Mounjaro, Comfort Eating and the Day I Didn't Want Chocolate. Now THAT Was Unexpected! 🍫😂

I have a confession to make.

I've always loved food.

And I don't mean I've simply enjoyed a nice meal occasionally. Oh no. I LOVE food.

Cooking it, baking it, eating it, going out for it, planning what we're going to have at the weekend. All of it.

My husband is a chef, so food has always been a huge part of our lives. Trying a new restaurant, finding a lovely country pub or deciding what to cook for Sunday dinner are all things I've genuinely enjoyed.

And I still do.

But before I started Mounjaro, food had another job.

It made me feel better.

Or at least, I thought it did.

If I was celebrating, there was food. If I was happy, there was food. If I'd had a dreadful day, there was definitely food.

And if there happened to be chocolate in the cupboard?

Well, it would have been rude not to. 🍫😂

But something happened recently that made me realise just how much my relationship with food has changed.

And it wasn't something I was particularly prepared for.

The pantry incident 🍫❤️

We have a rather lovely, enormous double-door pantry in our kitchen.

It's full of all sorts of things. Cooking ingredients, snacks, treats and, naturally, chocolate.

And one evening, after something had upset me, I found myself heading straight towards it.

I hadn't consciously decided to get something to eat.

I wasn't hungry.

I simply felt upset and overwhelmed, and apparently my feet knew exactly where to take me.

Straight to the pantry.

Years ago, I wouldn't even have thought about it.

I'd have opened the doors, found something nice and eaten it.

Probably while telling myself I deserved a little treat after the evening I'd had.

But this time, I stood there looking at the chocolate and realised something rather extraordinary.

I didn't actually want any.

Not even a little bit.

I wasn't hungry. I didn't fancy it. And the thought of eating chocolate wasn't particularly appealing.

Now, if you'd told the Helen of October 2024 that she'd one day stand in front of a cupboard full of chocolate and voluntarily walk away, she'd probably have suggested you seek medical attention. 😂

But there I was.

And the strangest part?

I still wanted comforting.

I just didn't want food.

And that was a much bigger realisation than I'd expected.

Apparently, I didn't come with an OFF button 🙈

Looking back, I don't think I ever had a particularly reliable signal telling me when I'd eaten enough.

Or perhaps I did, but I was exceptionally good at ignoring it.

Take roast potatoes.

Oh, I do love a roast potato. 🥔❤️

I'd eat an entire Sunday roast, be absolutely stuffed, and then spot one last roast potato sitting in the serving dish.

And obviously, I couldn't possibly leave it there.

That poor, lonely potato.

Somebody had to eat it.

And apparently, that somebody was always me. 😂

Crisps were another weakness.

I could quite happily work my way through a multipack of six without giving it much thought.

Not necessarily because I was hungry.

Just because they tasted nice, they were there, and I wanted to carry on.

And baking!

I love baking muffins, cakes and all sorts of lovely things.

I could decide to make a batch of muffins in the morning and somehow convince myself that because I'd made them from scratch, they were practically health food.

After all, I knew exactly what had gone into them.

Never mind the sugar, butter and everything else.

Homemade calories apparently didn't count.

Or so I liked to believe. 🧁😂

The trouble was that food wasn't just something I enjoyed.

It was something I thought about constantly.

What could I eat next?

What were we having for dinner?

Was there anything nice in the cupboard?

And if I was feeling miserable, what could I have to make myself feel a little bit better?

It was exhausting.

Although I didn't fully appreciate quite how exhausting until it stopped.

When somebody finally turned the volume down 🔇

Before starting Mounjaro in October 2024, I'd heard people talking about something calledfood noise.

And I wasn't entirely sure what they meant.

I'd spent years dieting, including doing WeightWatchers, and the irony was that whenever I tried to lose weight, I seemed to spend even MORE time thinking about food.

Planning meals.

Counting points or calories.

Wondering what I could have later.

Trying not to think about the things I wasn't supposed to eat.

Which, naturally, meant thinking about them constantly.

Wonderful system, really. 🤦‍♀️

Then I started Mounjaro.

And gradually, something changed.

I'd be working away at my computer in the evening and suddenly realise I hadn't spent the previous hour wondering what I could eat.

I wasn't mentally planning a snack.

I wasn't negotiating with myself about whether I'd been good enough to deserve something.

I was simply getting on with whatever I was doing.

It felt rather like somebody had turned down a radio that had been playing quietly in the background for years.

And I hadn't even realised how loud it was until it went silent.

That was one of the biggest surprises of my entire weight-loss journey.

Not just that I could eat less.

But that I could think about food less.

And goodness, what a relief that was. ❤️

Don't worry, I haven't fallen out of love with roast potatoes! 🥔😂

One of my biggest worries before starting Mounjaro was that I'd stop enjoying food.

And that genuinely bothered me.

Because when food is such a big part of your life, the idea of losing all interest in it isn't particularly appealing.

I didn't want to go out for a lovely meal and spend the evening pushing food around my plate.

I didn't want to stop cooking.

I didn't want to live on lettuce leaves and protein shakes.

And I DEFINITELY didn't want to say goodbye to crusty bread and roast potatoes.

That would have been a step too far.

Fortunately, that hasn't been my experience.

I still love good food.

I still appreciate lovely ingredients, beautiful flavours and a really well-cooked meal.

And I can still thoroughly enjoy a peppermint Aero melting in my mouth.

Oh, they're lovely. 😍🍫

But there's an enormous difference between enjoying something and feeling compelled to keep eating it.

These days, I can have a little chocolate and be perfectly happy.

I can enjoy a roast potato without needing to finish every last one.

And I can go out for a delicious meal without feeling that I need three courses to get my money's worth.

Actually, when you think about it, some of the loveliest restaurants serve relatively small portions.

It's about the cooking, the flavours and the experience.

Not seeing how much food you can possibly fit onto one plate.

Although, admittedly, that was a concept I took rather a long time to appreciate. 😂

Our Indian takeaway has undergone a transformation! 🥘

One of the funniest things to look back on is how much food we used to order when we had a takeaway.

An Indian takeaway, for example.

There would be starters.

Two main courses.

Rice.

Naan bread.

And usually enough leftovers to feed several additional people who hadn't actually been invited.

Because obviously you needed a bit of everything.

These days?

Two main courses, one portion of rice between us and one naan bread.

My husband has most of the naan, I have a little bit, and that's generally plenty.

We still enjoy the meal.

We still have the flavours we love.

We just don't need quite so much of it.

And when we go out, I'm much more likely to order a main course and leave it at that.

I particularly enjoy fish restaurants, where I can have something delicious with a few sides and feel comfortable afterwards.

Or somewhere like Wagamama, where I might choose a couple of smaller dishes.

I haven't stopped going out to eat.

I've simply stopped treating every restaurant visit as an opportunity to eat as much as physically possible.

Which, when I write it down, sounds like a fairly sensible development. 🙈

But what happens when food isn't there to comfort you anymore? ❤️

And this brings me back to the pantry.

Because, for all the wonderful changes I've experienced on Mounjaro, this is the part I hadn't really anticipated.

I was upset.

My instinct was to go and find something to eat.

But when I got there, I didn't want it.

And suddenly I was left standing there with the feelings I'd been trying to escape.

Still upset.

Still overwhelmed.

Still wanting something to make everything feel a little bit better.

Except chocolate wasn't going to do it.

It was a strangely lonely moment.

And I think that's quite difficult to explain unless you've spent years using food as a way of dealing with difficult emotions.

Food had always been an easy distraction.

Something pleasant.

Something familiar.

Something I could reach for without really having to think about what was bothering me.

But Mounjaro had changed my appetite.

It hadn't magically removed life's difficult moments.

It hadn't made me immune to stress or sadness.

And it certainly hadn't given me all the answers about how to deal with those feelings.

I'd lost the desire to comfort eat.

But I still needed comfort.

Those are two very different things.

I'm still figuring this bit out 💕

I wish I could tell you that I've developed a wonderful collection of healthy coping strategies and now deal with every difficult emotion in a perfectly calm, mature and sensible manner.

Wouldn't that be lovely?

Unfortunately, I'm still Helen. 😂

Sometimes I find it helpful to put my thoughts into words, even if it's just privately trying to make sense of what's going on in my head.

Sometimes I need a little space.

Sometimes I need to distract myself with something else.

And sometimes I haven't the faintest idea what I need.

I'm learning.

And I don't think that's something to be ashamed of.

For years, food was such an automatic response that I didn't always stop to think about what I was actually feeling.

Now, sometimes, I have to.

And that can be uncomfortable.

But there's something important I want to say.

I don't miss comfort eating.

Not one little bit.

I don't miss feeling as though I couldn't stop.

I don't miss eating when I wasn't hungry.

And I certainly don't miss the unhappiness I felt about my weight and my health.

I'm enormously relieved that those things have changed.

What I'm still learning is how to look after myself emotionally without automatically reaching for something to eat.

And perhaps that's going to take a little longer than learning how much pasta to put on my plate.

Which, incidentally, I'm still working on too. 🍝🙈

Eight stone lighter, and still learning ❤️

When I started Mounjaro, I was worried about so many things.

Would I feel sick?

Would I stop enjoying food?

Would I lose muscle?

Would I struggle to get enough nutrition?

Would it change the way we socialised and enjoyed meals together?

And would I end up spending the rest of my life following some terribly restrictive diet?

Nearly two years later, having lost more than eight stone, I can say that my experience has been very different from what I feared.

I still love food.

I still love cooking and baking.

I still enjoy going out for meals.

I still love chocolate, crisps and roast potatoes.

Although thankfully not usually six packets of crisps at once. 😂

But I no longer feel that I have to keep eating just because something tastes nice.

And I no longer automatically want food whenever life gets difficult.

For me, those changes have been every bit as important as watching the numbers on the scales go down.

Perhaps even more important in some ways.

Because losing weight is one thing.

Changing a relationship with food that you've had for decades is quite another.

And I think I'm only just beginning to appreciate how much that relationship has changed.

I'm not suggesting that everybody who takes Mounjaro will have the same experience. We're all different, and medication is only one part of a much bigger picture.

I still make an effort to eat balanced meals, get enough nutrition and look after my health.

And I certainly don't think that feeling less hungry means we should stop nourishing ourselves properly.

But I am grateful for the freedom I've gained.

The freedom to enjoy food without constantly thinking about the next thing I'm going to eat.

The freedom to stop when I've had enough.

And, rather unexpectedly, the freedom to stand in front of a pantry full of chocolate and realise that I don't actually want any.

Now, if somebody could just invent something that makes all of life's other problems disappear as easily, that would be marvellous.

Preferably without a monthly subscription. 😂💕

I'd love to hear your experience! 💬

If you're taking Mounjaro or another GLP-1 medication, has your relationship with food changed in ways you weren't expecting?

Has the food noise quietened down? Do you still enjoy eating out? And if you've experienced comfort eating in the past, have you noticed a difference in how you respond when life gets difficult?

I'd genuinely love to hear your thoughts.

Because sometimes the biggest changes on a weight-loss journey have absolutely nothing to do with the number on the scales. ❤️

I'm sharing my own personal experience of Mounjaro, emotional eating and weight loss, not offering medical advice. Everyone's experience is different, and questions about medication, nutrition or eating behaviours are best discussed with an appropriately qualified healthcare professional.