Oprah Winfrey continues to speak out on the hazards of diet culture, including her own experiences with weight shaming and fatphobia.
During a recent appearance on The Jamie Kern Lima Show, the 70-year-old discussed how her weight was often criticized for amusement and how she felt too ashamed to attend public events.
Winfrey admitted that she once skipped a party hosted by Miami Vice actor Don Johnson, saying, “I wouldn’t go because I thought I was too fat to go.” At the time, she stated that her weight had fluctuated between “145 [lbs.]” while filming her show to “157 [lbs.] over the course of, like, a week and a half or two.”
According to the multi-hyphenate superstar, her weight became a joke among many, including the sketch comedy show In Living Color.
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“In Living Color had done a skit where the woman was doing something, and she just kept eating and getting fatter and fatter and fatter, and the comedy bit was that eventually she just exploded,” she said, referring to the 1990 episode in which Kim Wayans played Winfrey’s talk show days. “The whole audience fell out [laughing] and the woman was me.”
The Color Purple actress also revealed that she was most “offended” by a TV Guide magazine edition. Winfrey recalled the late reviewer, Richard Blackwell, calling her “bumpy, frumpy, and downright lumpy” on the October 1990 cover.
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“I ingested that, I swallowed it like it was a pill designed just for my body and I took in all the shame,” she told herself. “And I acknowledged that the labels that people have given me–being obese, being overweight, being unable to manage my willpower, having no willpower–are my shame. That is it. They are correct.
Winfrey, who has found a way to “bury the shame” of her weight-loss journey, noted that her weight was the subject of “25 years” of jokes. Since then, she has advocated for medical assistance in losing weight, however she has not revealed the medications she utilizes.
Last year, she discussed obesity and weight reduction on the television show An Oprah Special: Shame, Blame, and the Weight reduction Revolution, when she referred to an unknown “medically approved prescription for managing weight and staying healthier,” as a “gift.”
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“I’m absolutely done with the shaming from other people and particularly myself,” she told us.
Watch the whole interview with Jamie Kern Lima below.
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