Dr. Brittany Booth vividly recalls the mortifying incident that served as her wake-up call for change. As a young doctor, nearing the age of 30, she had just graduated from medical school and was working as a resident physician in Pennsylvania. Her duties heavily involved advising patients on maintaining a healthy lifestyle, particularly through weight management.

However, these discussions became increasingly challenging as Dr. Booth struggled with her own weight, which soared to 230 pounds—considered morbidly obese for her 5-foot-2-inch stature.

The turning point came during an encounter that left her deeply embarrassed. While counseling an overweight patient on how shedding pounds could naturally lower his blood pressure, he retorted with a pointed suggestion: “Well, you go first.”

Then came her moment of humiliation. 

She was explaining to an overweight patient how he could lower his blood pressure naturally by slimming down,when he snapped back: ‘Well, you go first.’

‘He was kind of snickering at me,’ Dr Booth recalls.

And these awkward encounters became more frequent, with patients pointing out Dr Booth’s hypocrisy.

Dr Brittany Booth, pictured left at 320lbs and right today, lost half her body weight over two years after following a diet plan that saw her consume virtually no carbs

Like many overweight people, she had tried every fad diet under the sun, but had always abandoned efforts after being disappointed by slow progress.

It didn’t help that she was prone to comfort eating, often consuming half a tub of ice cream a day.

But the embarrassing encounters with her patients gave her a new determination to shed the weight and she made herself a promise – in August 2014.

‘I decided I didn’t care how long it took or how slow the progress was, I was determined to get healthy again,’ she said.

What followed was a two-year struggle that eventually saw her lose a total of 120lbs – at a pace of about 1lb a week.

Nine years on, and now 41, Dr Booth has succeeded in keeping the fat off and today weighs around 110lbs.

And she has done it all without the use of weight-loss drugs – instead changing her diet and introducing moderate exercise into her routine.

She began by sifting through online diet plans and quickly noted a striking trend.

She learned that America’s obesity problem had begun in the early 1980s, around the time US dietary guidelines promoting a low-fat, high-carb diet were introduced.

Back then, around 15 percent of Americans were obese, estimates suggest, compared to more than 40 percent today.

Experts say few people actually followed the ‘low-fat, high-carb’ advice, but the guidelines prompted food companies to reformulate their products, cutting fat and adding sugar or refined carbs to make foods taste better and appear ‘healthier’.

We now know, however, that carbs lead to weight gain, not fats – though many fad diets have not kept pace.

So Dr Booth decided to flip the script and switched to her own low-carb, high-fat plan.

She largely focused on healthy, unsaturated fats found in olive oil, fatty fish and, at lower levels, in beef and pork. Doctors now say these can help to improve cholesterol, lower blood pressure and reduce inflammation.

Dr Booth followed a plan where she ate no carbs for six out of seven days of the week, only meat and vegetables. 

She did not count her calories and still ate three meals a day, filling her plate with greens and ensuring every meal contained a fist-sized portion of meat for protein – including bacon, chicken, pork and even burgers without the bun. For snacks, she had nuts or cheese. 

She also gave up those daily ice cream binges.

Dr Booth also started to incorporate more exercise into her day, steering clear of running or weightlifting, but using other strategies such as parking further away from the office to walk more and talking the stairs instead of the elevator.

Dr Booth started her weight loss journey in August 2014 after she noticed some patients snickering at her. She has managed to keep the weight off for nine years after reaching her goal weight in August 2016

Her weight loss was slow compared to those on weight-loss drugs, and there were some weeks where she did not lose any weight or even gained a few pounds.

Compared to her 1lb-per-week loss, people who turn to Ozempic, Wegovy or similar drugs, typically lose around double the amount of weight every week.

At the time, she was also juggling work and caring for her children – and because her kids were fussy eaters, she had to make two meals every night, one for herself and another for the kids.

Of course, back in 2014, Ozempic was not available when Dr Booth started losing weight. Now, she says, she would definitely have used it.

However, she added that by not resorting to weight-loss drugs she was able to built habits that have allowed her to both lose weight and keep it off. 

Only about 20 percent of people who come off weight-loss drugs manage to maintain their slimmer frame, research suggests. Nearly one in five regain all the weight they have lost and more. 

Doctors say this is likely because they did not also build the healthy habits that would help them to maintain the weight loss.

‘I think I am happy with the way I lost the weight because it shows that you do it on your own. I think it gives me a little more credibility even,’ she said.

‘We have this standard now, right now with GLP-1s, where you can lose like ten pounds a week.

‘But rapid weight loss is not healthy in general, because it can lead to other medical problems.’

Dr Booth said her weight rose, in part, because she would binge eat ice cream and would use it both as a reward and to relieve stress

‘Your body is like an equilibrium, and when you are shifting fat cells and fluids and all of the other components of weight loss, your body has to readjust,’ she said.

‘If you’re losing massive amounts of weight too quickly, it can be really dangerous. And then, there is, of course, the cosmetic side of it. You’re going to get saggy skin, you’re going to get wrinkles. It doesn’t look good when you lose weight too quickly. And, also, you lose a lot of muscle.’

Doctors warn that rapid weight loss involving a very restrictive diet can also lead to nutrient deficiency, muscle loss, fatigue, loose skin and other complications.

Dr Booth said she was ‘100 percent certain’ that the slow weight loss allowed her skin to retract much better than in many Ozempic patients, although she still needed to have some surgery to remove the skin.

‘I literally lost a whole person. So, I did have some extra skin around my tummy and some extra skin around my arms, and I did have that removed, although it wasn’t really necessary; it was purely cosmetic,’ she said.

After reaching her goal weight, Dr Booth went on to build her own weight-loss clinic, Body by Barker, in York, Pennsylvania. Dr Booth’s middle name is Barker.

‘In general, people take my advice more seriously now, and specifically when I am coaching on weight,’ she said. ‘They consider me something of an expert because I have done it all myself.’