‘Like a tsunami’: What happens when you stop weight-loss drug? Woman says, ‘There's an addiction’

Anti-diabetic and weight-loss drugs have gained prominence as millions of adults across the world live with obesity. While awareness has grown about their dosage, side effects and cost, here's the account of a woman who stopped using weight-loss jabs after a while.

"It's like a switch that goes on, and you're instantly starving," Tanya Hall, who tried to stop taking weight loss medication multiple times, told the BBC.

Tanya, a sales manager for a large fitness company, had started taking Wegovy. She was overweight, felt like an "imposter" and thought her opinion was not valued by her industry because of her size, the report added.

After using the jabs, she said, people would come up to her and congratulate her on her weight loss. She felt she was treated with more respect.

However, during the first few months of the treatment, Tanya struggled to sleep, felt sick all the time, had headaches and even started to lose her hair, which might not be directly due to the drug but is a potential side effect of rapid weight loss.

"My hair was falling out in clumps," Tanya was quoted by the BBC. But in terms of weight, she was getting the results she'd hoped for. "I'd lost about three and a half stone."

Now, more than 18 months after taking Wegovy, she's tried to come off the drug several times. The experiment ultimately led to a complete life change.

Within just a few days, Tanya said she started eating so much food that she was left "completely horrified".

She said, “It was like something opened up in my mind and said: 'Eat everything, go on, you deserve it because you haven't eaten anything for so long'.”

As per the report, Tanya is staying on the medication and is fully aware of the pros and cons of this decision.

She talked about “addiction”, saying, "For the first 38 years of my life, I was overweight - now I'm six stone (38kg) lighter."

"Therefore, there's part of me that feels like there's an addiction to keep it going because it makes me feel the way that I feel, it makes me feel in control," she said.

Maybe it's the other way round, she muses, maybe it's the drug that controls her.

Stopping weight loss drugs feels like...

Lifestyle GP Dr Hussain Al-Zubaidi, based in the UK, told the BBC that stopping weight loss drugs can feel like "jumping off a cliff."

Experts warned that patients should consult a healthcare provider to determine the dosage of these drugs and that “side effects should be taken into account as part of this.”

"I often see patients who will come off it when they're on the highest dose because they've reached their target, and then they stop," Dr Zubaidi said.

According to Dr Zubaidi, that can be like being hit by an "avalanche or a tsunami". The food noise comes back as quickly as the next day.

Weight goes back on when...

Dr Zubaidi said the evidence so far suggests that, between one and three years after stopping the medication, people will see a "significant proportion of weight" return.

"Somewhere in the region of 60% to 80% of the weight that you lost will return," he said.

"It's all about having an exit strategy," Dr Zubaidi explained. He said, "The question is: what are these people's experiences once they come off the injection?"

What's recommended

Dr Zubaidi expressed worry that without additional support for people making the transition, society's unhealthy relationship with food means little will change.

"The environment that people live in needs to be one that promotes health, not weight gain," he said.

The UK's medicine watchdog, National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), recommended that patients receive at least a year of ongoing advice and tailored action plans after they've stopped treatment.

This would help them make practical changes to their lives, enabling them to maintain the weight loss and, most importantly, stay healthy.

But for those who pay for the drugs privately, like Tanya, this kind of support is not always guaranteed.

Weight-loss drugs in India

Weight loss jabs have done for many what diets could never do.

Recently, Novo Nordisk's injectable drug Ozempic entered the Indian market. Apart from Ozempic, Wegovy is another weight-loss drug approved for use in India. It was launched in India on 24 June. India's drug regulator also approved the launch of Eli Lilly's weight-loss drug, Mounjaro, Reuters reported on 26 June 2025.