There is a very specific kind of panic that happens when you are trying to lose weight on a GLP1.
You step on the scale.
You don’t like the number.
And suddenly you are conducting a full investigation into your entire existence.
Maybe the dose isn’t working anymore. Maybe you need more protein. Maybe you aren’t eating enough. Maybe you’re eating too much. Maybe you need to work out more. Maybe you need to stop eating carbs. Maybe everyone else on Reddit is losing faster than you. Maybe your metabolism is broken. Maybe you should change medications. Maybe you should just throw the scale directly into the trash and pretend none of this ever happened.
I understand the impulse because weight loss can make us incredibly impatient with ourselves. We want the number to tell us whether we’re doing a good job, and when it doesn’t give us the answer we want, we start looking for something to fix.
But I’ve been thinking a lot about how often we try to change something before we actually understand what is happening.
And I think that is one of the biggest mistakes we can make on a GLP1.
We keep trying to solve the wrong problem.
The problem with using the scale as the entire story
The scale is useful. I am not anti-scale, and considering how much of my own journey I’ve documented publicly, that would be a pretty hilarious position for me to take.
But the scale is still only one piece of information.
It can tell you what you weigh today. It cannot tell you whether you have built habits that are supporting you. It cannot tell you whether you’re eating enough protein. It cannot tell you whether stress is making everything harder than it needs to be. It cannot tell you whether you’re sleeping like a person or like someone who has been personally victimized by bedtime. It cannot tell you how consistent you’ve actually been.
And it certainly cannot tell you why you are doing all of this in the first place.
That matters because two women can have almost identical numbers on the scale and need completely different things.
One woman might have lost 15 percent of her starting weight and be moving steadily toward her goal, but she has completely stopped prioritizing protein and movement because her appetite is so low.
Another woman might have lost 7 percent and feel frustrated because she expected more, when in reality she has been incredibly consistent, is building sustainable habits, and simply needs a little more patience.
Another might be technically progressing but feel miserable because she is spending every single day thinking about the scale.
Another might know exactly what she should be doing but is struggling to follow through because her actual life is currently on fire.
Those aren’t the same problem.
So why would we give all four women the same advice?
Knowing your numbers is not the same thing as knowing what to do next.
Your GLP1 journey needs a bigger picture
This is something I have had to remind myself of throughout my own weight loss journey.
It is very easy to become obsessed with the outcome because the outcome is measurable. Pounds are measurable. Percentages are measurable. Goal weights are measurable. Your dose is measurable.
The other pieces of this journey are a lot harder to put into a neat little box.
How is your relationship with food changing?
Are you getting enough protein consistently, or are you having one good protein day followed by three days of realizing at 8:47 PM that you’ve basically eaten coffee and vibes?
Are you moving your body in a way that you can actually maintain?
Are you sleeping?
How stressed are you?
How often are you starting over?
How do you respond when the scale goes up?
Are you actually living differently, or are you just waiting until you hit your goal weight to start living differently?
And underneath all of that is the question I think we don’t ask nearly enough:
What is the bigger reason you wanted to lose weight in the first place?
Because your answer to that question should influence what happens next.
If you want to lose weight because you want to feel stronger, then movement deserves attention.
If you want to lose weight because you want to feel better in your body, your relationship with the scale might deserve attention.
If you want to lose weight because you want to be around and active with your family, then building habits you can maintain in your actual family life matters a whole lot more than following a plan that only works when everything goes perfectly.
There isn’t one right way to do this.
There is the thing that matters most for you right now.
That’s why I made The GLP1 Assessment
I’ve been working on something that I wish more women had when they started this journey.
Not another giant PDF.
Not another checklist telling you that you need to drink your water, eat your protein, exercise five times a week, meditate, sleep eight hours, journal, meal prep, stretch, and somehow remain calm while doing all of it.
Because honestly, who has time for that?
I wanted something that would help you step back and actually see where you are.
So I created The GLP1 Assessment, a free interactive assessment for women who are currently on a GLP1.
You enter information about your starting weight, current weight, goal weight, height, age, how long you’ve been on your GLP1, your weight loss and pace, along with questions about food, protein, movement, sleep, stress, your relationship with the scale, consistency, and the bigger reason behind your goals.
Then it takes all of that information and gives you a personalized GLP1 Snapshot.
You’ll see things like how many pounds you’ve lost, what percentage of your starting weight you’ve lost, how far you are from your goal, your approximate pace, your 20 percent milestone, and your current trajectory.
But the part I care about most isn’t the number.
It’s the biggest opportunity.
Because I don’t want this assessment to tell you that you are good or bad at weight loss.
I want it to help you see where your attention could make the biggest difference right now.
You don’t need to fix everything. You need to know what matters most.
Clarity comes before the plan
There is a reason I intentionally made the assessment separate from the next thing I’m building.
I don’t want the free assessment to tell you exactly how to overhaul your entire life.
That’s not its job.
Its job is to give you a clearer picture of your starting point and help you identify the area that deserves your attention.
Because once you know that, you can stop trying to fix twelve things at once.
If your assessment shows that your biggest opportunity is protein, that’s useful information.
If it shows that movement is the thing you’ve been consistently avoiding, that’s useful information.
If your weight is progressing but your relationship with the scale is making the entire experience miserable, that is useful information too.
And if your biggest opportunity is consistency, that doesn’t mean you need more discipline or a stricter plan. It might mean the plan you’re trying to follow simply doesn’t fit your life.
That’s an important distinction.
We have a tendency to look at inconsistency and immediately blame ourselves. But sometimes inconsistency is actually information. It can be a sign that something about the plan needs to change.
The goal isn’t to walk away from the assessment with a longer list of things you’re failing to do.
The goal is to walk away thinking, Oh. I see it now.
That moment matters.
Because you cannot build a useful plan from a picture you haven’t taken the time to look at.
And then comes the much more interesting question
Once you know where you are, the obvious next question becomes:
Okay.
Now what?
That is the question I’ve been building toward with my next project, You’re on a GLP1. Now What?
The GLP1 is the tool.
You are the plan.
And I don’t think the answer is another list of rules that someone else hands you.
The next step is figuring out what your own plan actually needs to look like. What are you going to do about food when your appetite disappears? How are you going to approach protein when you are struggling to eat? What happens on the days when life gets chaotic? How are you going to handle the scale? What kind of movement makes sense for you? What happens when you have a bad week? How are you going to build consistency without making your entire life revolve around weight loss?
Those are much bigger questions than, How many calories should I eat?
And they deserve more than a generic answer.
I’m working on a guided digital workbook that will help you take the clarity you get from your GLP1 Snapshot and turn it into an actual plan for your next 30 days.
The Assessment helps you understand where you are.
The digital workbook will help you decide what you’re going to do next.
If you want to be the first to know when You’re on a GLP1. Now What? is available, you can join the waitlist here » You’re on a GLP1. Now What?
But start with the assessment.
Don’t try to overhaul your entire journey tonight.
Don’t decide that everything is broken because the scale didn’t cooperate this morning.
Don’t immediately assume you need to change your medication, your calories, your workout routine, your entire diet, and your personality.
Take a breath.
Look at the whole picture.
Figure out what is actually going well, what isn’t, and where your biggest opportunity is right now.
Because weight loss gets a whole lot less overwhelming when you stop trying to improve everything at once.
And sometimes the most productive thing you can do isn’t making another plan.
It’s finally getting clear on the one you actually need.
Nyk