Avoiding Ozempic Noise

Books based around food & eating

I recently sat in a hair dressers chair receiving one of the worst haircuts of my adult life. Internally I cringed as the hair dresser lobbed off inch after inch whilst talking to me about the amazing results from taking Ozempic. Her colleague next to her fizzed with excitement as he joined in to share how many KG he had also lost. It turned out that I was the only one in the room that was not yet on the drug.

Literally 5 minutes earlier I had shared that I was finding the post baby weight difficult to shift, those last few lbs were clinging on and I was still 9 months postpartum waiting to feel my normal self again. I found myself nodding in encouragement to their stories of amazing and easy transformation. My hairdresser even exclaimed that she should work on commission the amount of people who, because of her have signed up to the drug. Then there was definitely a pause. I have never felt more awkward.

Luckily I feel like I can easily laugh in these situations, the ridiculousness of it all. I had gone to the hairdresser for a pick me up. Took the time to feel pampered and maybe walk away feeling more myself. Instead I went away feeling less me than ever before. Fighting back tears in Tesco express buying a kinder beuno and questioning whether or not I should.

Since then I’ve constantly stumbled across Ozempic way too many times since.

The phrase that kept coming up was “food noise”. That voice in your head that thinks about your next meal or snack. The noise I’ve personally found louder is “diet drug” I hear it all the time. But weirdly I hear it from people who are much smaller than average size (UK average is 16) the sudden availability of a drug which, for some people is an amazing tool to help them loose weight but for many others a drug which will support dangerous dieting habits.

It seems jarring conversation to have whilst sitting on the floor of a library singing Peter and Paul in a village, that in 2025 still gets no mobile reception. To everyone seeming to have botox, lip fillers, implants. I ask myself all of the time HOW DID WE GET HERE?

As if Substack has been listening to my conversations and inner thoughts it has been suggesting so many weight loss articles. I’ve clicked on some really great pieces probably encouraging the algorithm. But in contrast it used to be something that I actually thought about very little.

Anyway, I recently picked up The Eyes are the Best Part by Monika Kim (recommended by

Jam Canezal

) which, although isn’t explicitly about food it features plenty of eating eyes and their texture that it made me think about all the other food literature I’ve enjoyed. Or on my TBR….

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Books

• Read along book - anyone out there who would like to join me in a read along and together discuss the book I’ve chosen Piglet by Lottie Hazell. (Full review to come in my July catch up) I know it only leaves a couple of weeks! let me know if you’ve already read it and what you think?

I love how food literature is so visceral, that it can make your mouth water or stomach squirm depending very much on the ingredients. When I was pregnant I started reading Land of Milk and Honey by C Pam Zhang and despite loving the premise the description of food and cooking just kept turning my stomach. I’ve promised myself that I will pick it up again. Set in a dystopian future a chef escapes the city to a remote mountain in Italy where a billionaire and his daughter host meals with those wealthy enough in their community.

Another book that had my mouth literally watering was Crying in K mart by Michelle Zauner this was an xtremely raw memoir exploring grief of losing a parent, one who Zauner had a very complex relationship with. I found it to be so emotional, I loved the way she wrote about her life and her experience and of course made me constantly hungry. The book focuses on Zauner whilst she processes her mother’s death after a battle with cancer whilst also reflecting on their difficulties. It somehow manages to be beautifully tender and funny.

I recently wrote a review on Spoilt Creatures by Amy Twigg which you can read here. With the hot weather and me racing to eat all the food before it spoils it made me think of the constant rotting, spoiling food in this book. The oppressive heat and the sweet sticky sickliness still sits with me.

There are so many books on my TBR based around food, I’ve stumbled across Butter by Asako Yuzuki which everyone seems to be reading as well as Gingerbread by Helen Oyeyemi which was really popular the year of release. I’d love to read Hunger: a memoir of my body by Roxanne Gay a deeply raw and personal memoir.

What are your favourite books based around food or the love language of eating?