Thread

1. krisroadruck · 1790993093 · focus · HN ↗

   Reporting on these drugs is so bad. Most of the benefits AND downsides they keep reporting are the same for any major rapid weight loss. Be it hair shedding or sleep apnea resolving. They keep acting like these are novel drug specific side effects rather than weight-loss related side effects.

   1. chis · 1790993547 · focus · HN ↗

      At this point it might legit be impossible for a side effect to be discovered that outweighs the immense health benefits of losing weight.

      It feels like people want there to be some horrible side effect to these drugs. Idk if it’s some moral objection to weight loss without discipline, or just general mistrust of big pharma.

      1. crooked-v · 1790994165 · focus · HN ↗

         It's absolutely the moral thing. Even on HN there are an endless number of people who treat the use of GLP-1s as a failure that must be publicly shamed.

         1. imustbeevil · 1791004124 · focus · HN ↗

            That's because people are recommending them for long term use, and treating them like some miracle cure, when the only affect is appetite suppression. If you are malnourished for years, you're just going to die. These things are useful for a few months if you really, really have no willpower and don't want to develop any. For anyone else (most people), it's much healthier to learn how to do difficult things.

            Yes, there absolutely is a sense of "it was hard for me, but I did it anyway, you should do the hard thing too". But that's not out of nowhere. Willpower is a muscle. If someone never exercises it, it's going to atrophy. It doesn't need to be shameful, but people who promote these things need to seriously consider the reality that most people's hunger is caused by something real, and just not being hungry does not solve any of those underlying problems.

            My mother is a little bit overweight, which is a problem of calories OUT being too low. She doesn't exercise enough. She doesn't have energy to exercise. That's a problem of calories IN being too low. She's taking a GLP-1 now to lose weight. It very exactly does not solve either of those issues. She has less energy. Most of the weight being lost is muscle mass. I think it's despicable that these things were rushed through the medical system. I don't think it's the layman's fault for being manipulated into thinking it's medicine.

            1. alexgieg · 1791021175 · focus · HN ↗

               That's common sense reasoning, which is to say, not based on anything scientific.

               GLP-1 is produced by the body to regulate and balance food consumption. People whose bodies produce less than the correct amount eat more because they feel a lot more hunger than people whose bodies are normal. Taking in GLP-1 drugs, if following medical advice, brings their level back to what it should have been all along, in which case most wouldn't have become obese at all.

               I'm such a case. Clinical exames never showed up any clear problem associated with weight gain, so for my entire life my obesity was linked by everyone, doctors included, to lack of willpower.

               I only discovered what my issue was when I took a genetic test and discovered that my DNA came with these lovely traits:

               * I feel more intense hunger than the average people, so I need to eat more than they do to feel satiated. If I eat the same amount a normal person does, I leave the table literally still hungry.

               * My body accumulates more fat than the average person, so even if I eat the same amount they do and keep constantly hungry, I accumulate some fat.

               * Caloric-reduction diets don't work for me. So the years and years I tried and tried them had little effect, and were mostly wasted effort.

               * Fat-reduction diets also don't work for me. Good thing I didn't lose time with those since everyone recommended me the useless caloric-reduction ones.

               * The only diet that has some effect for me is the Mediterranean one, which I didn't know about and no one had ever recommended.

               * Physical exercise has little effect for me, as I gain less muscle mass from it than the average person. So the years of walking and the many attempts at going to the gym were also mostly wasted effort.

               * And physical exercise causes more pain for me than it does for the average person, so all the time I was doing those, I was suffering more than most people while getting worse results then they do from it.

               If your genetics is normal on all those fronts, then sure, a bit of willpower fixes that. With that combo though, and fully not knowing you have any of that? Not a chance.

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