Oprah Winfrey has faced public scrutiny over her weight since she first graced our screens. But, nearly 50 years after her career began, she finally released the shame of her weight. In an honest conversation with her best friend, Gayle King, Oprah shared how a GLP-1 weight loss medication changed her life and how she has learned to stop blaming herself.
This shift marks a major turning point in the cultural conversation around obesity, moving it away from a discussion of willpower and toward an understanding of clinical biology.
Oprah, 71, joined Gayle on CBS Mornings to discuss her new book, Enough, which she co-wrote with Dr. Ania Jastreboff from the Yale School of Medicine. The title comes from an enough point – “the weight [people] kind of always gravitate to,” explained Dr. Ania.
“Our body’s like, ‘Well, if you’re gonna eat less, then I’m gonna make you more efficient. I’m gonna make you burn less,'” said Dr. Ania. “So what happens is, together, collectively, we end up eating more, and burning less.”
Oprah decided to write Enough out of a place of honesty and vulnerability. She wanted to take ownership of the discussions about her weight. Gayle candidly told her friend: “I’ve been with you through [all] this and never thought, ‘Wow you’re fat.'”
“Well, you’re my friend,” Oprah responded, noting that the public thought exactly that. And over the years, the renowned journalist blamed herself and thought her weight was some kind of failure.
“For you Oprah, I know for years you blamed yourself thinking, ‘Why can’t I just do this? I can be a success in so many things, why can’t I do this?'” Gayle told her.
© InstagramOprah, like millions of Americans, suffers from obesity. Per the CDC, the prevalence of obesity among adults 20 and over was 41.9% from 2017 to 2020, meaning more than 100 million adults in the country have obesity.
Obesity is a chronic disease and public health crisis that leads to many other chronic diseases, including diabetes and heart disease. Yet, we treat it like an individual and moral failure to be obese. Dr. Ania and Oprah are working to change that.
“Every time somebody says, ‘Just eat less, move more,’ we’re asking our patients to control their biology and hold their breath. And it’s just not possible. And why would we do that? We don’t do that for any other disease,” Dr. Ania told CBS Sunday Mornings.
© FilmMagicGLP-1 medications, like the ones Oprah takes, work by mimicking naturally occurring hormones that signal fullness to the brain. The medication effectively quiets the constant food noise and metabolic resistance that many patients with obesity face daily.
She explained to Gayle: “Oprah lived the biology [and] her body wanted to live at a higher point.” All of that changed when Oprah started taking a GLP-1 weight loss medication. She lost around 40-50 pounds, with 160 being her goal weight.
Even with the GLP-1, the shame spiral still swirled around her. “I was so motivated by shame that I felt I could not take the drug,” she said. “Because if I took the drug – I, who had been the poster child for I can do it, I can do it, I can do it, willpower, willpower, let’s just get more willpower – if I couldn’t do it, then I would be shamed, and ashamed of myself for not being able to do it myself.”
© InstagramBut, Oprah has worked hard to eradicate that shame. She recognizes that GLP-1s are not a “miracle drug.” Oprah is working out “more now” than ever before, and can even deadlift 130 pounds – weightlifting is especially important for patients on GLP-1s as they experience rapid weight lift.
As she told Gayle: “I want people to stop blaming themselves and shaming themselves, because it’s not about willpower.”
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