Losing weight alone is quiet, and quiet makes it easy to give up. A weight loss accountability partner fills that silence with check-ins, honesty, PowerPoints, and some motivating pictures.
I opened Instagram, found Joyce’s name, and typed the most dramatic thing I could think of.
Bibii.
Are you happy?
I hit send before I could talk myself out of it. Then I put my phone face down and pretended I wasn’t waiting.
She replied.
What’s with the question 😳
Fair. I’d skipped every polite step of a normal conversation and gone straight to existential.
But that’s where we started. What began as a more-than-quarter-life crisis about careers and where our lives were going slowly drifted, the way late night conversations do.
I saw her IG story and I was amazed! She looked amazing!
Nidaot jud ka bibiiii! Meal secret pleaseee
(You really glowed up, bibi! Meal secret, please!)
Her answer came back simple.
Calorie deficit rajud ko, Charlotte.
(Honestly, I just did a calorie deficit, Charlotte.)
No magic tea. No detox juice. No 5 a.m. routine with ice baths. Just math, and someone willing to tell me the truth about it.
But it didn’t stay simple for long, because my body isn’t simple. We talked about nutrition. Then we talked about the things I usually skip over when people ask why losing weight is hard for me. My PCOS. My myoma. Insulin resistance. She didn’t flinch at any of it. She just listened, asked questions, and took notes (like she literally took down notes).
We talked about supplements too, mainly inositol and berberine. I was already taking berberine at the time. I’d heard so much about it, and since it’s sold as a supplement, I bought a bottle without a prescription to see if it would work for me.
If you’re thinking of trying it, check with your doctor first.
Neither of us treated them like a shortcut, though. They were one small piece of the puzzle. The rest of the puzzle was still on my plate, literally.
Then she did something I wasn’t ready for.
She made me a PowerPoint.
An actual PowerPoint. With slides. For me.
We had a call and she explained how the body works when it comes to food, what a calorie deficit really is, how to figure out your daily calorie rate, and how subtracting from it creates the deficit. Things I had heard a hundred times but never actually understood, laid out like a lesson plan. As a teacher, I recognized the effort immediately. As a friend, I was soooo touched. 🥹
And she didn’t stop there.
MyFitnessPal on my phone to track every meal. A food scale to measure what I was actually eating, not what I thought I was eating. A personal weighing scale so I didn’t have to wait for Pilates to find out my weight. For once, my Shopee cart had a food scale in it instead of my ShopeeFood order having pizza or even bún đậu mắm tôm.
Then came the rules. Cut out sugar. Minimize carbs. More fiber, more protein. Learn the food swaps. Read the labels, all of them, even the ones on things that look innocent. Walk at least 7,000 steps a day.
She sent me recipes. She sent me pointers. She checked in on me. Somewhere along the way, without either of us really deciding it, she became my fitness coach too. She had been through the whole process herself, so she knew exactly where I would struggle before I did.
Here’s the thing nobody tells you about trying to lose weight alone, especially in a country where you can barely order coffee without pointing. It’s quiet. Too quiet. There’s no one to notice when you skip the extra pastry. No one to tell you it’s okay when you don’t.
Joyce noticed. Joyce told me it was okay.
That’s what a weight loss accountability partner really is, I think. Not a drill sergeant. Not a cheerleader with pom-poms. Just someone who has stood exactly where you’re standing and doesn’t flinch when you tell them the number.
Then I stepped on the scale.
97.6.
Wow! Like WOW!
It’s 2.4 kilos. On paper, that’s not much. It’s a bag of rice. It’s a carry-on that’s slightly over the limit. But for the first time in a long time, the number moved in the right direction, and I wasn’t the only one who cared.
I messaged Joyce right away.
I’ll be honest. Right now, I’m running on that first burst of motivation, the kind that makes you meal prep at 11 p.m. and buy new workout clothes you don’t need yet. I know it won’t last forever. Motivation never does.
But hope is a different thing. Hope sticks around a little longer.
The pain on my lower right side is still there. I went to the doctor and the ultrasound showed grade 2 fatty liver.
I wanted to ask what I should do, and whether I needed medication. But when you’re in a foreign country, don’t speak the language, and rely only on Google Translate, everything is a hundred times harder.
Especially when the translated notes from your doctor say you have terminal appendicitis.
Imagine my anxiety and fear kicking in while reading those words.
It turns out he meant I needed another ultrasound to check my appendix. Thank you, Google.
Thankfully, I’d been diagnosed with fatty liver before in the Philippines, so I knew what it meant. No pill. Just a lifestyle change, and the thing I already knew deep down: LOSE SOME WEIGHT.
The luggage is 2.4 kilos lighter. And I’m not carrying it alone.
And somewhere in all of it, I’m still thinking about my own question.
“Charlotte, are you happy?” Yes, I am.
Entry #2
Baseline weight: 100 kg
Current weight: 97.6 kg
Lost so far: 2.4 kg
Goal: 55 kg
Emotional Temp: Hopeful, understood, fired up, and a little relieved
This is my personal journey, not medical or nutritional advice. Please talk to a healthcare professional before making changes to your diet or exercise.
