Sunday Weigh In: Up a Pound, End of My Period, and the Fear I Finally Said Out Loud
The honest update from this week including the realization that changed how I think about everything.
185.5
Last Sunday I was 184.4. So yes, I am up a pound. And before you spiral on my behalf, let me tell you exactly why I am not.
My period is ending. Right now, today, it is wrapping up. And if you have been following along for any amount of time you know what that means for the scale. Water. Hormones. The whole thing. I have watched this pattern enough times now to know that what goes up at the end of a cycle comes back down in the days after. I am not worried. I am watching.
That is what the data does for you. It turns a number that used to wreck my entire morning into information I can actually use.
the gym situation, let’s be real
I did not make it to the gym this week. Not once. And I am telling you that because this is an honest weigh in and pretending I hit my workouts when I did not is exactly the kind of thing that makes people feel alone when they read content from creators who make everything look perfect. I am no where near perfect & I won’t pretend to be.
Here is what actually happened. We got a puppy. And I have not left her home alone once since she arrived. Not once. Which means the gym, which requires me to actually leave the house for longer than a quick errand, has just not happened.
But I also had volleyball camp three days this week. And I want to be clear that volleyball camp counts. I was on my feet the entire time. Setting, moving, coaching, walking constantly. My body worked this week. It just worked in a gym that did not have equipment in it.
This week is different though. I have a plan. I am leaving the puppy with my husband and I am getting back in the gym at least three times. Ideally more. I genuinely miss it in a way that still surprises me every time I am away from it too long. The gym stopped being a punishment a long time ago and became something that is actually mine. Missing it feels like missing something that belongs to me.
Three times minimum. We will see what actually happens and I will tell you the truth about it next Sunday either way.
the weird fullness thing
If you watched my vlog last week you saw me talk about this strange fullness feeling I could not explain. It was uncomfortable and honestly a little scary because my brain went immediately to the places it always goes when something feels off on this medication.
Pancreatitis. Gastroparesis. Gallbladder issues.
Those are real fears. They are not irrational. They are documented risks and I take them seriously and I pay attention to my body because of them.
But here is what I think was actually happening. My period was coming. The bloating and the fullness and the general feeling of my digestive system doing whatever it wanted was almost certainly hormonal. Because this week, as my period wraps up, it is gone. Completely. I feel completely normal again.
I am sharing this because I know I am not the only one who goes to the scary place first. Who feels something unfamiliar and immediately starts researching worst case scenarios at 11pm. That is what this medication does to your head sometimes, especially when you are paying attention and you care about what is happening in your body.
Pay attention. And also give your body a little grace to have a weird week sometimes.
the fear I finally said out loud
This is the part I really want to talk about.
I have real fears about this medication. Pancreatitis. Gastroparesis. Gallbladder. I am not going to pretend those fears do not exist because they do and anyone who tells you they never think about the risks is either not paying attention or not being honest with you.
But this week I had a realization I have been sitting with and I need to say it out loud.
I am more afraid of staying obese for the rest of my life than I am of the risks of this medication.
Let me say that again because I want it to land.
The fear of what obesity does to my body, my joints, my heart, my hormones, my longevity, my quality of life, that fear is bigger than my fear of the medication side effects.
And I think a lot of women in this community feel this exact thing and nobody is saying it because it feels like you are not supposed to admit that. Like admitting you are more afraid of staying in your body than you are of a medication risk makes you reckless or ungrateful or something.
It does not make you any of those things.
It makes you someone who has done the math on their own life and made a real decision based on real information. The risks of long term obesity are documented. They are significant. They affect every system in your body. And for me, personally, in my body, the weight of those risks is heavier than the weight of the medication risks I monitor carefully.
That realization did not make the fears go away. But it gave me a framework for living with them instead of being paralyzed by them.
I am choosing this. With open eyes. And I think you deserve to hear someone say that out loud.
what is happening here on substack
Quick update because I want you to know what I am building over here.
I spent time this week going deep on what the biggest creators on Substack are actually doing. The ones with 85,000 subscribers. The ones at the top of the Health and Wellness leaderboard. And what they all have in common is they post constantly. Every single day. Some of them more than once.
So that is what I am doing now. Every day. Sometimes more. A mix of free and paid. The free posts are for everyone. The paid posts go way deeper than anything I publish publicly and the post I put up yesterday is literally a 45 minute read. That is the level I am going at for the people who are in this with me on the paid side.
Here is why this matters specifically if you are in the Invisible Phase right now.
When you are losing consistently the scale reminds you every week that what you are doing is working. You have built in feedback. But in the Invisible Phase that feedback loop is broken. The scale is not giving you anything. And that silence is where people quit.
What I am trying to do with daily posting is become that feedback loop instead. A daily reminder that you are not alone in this. That someone else is in it with you and showing up and paying attention and naming the things that do not have names yet.
The free version of this community is genuinely good. But the paid side is where I go deeper, longer, and more specific than I can go publicly.
It is $3 a month right now. That price is locked for founding members forever, meaning once you are in at $3 you stay at $3 no matter what the price goes up to later. And it will go up. As soon as we hit 250 paid members the price increases.
We are close.
If you have been thinking about it, now is the time.
this week
185.5. Period ending. Puppy still very much at home. Gym happening for real this time.
Eating was all over the place this week and I am not going to pretend otherwise. It was a hard week in a lot of small ways and food was not the thing I had the most control over. This week I am resetting. Not perfectly. Just better than last week.
That is the whole goal. 10% better every day. Not perfect. Better.
slow still counts.
Nyk
Drop a comment below. Where are you this week? What does your scale say and more importantly what does it not say?
Hi, Nyk! I will tell you that I really do not ever worry about complications. Maybe it is because I am so far in, but I honestly did not *ever* think about the GI problems that can take us off the meds.
And, because I *was* so sick (CKD, diabetes, heart failure, liver disease, etc.) before I started GLP-1s, that is most assuredly, what I fear the most. But that comes hand-in-hand with getting fat again. If I get fat, I get sick, I'm in pain, I'm immobilized, and I die.
Clearly, the risks of complications from being fat and dying are FAR more than any risk the medication can throw at me.
Read into this as you will: I will NEVER be fat again. Never. Never ever. If I have to go off the meds for whatever reason, I will NEVER get fat again.
I traveled last week, so no gym. This week started a new in-person job AND sick. I am praying I make it to my Friday gym session because I miss the feeling I have when I am done and I did something I didn't think I could do. But I also know I have to heal. Asthma bad so constantly coughing. That's a workout right?