I was suicidal on Ozempic — it’s not a miracle weight-loss drug for everyone

Amelia had been intent on losing weight most of her life — but this concern had never caused the 35-year-old to consider ending her life.

Last summer, the Canadian woman was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and prescribed the wildly popular “miracle” drug Ozempic (semaglutide) by her doctor, who presented the drug as an easy way for Amelia to shed a few pounds and manage her blood sugar.

Amelia, who asked that her last name be withheld for privacy reasons, avoided filling the prescription for three months since she “didn’t want to focus on the number on the scale.” However, she agreed to begin the weekly injections — which cost as much as $1,350 a month — after finding people online discussing how the drug helped them maintain their glucose levels.

“I didn’t have any mental health issues when I started Ozempic — and then the suicidal ideation just kind of came out of nowhere a couple months after starting it,” the financial analyst and mother of one told The Post of her experience with the extraordinarily in-demand drug.

Amelia’s darkest thoughts eased after a few months but her anxiety worsened and she began to spiral.

“Once my anxiety ramped up in February, my appetite dropped and that’s when I started becoming obsessed. It was just nonstop thinking about food in terms of not eating enough,” she said. “I’d be so stressed out because I had no appetite and then I wasn’t eating, which caused my anxiety to get worse and I started to feel guilty about how little I was eating. It was just like a continuous vicious cycle.”

Despite increasingly mainstream, celebrity-hyped usage, Ozempic and similar injectables have led to a spike in ER visits. The long list of disturbing side effects includes prematurely aging faces and drooping butts, spontaneous diarrhea while sleeping and stomach paralysis. Ozempic is also noted for its ability to stop food fantasies, or, as some on social media have dubbed them, “food noise.”

“So many people praise the aspect of quieting the ‘food noise,’ whereas for me that caused me so much mental stress,” Amelia said. “It almost became obsessive. Like, every day I would spiral and was constantly thinking about how little I was eating, and how terrible that made me feel.”

She eventually turned back to social media to find validation — and discovered others who claimed to also have experienced anxiety, depression and suicidal ideation with taking Ozempic.

The US Food and Drug Administration’s adverse event reporting system received 190 reports of depression and suicide-related mental illnesses connected to Ozempic, along with 84 reports connected to Saxenda and 26 to Wegovy as of June 30.

Meanwhile, European drug safety regulators officially launched an investigation of Ozempic, Saxenda and Wegovy after patients reported that the medicine triggered thoughts of suicide and self-harm.

 All three drugs are manufactured by Novo Nordisk. A representative for the pharmaceutical company said “Novo Nordisk remains committed to ensuring patient safety,” however, “the safety data collected from large clinical-trial programs and post-marketing surveillance have not demonstrated a causal association between semaglutide or liraglutide and suicidal and self-harming thoughts.”

Amelia eventually addressed her concerns with her doctor and insisted on a lower dosage. Since switching to the lowest possible amount in June, Amelia told The Post her appetite returned and her mental health drastically improved.

The FDA requires that medications for weight management that work on the central nervous system, including Saxenda and Wegovy, carry a warning about suicidal thoughts. Ozempic, which is only FDA-approved to treat diabetes, does not come with that warning. 

Although Saxenda warns users of the possible mental health side effects, Leigh — a 27-year-old special education teacher who spoke to The Post — was not prepared for the extent of the impact. The Philadelphia native was shocked at how the change in her relationship with food altered her mental state.

Leigh told The Post the drug, which she was prescribed to manage her weight, “completely took the pleasure out of food,” shrinking her appetite and making most foods seem undesirable or nauseating.

“When you’re really desperate to lose weight you think, ‘Oh, I wish I didn’t have pleasure from food’ and ‘I wish that I didn’t love food so much like that would be so great. Then I could just, like, not eat that much and all the weight would fall off.’ But the second that that pleasure is taken away, that’s not what you want,” she insisted.

Leigh said she felt a lot of shame for taking a medication to lose weight, hiding it from her friends and lying to her family that she had a medical condition that required the prescription.

“I was blaming myself like, ‘Oh, my God, I let myself gain so much weight that this is what I have to do to my body,” she admitted. “I felt like this was a last resort.”

Two months into taking the daily injections, Leigh nearly quit her job, was avoiding hanging out with her friends and “never wanted to do anything.” Her family and boyfriend eventually expressed their concern and Leigh decided to stop taking the medication and work on intuitive eating with a nutritionist. She’s already feeling much better.

While many people are surprised by the connection between these medicalized weight loss and mental health, medical experts are not.

Research has shown that bariatric surgery patients have an increased risk for suicide and self-harm behaviors following the procedure. Lead study author Dr. Alexis Conason, a licensed psychologist in NYC, noted that triggering experiences such as changes in quality of life and unrealistic expectations also occur to those going through other weight loss treatments such as Ozempic.

“People put so much emotion and hope into weight loss, and are sold this fantasy that if they just lose weight everything’s gonna be okay and all the good things that they want in life will come when they lose weight,” Conason told The Post.

It can be devastating when that doesn’t happen.

“It’s not necessarily surprising when you see there may be an increase in suicidal ideation and other things like that because you’ve taken away a really important coping mechanism for many people,” Brooke Boyarsky Pratt, CEO and co-founder of weight-inclusive care company Knownwell, told The Post.

Dr. Gregory Dodell of Central Park Endocrinology also noted that patients on medications that suppress their appetite may not be getting sufficient nutrients, which in turn disrupts their mental stability.

“So much of balancing our body is about what we eat and drink,” he told The Post.

That’s why some experts, including Dr. Angela Fitch, president of the Obesity Medicine Association, recommend patients taking medications that result in weight loss seek comprehensive care, monitor both physical and mental health and be fully educated on realistic expectations and all possible side effects.

“Setting expectations and weight management is a huge problem in our country,” Fitch told The Post.

If you are struggling with suicidal thoughts or are experiencing a mental health crisis and live in New York City, you can call 1-888-NYC-WELL for free and confidential crisis counseling. If you live outside the five boroughs, you can dial the 24/7 National Suicide Prevention hotline at 1-800-273-8255 or go to SuicidePreventionLifeline.org.