Who Decides What Bodies Are Allowed?
GLP-1s, weight expectations, and how “body positivity” still comes with hidden rules disguised as empowerment.
→ Read the full essay on PROVOKED
Editor’s Note: Off-Script—the why, what, and oh sh*t moments behind this article.
It’s never been a more confusing time to be a woman.
We’ve been sold a shiny, hashtag-ready version of body positivity that promises freedom, self-love, and radical acceptance. And yet somehow, it still manages to feel like bullsh*t.
We’re told to love our bodies, but also to keep working on them. Diet, exercise, and if that doesn’t work? There’s a shot for that. Between social media, traditional media, friends and family, and hell, likely the women at Whole Foods, it’s impossible not to feel the pressure to constantly think about what you “should” change about the way your body looks.
Not how it functions, but how it looks.
And no, I’m not immune.
I take GLP-1s.
I’m not ashamed of it, and I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t complicate the conversation, but it’s a conversation worth having. So when writer Wendee Nicole pitched this piece, of course I said yes.
She was in the middle of her own mess. She thought she’d finally made peace with her body, but then her mom came to town. A month later, she started Wegovy. (And no, that wasn’t a coincidence.)
But I didn’t want another tidy “my journey” article that resolves neatly with self-acceptance and inspirational memes.
I wanted her to sit with the uncomfortable truth that so many women are forced to sit with. Especially in midlife, when our bodies are so out of whack anyway that the last thing we need is for the rules to get stricter.
The result is raw, self-aware, and asks an honest question:
Is weight loss a betrayal of body positivity? What do we really gain from losing weight? And who the hell gets to decide which bodies are “allowed”?
We don’t pretend there’s a clean answer, because there isn’t, and this piece doesn’t ask for approval or applause. It asks for honesty about the pressure, the choices, and the contradictions we’re all navigating in real time.
That tension is the story, because that story is real life.