The Psychology of Maintenance on GLP-1
Weight loss is exciting. What comes next is scarier — and far more transformative.
What happens after the weight comes off — and the real work begins.
Welcome back to “The Psychology of Weight Loss,” my honest look at what happens in your mind after your body changes. Losing 52 pounds over nine months has transformed my health — I’m off all daily medications, my energy is steady, and I feel more like myself than I have in years. But this part of the journey — the after — is quieter, slower, and surprisingly more complicated than I expected. Today, I want to talk about the scarier part of weight loss: maintenance, and all the skeletons that show up when the weight is gone.
The Scariest Part: The Aftermath
As I talked about last week, I always had this vague belief that losing weight would change everything — not a concrete list, just a cloudy idea that my life would somehow be better. And it is… in so many obvious ways. But as I’ve shed the weight, the skeletons are showing. (Yes, October Halloween pun fully intended.) Skeletons can be scary.
The adrenaline rush of weight loss — new milestones, looser clothes, shrinking numbers — is exhilarating. But maintenance? Maintenance is quieter and more unsettling. There’s no weekly scale victory to celebrate, no dramatic reveal moment. Instead, there’s a daily, ongoing conversation with myself: Can I trust me to keep going? Can I trust myself to stay here?
Skeletons on St Charles
New Joys (and Weird Moments)
I love walking into a store now and knowing without a doubt that I’ll fit into so many fun outfits. But here’s the surprising part: I don’t want a closet full of them. I like how I look and feel in carefully chosen pieces that suit me and feel comfortable. It’s not about “makeover mode” — it’s about ease.
Eating out is different, too. I never scan the menu for what will fill me up or comfort me — I order what I think will taste good. But sometimes, there’s this odd flicker of anxiety about ordering a smaller meal than everyone else. People comment on it. And for some reason, that makes me feel awkward.
I used to wonder how my best friend could be perfectly content with a salad and soup. Now I get it. She’s always been petite, and it’s not some lifelong diet — she just doesn’t need as much food, and she’s never obsessed over it. Wow.
Who’s That in the Mirror?
I look at myself in the mirror more often now — on purpose — because I’m not afraid of what I’ll see. But I am often surprised. I know this sounds strange, but somehow I keep expecting to look 35. (A question for therapy… no doubt.)
Instead, it’s me — present-day me — with a few bags under my eyes, some annoying turkey neck thoughts, and saggy skin in places I’ll spare you the details of. I am the same person, but also profoundly different. And that’s the tricky part: my reflection is familiar and foreign all at once.
Food for thought… when I’m feeling hungry again.
Emotional Echoes (and Funny Ones Too)
Even now, the old instincts linger. Sometimes I still brace for judgment when I walk into a room, as if the old version of me might still be visible to everyone else. Sometimes I still reach for comfort food when I’m stressed — though now it’s more likely to be roasted chickpeas than a pint of ice cream.
And sometimes, the echoes show up wearing an apron. Case in point: the dinner party I recently hosted where I cooked as if twenty guests were coming… except there were four. Somewhere deep in my brain, “enough food” still means way too much food. As I packed up container after container of leftovers, I had to laugh — my body might have changed, but apparently my inner Italian grandmother is alive and well. Rewiring those instincts takes time. On the plus side, all of us had dinner for the next couple of nights packed neatly in the fridge!
The weight is gone, but the wiring takes longer to rewrite. It’s humbling and comforting all at once — this process of learning to live comfortably in my own, somewhat saggy but very much alive skin.
How the World Sees You
Last night, I had dinner with my daughter, son-in-law, and my ex-husband — the first time I’d seen him since my daughter’s wedding over a year ago, when I was at my heaviest. When those wedding photos came back, I remember feeling devastated. It was one of the happiest days of my life, and yet I could barely look at the images. But I had just started my GLP-1 journey then, and I told myself things would change.
And they did. My ex’s reaction said it all: “Look at you. You’re skinny-skinny.” (Apparently that’s a family term for “acceptable weight and dimension.”) I felt this sudden, weird urge to explain myself — to blurt out that I’d had help from the shot. Another topic for therapy, I suppose. But I think some of you will understand that strange impulse to justify how you lost weight.
New Skeletons, Same Closet 💀
Which brings me back to those skeletons. The fears I had before — about being too heavy, about my health, about how I looked — have been replaced by new ones. Can I maintain this? Will I slide back? Will I still be enough if the number changes?
Losing weight stripped away more than pounds. It peeled back layers I didn’t know were there — expectations, insecurities, questions about identity and aging. And now, in this quieter, scarier phase of maintenance, I’m learning that the real transformation isn’t what happens to my body. It’s what happens in my relationship with myself.
🩺 Concrete Note on the Physical Journey
Still 52 lbs down, and I’m looking forward to my doctor’s appointment in two weeks to strategize for the maintenance phase. My goal is simple: don’t overthink my weight or my food intake. I want to keep the momentum — and the “chill” — going as I move into what’s next. I’m also still hunting for new recipes to keep my meals fresh and interesting.
💡 If you’re navigating your own GLP-1 journey, I’ve gathered everything I wish I’d known — from managing side effects to building sustainable habits — in my book, The GLP-1 Revolution. It’s part science, part story, and meant to help you feel less alone and more prepared as you find your own way forward
