ArcaMax

A Personal Appeal from Zola

It has come to my attention that a drug used to treat diabetes is now flying off the shelves as a weight loss drug. If you (or someone you know) are thinking about using that kind of drug to lose weight let me ask you to think twice. I can tell you stories.

Before I created Plan Z Diet, I tried just about every diet on the planet. Same results every time. I’d lose a little weight and then it would come roaring back and I inevitably ended up with more than I started with. It’s a vicious cycle. Those of you around in the 1990s might remember another drug that was widely prescribed for weight loss.

At the time I was a patient at the obesity clinic at the University of Wisconsin. They had a great reputation, so I trusted them. The drug of the day was Fen-Phen. They prescribed it for me. I visited weekly with my food log and weighed in. They’d ask me questions. Sometimes they took blood. They always took my blood pressure.

I’ll cut to the end of the story.

I took that drug for 18 months. I lost a whopping 13 pounds. They told me I was going to have to take that drug forever to keep off what I had lost.  They told me I could expect slow progress going forward. I remember being on a golf course one time and hardly having the energy to drag myself up the hill to the green so I could putt. That drug affected every day of my life.

The clinic shut down for budgetary reasons and I was left out in the cold. In less than a year of not taking the drug, the weight was back. I was eating healthy. No matter.

Then after two years, they came looking for me. They realized that Phen-Fen could cause serious heart issues. So they wanted me to come into the hospital to ensure I was okay. I was okay as far as my heart was concerned but not really. I had another story of promise only to fail in my efforts to lose weight and keep it off.

Now it’s happening again...

Read the full column at PlanZDiet: planzdiet/a-personal-appeal-from-zola

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