type 2 diabetes, but is increasingly being used by people who need to lose just £ 5 or £ 10. Included in both the weight loss drug Wegoby and the injectable Ozenpic. The former has been shown to help reduce weight by 15% and the latter by about 10%.
Semaglutide is “a hormone produced while we eat. Dr. Saunders, co-founder of Intellihealth, a company focused on medicated management of obesity, told The Post:” It’s people hungry. It reduces the feeling, helps you get full faster, and stays full longer, but that’s when we’re not really full. “
And it can be expensive. Dr. Abe Malkin, founder of the Los Angeles Concierge MD, has seen people pay Wegovy $ 1,300 a month. He understands its charm.
“Some patients in LA want to look good and feel good. This is a way to maximize profits when starting a weight loss program,” he told the post. On the other side, Dr. Malkin added: Effective for people, regardless of weight, whether they need to lose 5 or 50 pounds. “
Officially, Wegovy is recommended for patients with an obesity index of 27 or higher and at least one weight-related condition.
But there are pitfalls. When you stop, you will feel hungry again. So for those who want to stay slender, it could be a lifetime of $ 1,300 dollars out each month. This explains Dr. Sanders as “forbidden for most people.”
Fortunately for Rubin, who has a family history of diabetes, her insurance company covers Ozenpic. Its effectiveness by self-injecting “in my tummy” every week has surpassed her most barbaric dreams.
“I wanted to lose £ 10 — and I ended up losing 19,” Rubin said, who started taking the drug last December. “I haven’t been so bright since my early twenties. People call me” skinny “, and I haven’t been called” skinny “for a long time. It is a positive reinforcement in itself. “
However, taking medications can cause complications. Rubin reports that he suffered from acid reflux disease and heartburn for the first 5-6 weeks. Moreover, the food wasn’t very good. First, Rubin told the post when the effect was most noticeable. I wasn’t hungry at all. I had to eat slowly and watch the meal. My doctor told me that if I eat too much, I will get sick.
“There were times when I ate a little too much and felt sick.”
Evidence of the effectiveness of what is called a “miracle drug” is the fact that Rubin was unable to gain weight under normal conditions. Five weeks after she started taking Ozenpic, Rubin and her husband traveled to Egypt. Rubin says she always gains weight during her vacation, and she told the nurse practitioner in Dr. Sanders’ office about it. “This time it’s different,” the nurse predicted.
She was right. Rubin’s weight was stable. Maybe she thought, it had to do with Egypt not being exactly a foodie’s destination. But recently, she went to one of the most food-rich places in the world.
“I was in Paris just two weeks ago,” Rubin said. “I ate bread every day, but I still didn’t gain weight.”
But she ate Less than Bread than usual: “If you had food on the plate and you had enough, I stopped. I actually lost half a pound in Paris.”
However, there are people who want non-obese people to fire Wegoby. It has been reported that access to new users is restricted due to supply chain issues and the popularity of medicines. The manufacturer Novo Nordisk (which manufactures both Wegovy and Ozempic) admits on its website: [which is the starter dose] It will start as early as May and will continue until the second half of 2022, when supply is expected to stabilize. “
This has caused concerns for some people using Wegovy. “It should only be for people in need of medicine for health reasons,” Kelly Divers Charpentier, who is 5 feet 2 tall and currently weighs 170 pounds, told the post. “My body is insulin resistant and if I can’t get it, I’ll quickly regain weight. I was morbidly obese.” She weighed 12 pounds in 7 weeks. He reduced it and added, “I’m obese now.”
Dr. Scott Kahan, director of the National Center for Weight and Health in Washington, DC, described Wegoby as a “great medicine,” but he told the post: It would be inappropriate to lose a few pounds for a wedding. Obesity is a medical condition. For those who are overweight by 100 pounds, this is the right medicine. Overtreatment with medicines is not medically wise. “
Rubin and other patients qualify for their medication by being there in the past and possibly getting there in the near future, rather than suffering from obesity now. This is the treatment that Dr. Kahan generally agrees with.
“We look at someone’s weight,” said Dr. Saunders. “If they [a BMI of ] I’m 40 and now 26, but I’m likely to regain my lost weight, so I might want to prescribe it. It’s not only where they are now, but also where they were before they lost weight. Our bodies have evolved to avoid hunger. That’s why people lose and gain. 74% of the country is overweight or obese. Our body interferes with our best efforts. Medicine helps. “
The Battle of the Bulge is not an easy war for Rubin to lose, even if that means taking Ozenpick for the rest of her life.
“I’m not going to quit,” she said. “If I quit, I’ll be hungry again.”
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