Food Noise, Body Image & Fear of Regain: The Emotional Side of GLP-1 Weight Loss

[gentle music] Welcome to Your GLP-1 Bestie, the podcast for those of us navigating life on GLP-1s who are tired of doing it alone.

I'm Gianna, registered dietician, certified personal trainer, and your go-to bestie for all things GLP-1s.

I've been on a GLP-1 myself since 2022.

Here, we're breaking down the science, cutting through the noise, and helping you feel confident in your journey because you deserve support, not confusion.

Let's dive in.

[gentle music] One thing that I don't think we talk about enough on GLP-1s is that weight loss is not just physical.

This journey is so complex, and when we are on this journey and when weight is changing, it can bring up a lot of very valid, very real feelings around fear and guilt, identity changes.

It can actually create new anxiety or worsen anxiety around food.

It can create body image struggles that maybe we hadn't had in a while.

It can create, like, the fear of regaining weight, uh, and it can create discomfort when your body starts changing.

And I think that this can be a confusing kind of crossroads to be at because sometimes we're just thinking, like, "Shouldn't I just be happy?" Right? Like the, like, "I'm finally losing weight.

Shouldn't I just be happy?" But two things can be true at once.

We can feel grateful for progress, but still emotionally struggle with parts of this overall experience.

So today, we're gonna talk about the mental and emotional side of weight loss on GLP-1s that almost nobody prepares people for.

And you might be like, "Gianna, as a dietician, why are you talking about this?" Well, let me tell you something.

A really big part of behavior change and supporting change long term and really navigating through a GLP-1 journey successfully requires, yes, the physical component of health, but also the mental component of health.

And my clients have heard this.

If you've listened to episodes before of the podcast, I say this all the time, that, like, your mental health has to go with your physical health.

They go together.

You can't really successfully have one without the other, in my professional opinion.

Uh, and that doesn't mean that I am the one handling the mental health side of things with my clients.

I refer out for that.

There's certain things that are still in my scope with, like, the mindset and the habit side of things, but, um, I'm a, I'm a big therapy fan over here, you guys.

So we refer out when we definitely need to, but that's why I wanted to talk about this today.

So welcome to Your GLP-1 Bestie podcast.

I'm Gianna, registered dietician, certified personal trainer, and your GLP-1 bestie.

Today's episode is a little bit different because we're talking less nutrition and side effects and more about, like, what's happening mentally and emotionally during this journey.

But like I said, I think it's really important that we address this piece of things because if you don't tackle the mental side of things, no matter what number you finally get to on the scale, it's never going to really be enough for you or you're never going to feel very settled there and content there and happy there until we get the mental side of things worked out.

So again, just for my quick disclaimer, this is not me [laughs] as, like, a mental health professional.

I have many, though, that are wonderful.

If you need recommendations of someone to reach out to, I'm happy to see if there's someone in my network for you.

But I wanna really bring awareness to this topic so that if this is something that you're experiencing or if, if you've started thinking through these things or maybe you're just in the beginning of your journey, it's something you can be aware of and be looking out for in case you do need some additional support on this.

But I think we don't talk about this enough, so people don't totally know that it's not, like, you're not crazy if you're feeling this way.

[gentle music] Welcome to Your GLP-1 Bestie, the podcast for those of us navigating life on GLP-1s who are tired of doing it alone.

I'm Gianna, registered dietician, certified personal trainer, and your go-to bestie for all things GLP-1s.

I've been on a GLP-1 myself since 2022.

Here, we're breaking down the science, cutting through the noise, and helping you feel confident in your journey because you deserve support, not confusion.

Let's dive in.

[gentle music] One thing that I don't think we talk about enough on GLP-1s is that weight loss is not just physical.

This journey is so complex, and when we are on this journey and when weight is changing, it can bring up a lot of very valid, very real feelings around fear and guilt, identity changes.

It can actually create new anxiety or worsen anxiety around food.

It can create body image struggles that maybe we hadn't had in a while.

It can create, like, the fear of regaining weight, uh, and it can create discomfort when your body starts changing.

And I think that this can be a confusing kind of crossroads to be at because sometimes we're just thinking, like, "Shouldn't I just be happy?" Right? Like the, like, "I'm finally losing weight.

Shouldn't I just be happy?" But two things can be true at once.

We can feel grateful for progress, but still emotionally struggle with parts of this overall experience.

So today, we're gonna talk about the mental and emotional side of weight loss on GLP-1s that almost nobody prepares people for.

And you might be like, "Gianna, as a dietician, why are you talking about this?" Well, let me tell you something.

A really big part of behavior change and supporting change long term and really navigating through a GLP-1 journey successfully requires, yes, the physical component of health, but also the mental component of health.

And my clients have heard this.

If you've listened to episodes before of the podcast, I say this all the time, that, like, your mental health has to go with your physical health.

They go together.

You can't really successfully have one without the other, in my professional opinion.

Uh, and that doesn't mean that I am the one handling the mental health side of things with my clients.

I refer out for that.

There's certain things that are still in my scope with, like, the mindset and the habit side of things, but, um, I'm a, I'm a big therapy fan over here, you guys.

So we refer out when we definitely need to, but that's why I wanted to talk about this today.

So welcome to Your GLP-1 Bestie podcast.

I'm Gianna, registered dietician, certified personal trainer, and your GLP-1 bestie.

Today's episode is a little bit different because we're talking less nutrition and side effects and more about, like, what's happening mentally and emotionally during this journey.

But like I said, I think it's really important that we address this piece of things because if you don't tackle the mental side of things, no matter what number you finally get to on the scale, it's never going to really be enough for you or you're never going to feel very settled there and content there and happy there until we get the mental side of things worked out.

So again, just for my quick disclaimer, this is not me [laughs] as, like, a mental health professional.

I have many, though, that are wonderful.

If you need recommendations of someone to reach out to, I'm happy to see if there's someone in my network for you.

But I wanna really bring awareness to this topic so that if this is something that you're experiencing or if, if you've started thinking through these things or maybe you're just in the beginning of your journey, it's something you can be aware of and be looking out for in case you do need some additional support on this.

But I think we don't talk about this enough, so people don't totally know that it's not, like, you're not crazy if you're feeling this way.