Body image changing more slowly than the body posts 31–60
This is a continuation of a long topic, addressed by post number rather than by page. Start at post 1.
Answering the question post #28 raises rather than the one it answers.
The social side of this — how other people respond to visible change — comes up constantly and has nothing to do with pharmacology.
That holds for the case as described. Change the assumptions and it may not.
Saving this. It is the version I will quote when the question comes round again.
I would put moderate confidence on the mainstream reading of body image and no more. That is not scepticism for its own sake; it is where the sourcing actually stops.
Post #32 describes the usual case. This is about the unusual one.
On body image: the maintained page in the documentation commons covers the general case with citations and a review date, which is more reliable than any reply here including this one.
Body image and weight loss: large weight loss changes a person's relationship with their body in ways that can be psychologically complex. Some of that is positive; some might involve adjustment or processing.
Same conclusion as the reply above, reached differently, which is mildly reassuring.
Where a member is finding this hard, the useful reply is usually a question rather than an answer, and this subcategory does that well.
Maintenance brings a different set of psychological questions from loss, and the discussion here is much thinner on that phase.
Worth separating body image as a question about the compound from body image as a question about the documentation. They get answered by different people and only one of them is answerable here.
Coming back to post #41, because the follow-up matters more than the original answer.
Offering a way to settle body image rather than another opinion about it. Two measurements, taken the same way, a fortnight apart. If the difference is within the noise, the question was not answerable at this precision.
Fine by me. I had wanted a stronger conclusion and there is not one available.
Substance use: if someone has a history of substance use, appetite suppression and weight loss can shift thinking about body and substance use. This is a risk factor worth acknowledging.
A weak preference rather than a position.
Post #45 answers the question as asked. The question underneath it is different.
I have three months of notes on body image and the honest summary is that the trend is real and the week-to-week numbers are noise. I nearly drew the opposite conclusion from the first fortnight.
Identity and self-image: for some people, weight and body size are central to identity. Large change to body size can affect identity. This is not pathological; it is human.
Careful with the language on body image. "Not detected" and "not present" are different findings and the first is a statement about the method.
Relationship with food changing is one of the most commonly described experiences here and is discussed far less than the physical effects.
I am confident about the direction and much less about the magnitude.
Posting my body image numbers with the method attached so they can be discounted properly. Uncontrolled, unblinded, and collected by someone who wanted a particular answer.
This is the sort of exchange that makes the archive worth searching.
Support and community: some people process weight change through community (online or in-person). Others prefer privacy. Knowing what you need and seeking it proactively helps.
The number is defensible. The precision I gave it is not.
Collapsed as off-topic by two members at trust level 3 or above
Adding a small correction to the body image summary above rather than a disagreement with it. The substance holds; one of the figures is out by a factor that matters.
Everything in post #54 holds. The case it does not cover is the one I have.
What I want from this body image thread is the list of things that would need to be true for the claim to hold. If we can write that list, we can check it.