I unwrapped my periwinkle blue Ozempic pen, screwed on the tiny needle, and turned the dial to .25. A tiny droplet of clear liquid appeared at the tip; I jabbed it into my abdomen. (Calling this an injection overstates things — it’s a teeny, painless pinprick, especially painless if you’ve got the body fat to justify it.) As I write this, I have lost 40 pounds, an astonishing quarter of my body weight.
…
And I have to admit to some qualms, even now, about resorting to the easy way out. If America has a Puritan strain, which demands that we lose weight the old-fashioned, diet-and-exercise way, there is also something quintessentially American about the alluring prospect of the quick fix, the magic pill. In the realm of supersized sodas and sedentary lifestyles, what the experts call our obesogenic environment, does the availability of obesity medications offer too much license to ignore underlying causes? Should I have just tried harder, again, before turning to my 21st-century version of Mother’s Little Helper?
