Millions of Americans have successfully lost life-changing amounts of weight thanks to Ozempic, Wegovy and other highly successful obesity vaccines.
The safety of the drugs and their good performance have convinced doctors; However, what remains to be seen is how long weight is maintained when patients stop taking them.
Some experts, for example, have suggested that weight regain is inevitable unless patients continue taking appetite suppressant medications for life.
However, one patient who offers evidence that the benefits can outlive a prescription is Natalie Di Grazia of Austin, Texas, who maintained significant weight loss a year after stopping the medication.
In a video posted in June 2023, a year after stopping taking Ozempic, Natalie Di Grazia showed off her impressive sustained weight loss from 200 pounds to approximately 162 pounds.
in a account in depth On her health transformation shared with her 13,000 YouTube subscribers, Ms. Di Grazia explains that she even continued to lose weight without medication.
In a July 2023 video filmed a year after she stopped taking semaglutide, the generic drug for Wegovy and Ozempic, Natalie weighed 162 pounds, a far cry from her original weight.
The content creator started taking Ozempic in January 2022, weighing 200 pounds when her doctor determined she was prediabetic.
He had lost 26 pounds in six months and decided to stop shortly after having a dangerously low blood sugar crash after drinking two cocktails, and used that experience to warn all viewers taking a weight loss drug that to stay away from alcohol while at it.
With the help of calorie tracking and exercising most days for at least 30 minutes, Ms. Di Grazia has continued to lose weight and now weighs about 162 pounds.
Natalie’s experience with Ozempic began in December 2021 at her annual visit to the gynecologist, who noticed that her weight was high for her height.
At 5’3″ and 200 pounds, Ms. Di Grazia was determined to be prediabetic and was referred to an obesity medicine specialist, who started her on Ozempic treatment the following month.
When she stopped taking Ozempic in the summer of 2022, Ms. Di Grazia weighed 174 pounds.
Ms. Di Grazia’s channel is an honest look at weight loss and its drawbacks as well as its benefits. In her videos, she talks openly about feeling uncomfortable in her skin.
He found that his appetite was negligible or nonexistent while taking the medications. He said that he often went hours and hours without eating simply because he didn’t feel like it.
Their videos show that losing weight is not the end of problems. She describes, even with her impressive weight loss, feeling bloated and uncomfortable in her skin some days.
In one of her videos, she describes her family’s discomfort at the prospect of putting on a swimsuit to spend a day at the beach with her boyfriend.
Throughout those six months, Natalie documented her week-long experimental forays into intermittent fasting programs, the ketogenic diet, mindful eating, and exercise fads on her YouTube channel.
At one point during his trip, he walked five miles on a treadmill. At another point, he vowed to burn about 500 calories a day to maintain his weight loss.
She has since become a regular at the gym with her boyfriend.
As Ms. Di Grazia says, Ozempic and its sister drug Wegovy are tools in everyone’s arsenal. They do not cure obesity because obesity is a multifaceted chronic disorder with roots in both physiology and psychology.
Doing nothing to address the root causes of obesity, such as an emotionally unhealthy attachment to food as a source of comfort, often results in weight rebound when Ozempic injections are stopped.
An NIH-led study in 2022 reported that once patients stopped taking weight-loss medications, the average rebound of weight gain is about two-thirds of the total weight loss.
Consolidating healthy eating habits and making exercise an integral part of life are very effective safeguards against regaining lost weight.
Wegovy and Ozempic are known GLP-1 receptor agonists. Its active ingredient semaglutide stimulates weight loss by mimicking the actions of GLP-1, or glucagon-like peptide 1, a hormone in the brain that regulates appetite and feelings of satiety.
Initially, the drug Ozempic was intended to treat type 2 diabetes. Semaglutide works by helping the pancreas release the right amount of insulin when blood sugar levels are high.