Real-life stories of weight loss wins, non-scale victories and life-changing transformations

need to know

• PEOPLE’s new cover story celebrates seven everyday people who changed their lives after getting healthy

• Cover stars Samantha Milton and Charlieh Torres-Vega reflect on their long struggles with weight — and how they lost a collective 360 ​​pounds.

• Obesity is declining in the US, largely due to the use of GLP-1s, and there is growing acceptance of the condition as a treatable disease.

Samantha Milton and Charlieh Torres-Vega walk toward the camera, beaming, arms folded. The two first met less than an hour before their PEOPLE shoot but immediately bonded like warriors fighting a common enemy.

“We had this shared experience as the world looked at it, which was my experience of being very underweight,” says Milton, 29.

Says Torres-Vega, 46: “I understand what it’s like to feel unworthy. I’ve always been a nice person. I’ve always been warm, friendly, but it wasn’t always returned to me because I was heavy.”

Sharing her story now through “Tears of Joy,” she says, “I’m celebrating the inner strength I have in the face of adversity. I want people to know I’ve been there and I know your struggles. I’ve overcome them. You can too. I’m living my best life. Everyone deserves it.”

After facing a long struggle with weight, the women lost a collective 360 ​​lbs. By walking more, eating less and making healthier choices, and, like a growing number of people, by taking weight-loss drugs known as GLP-1s.

Both women say they changed their lives and habits before they got into drugs.

When she began her health transformation, Milton, a mother of three, didn’t have the time or money for a trainer or gym, so she started small by changing her fast food orders to healthier options. (Milton, who now microdoses a compounded version of GLP-1 to maintain her weight and manage her Polycystic Ovary Syndrome symptoms, shares her fast food hacks on social media with the 4 million followers she’s built as a content creator.)

Torres-Vega lost more than 60 lbs. Diet and exercise changes and after a vertical sleeve gastrectomy. But no matter what she did, she realized her body was struggling to lose weight.

“It’s really biology. I have obesity, and my body has this preset weight and it wants to get there by any means necessary,” says Torres-Vega, who now also works as a wellness coach. “Even though I’m disciplined and my nutrition is good, my body still wants to gain this weight.” She started taking GLP-1 “and it’s been a huge key tool that I’ve depended on. I’m really grateful that it’s helped me maintain my health.”

GLP-1s have “revolutionized the way obesity is thought of as a chronic disease,” says Dr. Says Soheb Imtiaz. Imtiaz says obesity in America is declining after decades of growth.

And the decline in obesity rates has been largely attributed to the use of GLP-1s, which will be available as pills starting this year. More than 12 percent of adults in the U.S. report drug use.

But medicine is only a powerful tool for success. Over the next week on PEOPLE.com, PEOPLE will share Milton and Torres-Vegas’ journeys, as well as success stories from five other everyday people, each of whom has had a unique life-changing weight loss path.

Milton says: “It feels like our shining moment.”

Read the original article on People