What more could be lost from weight loss?
Ozempic’s fat-fighting capabilities have understandably made it all the rage in body-obsessed Hollywood.
Text size
Ozempic’s fat-fighting capabilities have understandably made it all the rage in body-obsessed Hollywood.
BEYOND the scale, weight loss can affect confidence and connection.
Photo courtesy of Unsplash/Haberdoedas
How true are reports that a new body shape, changing eating habits and sudden weight loss are causing marriages to fail?
In an article on The Telegraph, “Our spark has gone” (29 July), it is said marriages have been ruined by Ozempic, the so-called miracle weight loss jabs, as it theorizes that weight-loss jabs flatten libido and trigger sudden personality shifts such that long-term relationships reach a breaking point.
“The global phenomenon of relationships strained by weight-loss jabs — often dubbed ‘Ozempic divorces’ stems from sudden confidence boosts, shifting lifestyle expectations and neurological dampening of reward pathways. While widely discussed internationally, there is no distinct or official data showing that Filipino marriages face a unique or localized crisis tied specifically to Ozempic, the study continues.
It is important to understand how Ozempic’s GLP-1 receptor agonists can impact long-term relationships.
Lifestyle asymmetry
Standards are higher as there is a rapid physical transformation, and renewed self-esteem can lead a partner to reevaluate their self-worth and raise expectations for their partner or relationship.
One partner adopting a vibrant, health-focused social life can create friction if the other partner remains static or feels left behind.
There are unmasked realities. When body image issues or physical insecurities dissipate, underlying relationship cracks that were previously blamed on weight can become glaringly apparent.
Neurological and physical factors may also add to the damaged relationship.
Then there are studies that have shown that GLP-1 receptors in the brain influence reward and desire broadly, which can occasionally flatten libido or diminish romantic/sexual drive.
There may be a sudden shift in sexual availability, confidence or desire can confuse couples who struggle to communicate the neurobiological side effects of the medication.
Fat-fighting
The changes in the way a couple sees and deals with one another because of the changes can indeed affect a relationship.
“The injectable treatment mimics a naturally occurring hormone that tell the brain it’s full, thereby curbing the appetite and inducing rapid weight loss,” the New York Post reported. “Ozempic’s fat-fighting capabilities have understandably made it all the rage in body-obsessed Hollywood.”
There were an estimated nine million Ozempic prescriptions written in the last three months of 2022. But the Post expounded on several of the dangers that came with this drug.
The treatment has also been blamed for including vision problems, constipation and even changes in personality.
“In January 2024, several Ozempic adherents claimed they stopped taking the drug and ended up regaining more weight than they lost,” the Post also reported.
Diabetes and Ozempic, Wegovy
Ozempic was approved in the US in 2017 as a weekly injection to aid in blood sugar control in diabetics. But because of its weight-loss effects, it has led to wide spread use of other off labels like Wegovy for chronic weight-loss management.
Today, the results of the weight loss in users, who are non-diabetic, may cause more damage than is was developed for. More than the side effects like vomiting, muscle loss and severe stomach and gallbladder issues, there are great psychological damages, which may not be worth their weight in weight loss.
“Weight loss or gain vis-à-vis relationships: difficult to say there is a causal relationship,” said psychiatrist Dr. Dulce Sahagun. “But, surely it affects one’s perception of self.”
