Weight-loss drugs do nothing to address the troubled relationships we have with our bodies | Susie Orbach

FFifty years ago, I began thinking about the demand for women to look a certain way and the rebellions against the narrow ways in which we were expected to show (and not show) our bodies. For a while there was a conversation about restrictions. Some young women refused to comply. Some women risked being in the body they possessed rather than embodying the dominant images of being Madonna or the whore. But eating disorders abounded, even if they weren’t always visible, fueled by the food and diet industries and their counterparts in the beauty and fashion industries. These industries viewed appearance as essential to girls’ and women’s identities and their place in the world.

Today, a new type of eating disorder is sweeping the country, driven entirely by the new GLP-1 weight loss drugs produced by pharmaceutical companies and promoted by their willing agents on social media. It’s completely understandable that people want to free themselves from obsessive and invasive thoughts about their body and their diet. The explosion of GLP-1 drugs has brought a kind of psychological peace to many people who are less afraid of their appetite.

GLP-1 drugs have captured the public imagination, while prices are declining and online doctors in supermarkets are prescribing quite freely. The reach will be greater and greater as the pill version of the drug, as opposed to the current vaccine form, comes to market. The notion of managing appetite, the desire for food, oral hunger, wanting to quiet the food chatter that constitutes internal and often obsessive thoughts about eating and not eating, is the promise. The same goes for the desire for transformation of bodies. Be slimming and disciplined. Having the right body type, that is, an acceptable and admirably slim body, will become something to buy with these drugs.

The meanings of eating disorders – that is, why and how they became so prevalent – ​​will be circumvented and erased. Beauty, food and fashion industries that contribute to causing distress will be able to continue selling their products without censorship.

“GLP-1 face,” with intense cheekbones caused by rapid weight loss after use of these drugs, requires expensive interventions by clinicians who appear to have no difficulty plumping up emaciated faces. The Hippocratic oath “first, do no harm” is gone.

It doesn’t matter if doctors know about muscle loss. Never mind the many people who can’t take these medications and face a new type of discrimination – as others make fun of their weight and wonder why they don’t take medication. Never mind the studies that show that medications do nothing to retrain people’s appetites and that most people regain all the weight they lost within two years of stopping the medication.

GLP-1 medications provide short-term relief and this should be welcomed. But the heartache and pain implicit in the search for a durable and reliable body remains elusive. The food, fashion, pharmaceutical and cosmetic surgery industries continue to laugh all the way to the bank.

The food industry is run on the ethics of greed. Ultra-processed “non-foods” are a significant part of the business model: concoctions high in salt, sugar and saturated fat, which provide flavor and no substance except to further stimulate the appetite, are given carte blanche. They hook people by overstimulating taste receptors, with relief only coming at the end of the packet.

Today, this same industry that has been the primary driver of the obesity epidemic has developed divisions to reformulate foods to serve those who now find themselves with little appetite, calling the new food “GLP-1 friendly.” Food scientists talk enthusiastically about how to combine intensity and flavor with protein-rich foods to appeal to those whose appetites have diminished and whose food desires are alarmingly repressed (for food companies). They don’t want to lose market share.

GLP-1 medications only stop cravings for as long as they are taken. For them to truly help people, we need a deeper understanding of how disturbed bodies and appetites have become so prevalent. Wherever we look, at whatever stage of life, we can see anxiety around food and bodies, fueled by industries that both create and profit from this distress.

A good place to start is early in life, allowing babies and parents to enjoy and be satisfied with their hunger. Anxiety too often permeates pregnancy, and the postpartum period can be difficult when it comes to breastfeeding. Inadvertently, a new parent’s desire to change back into pre-pregnancy clothes and return to measured eating can make it difficult to feed themselves and their infant. The cycle of eating disorders and fear of appetite begins at a very young age. We need a whole-body approach, starting early in life and welcoming changes as our bodies grow.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our dining experience was enjoyable, healthy, and conflict-free? Such a taste would challenge the power of all industries determined to provoke bodily anxieties. This would definitely be worth aiming for.

• Susie Orbach is a psychotherapist, psychoanalyst and social critic. She is the author of numerous books, including Bodies And Fat is a feminist issue