Entertainment
Lizzo Was ‘Extremely Suicidal’ at the Start of Weight Loss Journey
Lizzo is opening up about her mental health while on her weight loss journey.
“I started losing weight in the fall of 2023. I was severely depressed. I had been the subject of vicious scandal, and it felt like the whole world turned its back on me. I became deeply suicidal,” Lizzo, 37, wrote in a Sunday, November 23, Substack post. “I cut off all my loved ones.”
Lizzo (real name Melissa Jefferson) explained that she “couldn’t trust anyone” after the “scandal,” referring to three of her former backup dancers filing a lawsuit against her in 2023, noting that her “former close colleagues and friends” began coming out and making “things up” about her.
(In court documents obtained by Us Weekly at the time, the group sued Lizzo for sexual and religious harassment, disability discrimination, creating a hostile work environment and more. She has denied their claims.)
Lizzo is proud of her weight loss transformation. “Somebody told me, ‘Thank you for giving me a safe space to celebrate my health journey wins,’” Lizzo, 37, wrote via Instagram on Saturday, September 13. “All I wanna do is inspire people to enjoy their bodies no matter what.” The musician (real name Melissa Jefferson) also […]
“God knows why. I supposed to kick me while I’m down? Fifteen minutes of fame? I guess I’ll never know. That resulted in my extreme isolation,” Lizzo wrote on Sunday. “I was angry every single day. Mostly because I couldn’t go out and defend myself. I couldn’t tell the world the truth because no one would believe me.”
Lizzo explained that she “needed a way to process [her] pain through [her] body,” so she began pilates. She admitted to sometimes crying after her workout sessions.
“I found that I had lost some weight in that process, but it wasn’t as significant as it is now,” she wrote. “Because it wasn’t intentional. I’d decided that winter to sit and record a video saying I wanted to intentionally lose weight. Why? I guess I felt like I had lost everything, and I wanted to change. After talking to a few therapists I discovered that my weight had been a protective shield, a joyful comfort zone, and even sometimes a super hero suit to protect me through life. My weight, like my hair, represented time. It stored energy. And I wanted to release myself from it.”
Lizzo explained that she began perceiving her weight loss as not a pound “lost’ but a pound “released.” She noted that she’s not one of the “big girl celebrities” that have had “dramatic changes” to their body for medical reasons.
Lizzo is proud of her weight loss progress, which she denied was the result of using Ozempic. “When you finally get Ozempic allegations after 5 months of weight training and calorie deficit,” Lizzo, 36, wrote in a social media video on Friday, September 20. In the clip, Lizzo (real name Melissa Jefferson) flashed a closed-mouth […]
“I wanted to change how I felt in my body. I had been holding onto so much since my father passed away in 2009. I had been holding onto relationships that were deeply abusive and toxic since 2011,” she wrote. “I had been carrying the weight of supporting my family since 2016. I wanted to let-it-the-f*** go.”
In Lizzo’s mind, her weight loss journey was “never” about being “thin” — and she doesn’t think it’s possible for her to be “considered actually ‘thin’” by conventional standards.
“I will always have the stretch, and the skin of a woman who carries great weight,” she wrote. “And I’m proud of that. Even when the world doesn’t want me to be. The way I’ve been treated as a public figure since I was introduced to the world as a confident, body positive figure has been borderline emotional abuse. And it’s simply because of my weight.”
She continued, “Nevertheless, I made it work for me. I trolled the hell out of those obnoxious memes. I was self-aware that I was the butt of every fat joke on the Internet. And yet I continued to be who I am, because it’s the only thing I know how to be. And even in being myself, no one really believed it.”
Courtesy of Lizzo/Instagram Lizzo is celebrating both big and small goals in her ongoing and “intentional” weight loss journey. “I did it,” the Grammy-winning rapper, 36, wrote via Instagram on Saturday, January 25. “Today when I stepped on my scale, I reached my weight release goal.” She added, “I haven’t seen this number since 2014! […]
Lizzo noted that she discovered people thought she was being “performative” and that she had “internalized fatphobia.” She became “sick and tired” of her “identity being overshadowed by [her] fatness.” While reflecting on her career, Lizzo noted that she’s “made some questionable posts,” including a “smoothie detox,” but has been “very conscious” of how she presents her “weight release” with the public.
While claiming that plus-sized models are “no longer getting booked for modeling gigs” and that “all of our big girls are not-so big anymore,” Lizzo noted that she’s “still a proud big girl.”
“Objectively Big. Over 200 pounds,” she wrote. ‘And I love myself as much as I’ve loved myself no matter what the scale says. There may be some bad actors amongst us. Some people may have used the movement for financial gain or fame, and once it no longer served them they abandoned it. That’s OK, it was never about them anyway.”
She continued, “We have a lot of work to do, to undo the effects of the ozempic boom. I have a lot of work to do to regain the trust of the movement that gave me wings. It is work I am willing and ready to do. What do we do? We continue to have conversations. We continue to hold each other accountable. We release ourselves from the illusion that there is only good and bad. We re-introduce nuance into our discussions. I want us to allow the body positive movement to expand and grow far away from the commercial slop its become. Because movements move..”
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org.
Continue Reading
