'I've been using weight loss injections. Going to the pharmacy feels like a 'walk of shame'.'

Back in February this year, I weighed 127 kilos.

It’s the heaviest I’ve ever been but I didn’t know it at the time. I had refused to get on a scale since having a baby eight years earlier, terrified of what number would appear.

I knew that seeing that number would send me into a spiral. I would be bitterly disappointed in myself for having allowed this to happen. I would be screaming internally at the thought of what would be required of me to reduce that number and so I just flat out refused to weigh in.

It wasn’t like my weight was the biggest issue in my life. The body positivity movement had told me that my shape meant nothing to anyone but me and with no real health conditions to be concerned about I was doing alright.

But while my health was overall doing ok, one of my joints was not. I injured my left knee playing netball when I was 14. Two reconstructions and a multitude of cartilage clean ups later and it was a mess. I was in daily pain and that 127 kilos it was having to cart around was not helping it any.

GPs I had visited previously had advised that losing weight would help with pain management. One told me with every five kilos I lost I would reduce pain levels by 10 per cent. But here’s the problem, losing weight is not easy and being told to just up and go drop 10 to 20 kgs does not make that magically occur.

Claire in hospital after her knee op. Image: Supplied.

I have always watched what I eat, but I do not have a great relationship with food. I have since found out from my dietician that I am a punish and reward eater. In that I punish myself for being too fat so I restrict but then reward myself with treats when I think I've done well.

I also have a lot of food noise, which for those of you who don’t have this, I imagine it’s like having an addiction to anything.

When you’re eating, you might be panicked that what’s on your plate isn’t going to be enough. It’s when you’re doing something else but all you can think about is what your next meal will be. It’s telling yourself not to eat that treat while picking it up and putting it in your mouth. It’s like going into a trance when you have an open packet of something in your hands and the next time you check in, it’s completely gone.

It’s a constant distraction.

Nothing you tell yourself turns this off and it is a 24 hour a day, seven days a week presence.

I went to the GP about my knee. Unlike other doctors in the past he actually asked if he could discuss my weight. We did and after trying a few different options which came with some not so nice side effects for me, he asked me whether I had tried weight loss injections?

There are several on the market but there is one that stands out in the crowd. It’s designed to help those with type 2 diabetes control their blood glucose levels but the handy side effect is you will generally start to lose weight.

I said I’d give it a try but it hasn’t been easy to get a hold of. Supply has been short as millions of people around the world discover its weight loss possibility. Many chemists here in Australia won’t take non PBS prescriptions but some will. You can only get the PBS script if you have type 2 diabetes.

Watch: Peri Weight-Gain and Your Changing Body. Post continues after video.

After using it for a few weeks I started to read headlines about how this drug was being abused by people who are only using it to lose weight. I read how I was taking medication away from someone who has a real issue.

Comments started to fly about how you’ll pack back on the kilos once you stop taking it so you’re now stuck with it for life or you’ll just go back to being fat. Skinny blonde celebrities came out saying they had been prescribed it and the headlines followed with horror stories of something called (insert drug brand name here) face, that you’ll end up saggy and wrinkly in pursuit of being thin.

Then the commentary shifted to how those using these injections are somehow cheating the system. That they will never truly be healthy because they’re relying on drugs to do what you should be able to just achieve naturally.

Taking my prescription to the chemist feels like doing a walk of shame. I often call beforehand to make sure they have stock otherwise I’ve faced a snippy pharmacists who’ve not only had to have several conversations with colleagues before letting me know whether I was entitled to have my script filled this month or not but then to be told, “I can’t fill this for you, not now, maybe not until the end of 2024”.

Women and men around me who had been prescribed the drug by their own doctors secretly confided in me that they too were on it but would never tell anyone. This is how those who have had gastric bypass surgery have felt for many years, that they are somehow less of a person for having taken a surgical step for something as vain as weight loss.

Claire now. Image: Supplied.

So in the same breath, someone will tell you that you can’t be overweight and healthy, that losing weight will be the answer to all your issues, but at the same time tell you that taking a drug for it makes you not worthy because it’s obviously about vanity, not health or you would just eat better and exercise.

This mean girls, ‘you can’t sit with us’ idea that is being given off in this debate about these drugs, like I haven’t earned my thin privilege because I’m not genetically gifted nor did I suffer enough to get there, is rage inducing.

Now I read headlines warning other women not to use it by a woman who is already thin and who openly admitted to overdosing on it. I read how a man blames this drug for the death of his wife, who took it just to lose a few kilos before a wedding, even though the coroner has made no link between her cause of death and the drug.

I am already scared.

I am terrified that I will have to stop using this drug when my supply runs out and I will gain weight again, because the food noise will be back and I won’t have got in control of it just yet.

I’m scared that all the hard work I’ve put into changing my diet, having a full knee replacement and finally being able to exercise again, will go down the drain as soon as I stop.

But I will still use it, because it has been the right choice for me at this stage in my life. It turned off food noise and for the first time in my life, I can think clearly enough to make better choices. I am fitter and healthier now than I was nine months ago and I can thank a multitude of things for that, my doctors, my dietician, my physio and this drug, which none of us should feel ashamed to ask for.

Feature Image: Supplied.