Achi news desk-
After decades of being publicly ridiculed, shamed and scrutinized for her fluctuating weight, Oprah Winfrey said she was “very excited” about the availability of weight loss medication.
The media mogul’s latest TV one-off, Oprah’s Special One: Shame, Blame, and the Weight Loss Revolutionwhich was broadcast on Monday night.
During the hour-long broadcast, Winfrey, 70, candidly discussed obesity and how weight loss drugs have given her “hope”. Winfrey spoke highly of the medications — not to mention specific name brands like Ozempic — and said she wanted to remove the “stigma and shame and judgment” surrounding using weight-loss drugs.
In front of a studio audience, Winfrey said she had been teased about her weight throughout most of her career.
“I have to say that I took the shame that the world gave me,” Winfrey said. “For 25 years, making fun of my weight was a national sport.”
The talk show host recalled a 1990 cover of TV Guide magazine that featured her photo and the accompanying headline: “Bumpy, lumpy, and downright dumpy.”
Winfrey went on to read aloud a number of more disparaging tabloid headlines about her weight, including “Oprah: Fatter than ever” and “Oprah warns diet or die.”
“In an effort to fight all the shame, I starved myself for almost five months,” Winfrey revealed. “And after losing 67 pounds on a liquid diet, the next day, y’all, y the very next dayI started to win it back.”
Winfrey called obesity “a disease, not a character flaw.”
“I never dreamed in my life that we would be talking about medicines that would give people like me hope,” Winfrey promoted.
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She said the medications, as well as causing her to lose weight, helped Winfrey “stop blaming” herself for fluctuations in her body.
“When I tell you how many times I’ve blamed myself because you think, ‘I’m smart enough to figure this out,’ and then to hear all the time, you’re fighting against your brain!” Winfrey said about losing weight.
He said the medication helped him stop “constantly thinking about what the next meal will be.”
Winfrey added that she also walks three to five miles (about five to eight kilometers) every day, while running and eating a healthy diet regularly to maintain her slim figure.
The TV special featured a number of interviews with medical professionals about weight loss medications. Patients who, like Winfrey, have used these drugs to fight obesity were also interviewed. Many of the users highly praised the medicines, although some users also expressed critical opinions.
Still, Winfrey noted that weight loss drugs may not be for everyone.
“To people who feel happy and healthy celebrating life in a bigger body and don’t want the medications, I say: ‘Bless you,'” Oprah signed off at the end of the hour. “And to all the people who believe that diet and exercise is the best and only way to lose excess weight, bless you too if that works for you.”
Oprah’s Special One: Shame, Blame, and the Weight Loss Revolution will air just weeks after Winfrey announced that she will be leaving her role on the WeightWatchers board of directors. Winfrey, who had been one of the company’s most frequent spokespeople, decided not to stand for re-election to the board after she publicly disclosed that she was taking an unnamed weight loss medication.
Winfrey donated her shares in the company to the Smithsonian’s Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC
In December 2023, Winfrey told People magazine that she was using a weight loss drug as a “maintenance tool” for her fluctuating weight. The revelation came after Winfrey’s social media followers speculated that the star may be taking Ozempic or another similar medication.
Winfrey said she uses weight loss drugs “as a tool for control not yo-yoing.”
Due to popular demand, manufacturers of several drugs, including Ozempic, have experienced shortages that have continued into 2024. The shortage has affected many Canadian patients with Type 2 diabetes, who treat the condition with drugs such as Ozempic. Since then some diabetics who had been using Ozempic have been forced to change their medicines.
& copy 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
