Welcome back.

One day I might actually get onto a regular posting schedule like I keep promising…. but today is not that day. So take this offering and be happy with it ok?

I want to talk about weight loss today, not in a humble brag kinda way but in a why does no one tell you about how your brain can make you feel when you loose a large amount of weight way.

You might remember I posted a while ago about my journey with weight loss injectables and the fact I came off them due to the sickness I was feeling as a result. With the help of my GP and my injectable provider, I have lost a total of 4.4 stone since March 2025, 4.8 stone since Dec 2024. This is a total of 21.25% (4.4 stone) of my body weight in six and a half months.

In the spirit of being open and honest.. this one is really hard for me, I haven’t shared this with anyone before of how embarrassed it makes/made looking at it … here is the photo that I saw that made me truly see I needed to make a change to be healthier for the future. We all have that one thing that makes us say enough is enough right? Well, here’s mine.

I am really open and honest about this journey that I am on and I am thankful of the support of my GP and injectable provider for all their continued support. However what no-one prepares you for is how you’ll mind will feel during this process.

I should be celebrating this. It’s a huge win for me. Before the jabs, I tried clean eating, calorie deficit and working out but my body wasn’t having it. They have literally changed my life. I am wearing clothing 2/3/4 sizes down from where I started, but thanks to women’s clothing being a hell scape, there is no simple I am X amount of sizes down.

So why am I not celebrating this huge life change? I am healthier, more energy, fitting smaller clothes in brands I never thought I’d wear (this is just an added cool thing) but the goal was getting healthier for my future life with my incredible partner. All things I am achieving with my original 5 stone goal just within arms reach and after that we will see where we will end up and how much more I decide to loose.

I look in the mirror and I feel fatter than I ever did. I feel more ugly than I ever have. I still see that extra 4.8 stone in the mirror and an invisible further 6 stone on top of that. My friends are incredible, regularly telling me how they can see my body transforming in front of them, but in my eyes, I can only see an body that’s getting bigger.

My body image is deeply rooted in my self-concept, which takes time to update. I’ve lived for years seeing myself at a higher weight, and my brain has formed strong neural patterns that associate my identity with that body size. Even after losing weight, those patterns don’t instantly reset, nor will they without work.

When your body changes faster than your brain can process, you experience a mismatch between reality and perception. This is called cognitive dissonance which is the discomfort from holding two conflicting thoughts:

• “I’ve lost weight.”
• “But I still feel fat.”

The brain takes longer to adapt than the waistline does. This is exactly what I am feeling, I am fully aware I have lost weight. I can see that. I see it on the scale. I see it in my measurements. I see it in my clothing size but in the mirror, when I look at myself… I see nothing but a huge whale of a person.

Even when my partner, my friends and family, anyone compliments me on my weight loss, when they say I am looking great, it feels like they are only saying it to be kind because thats what they think I want to hear. I know that’s not true. I know thats not who they are, but my brain doesn’t see what they see. Not yet, anyway.

I think it’s routed in the fear of slipping back to where I was, to the incredibly unhealthy state I was in. I didn’t realise how unhealthy I had truly become. My brain is stuck clinging to the old image of myself as a kind of self-protection in a “Don’t get too confident, just incase you slip and put it all back on.” which for a moment lead me to being beyond obsessive about my weight loss, seeing the less I ate in a day as a badge of honour instead of a dangerous thing.

I am now working my harder to ensure I am eating my calories every day, enjoying food and not restricting what I put in my body, just being more aware of portions, snacks and not eating like it’s my least meal at every meal. What’s the point if I also cant enjoy my life?

So how am I working on changing my view on myself? I have got rid of all my old clothes, keeping only one pair of my jeans so I can remind myself of how far I have come on my bad days. I can put those jeans on and see how they fit now compared to when they felt snug on my body.

I am trying to not fixate on old photos of me. Taking regular progress photos of the now, of how my body looks now and how that makes me feel when I look at them, now! It’s really helping me build my timeline of my progress and truly how far I have come. It’s not easy, I see more issues and problems than things I love but I am trying to be more positive about my body.

I stand in front of my mirror for five minutes a day saying “This is my body TODAY. It has changed. I am allowed to see that” I also talk out loud to myself about specific features I like and appreciate about myself, even small things like my collarbones, arms, back or how clothes fit now.

I am really trying to change my thinking about my body and how I see it. I have to change my narrative around my body to help my own mental health and the way I view myself. I only have one body and thinking negatively only impacts one person. It’s me.

When I catch myself thinking:

• “I still look huge.”
• “I’ll always be the fat one.”
• “This outfit makes me look fat.”

I have to make myself pause. I can’t accept that as truth of what I see — it’s a leftover script when I am being so negative on myself.

Instead I am asking myself to replace the negative with:

• “Is that my old self talking?”
• “Would I say this to a friend who lost 4 stone?”
• “What does the evidence actually show?”

Catch → Question → Correct. That’s the habit loop I am rewiring within myself.

Does is work every time? No.

Am I working my ass off to try and re-write my own views on my body? Absolutely.

The language I use with myself really matters. If I talk about myself as though I am still the person I was at my heaviest, my brain will cling to that identity and that’s who I will be forever. I have to really work on how I talk about myself, small changes like that is proven to help change how you see your bodies identity. I take my language from: “I used to be fat, so I still feel like it.” shifting it over too: “I was heavier, but I’m not anymore. I’m adjusting to that change.”

Weight loss is physical. Identity is psychological and emotional. There’s often a lag — sometimes weeks, sometimes months, sometimes years — where the sense of self doesn’t match an appearance. The only person who can do the work to shift that view is me.

Some advice tho, If your mental image is stuck in a painful place — or feels obsessive — talking to a therapist, especially one trained in body image, CBT, or eating disorders, can be life-changing.

Your brain isn’t lying to you on purpose — it’s just trying to protect you with outdated information. You can teach it new truths.

I’m proud of you always, each and everyone of you.

Love ya, Beth xoxoxoxoxoxox