Oprah Winfrey is no stranger to weight-related scrutiny. The icon’s bodily journey has been documented in the media, on magazine covers, and on episodes of her own eponymous smash talk show, which aired for 25 seasons.
“It was public sport to make fun of me for 25 years,” Winfrey says in this week’s cover story for PEOPLE. “I have been blamed and shamed, and I blamed and shamed myself.”
One humiliating experience happened early in her career when she was named on the list of scathing fashion critics, Mr. Blackwell. “I was on the cover of some magazine, and it said, ‘Dumpy, Frumpy, and Downright Lumpy,'” says the new film’s co-producer. (Winfrey played the lead in the original 1985 picture.) “I didn’t feel enraged. I was depressed. I was hurt. I swallowed my embarrassment. I accepted responsibility.”
She says, “No more.”
Winfrey, who turns 70 next month, believes she now has a better understanding of how to maintain a healthy weight over time and finally free herself of guilt. Winfrey admits she has added a weight-loss drug to her routine as part of a comprehensive strategy that includes daily exercise and other lifestyle changes.
Weight variations “occupied five decades of space in my brain, yo-yoing and feeling like why can’t I just conquer this thing, believing willpower was my failing?” says Winfrey, whose tenacious rehab following knee surgery in 2021 sparked what has been steady weight loss over the previous two years.
“After knee surgery, I began hiking and setting new weekly distance goals.” “Eventually, I’ll be able to hike three to five miles every day, with a 10-mile straight-up hike on weekends,” she adds. “I felt stronger, more fit, and more alive than I’d felt in years.”
“I eat my last meal at 4 o’clock, drink a gallon of water a day, and follow the WeightWatchers point-counting principles,” she explains. I was aware of [weight-loss] drugs, but I thought I needed to demonstrate that I had the discipline to use them. That is no longer the case.”
She went on to say, “I was actually recommending it to people long before I was on it myself.”
The turning point in Winfrey’s approach to utilizing pharmacological assistance came in July, during a filmed panel discussion with weight reduction specialists and physicians titled The State of Weight, which was part of Oprah Daily’s Life You Want series.
“I had the biggest audience, along with many people in that audience,” she says of the September talk. “I realized I’d been blaming myself all these years for being overweight, and I have a predisposition that no amount of willpower is going to control.”
“Obesity is a disease,” she says. It’s not a matter of willpower; it’s a matter of the brain.”
Winfrey claims she “released my own shame about it” after reconciling the facts and seeing her doctor, who then prescribed a weight-loss drug. “I now use it as I feel I need it, as a tool to manage not-yoing,” she explains, declining to name the medicine.
“The fact that there is a medically approved prescription for losing weight and staying healthy in my lifetime feels like relief, redemption, and a gift, rather than something to hide behind and be mocked for.” I’m sick and tired of being ashamed, especially by myself.
Winfrey is conscious of the attention focused on her physical size, especially since the usage of weight loss drugs such as Wegovy, Ozempic, and Mounjaro has grown in popularity. However, she emphasizes that it has not been a one-size-fits-all answer.
“It’s everything,” she adds of her comprehensive health and exercise regimen. “I know everyone assumed I was on it, but I worked so hard.” I know it doesn’t work for me if I’m not also working out and staying on top of everything else.”
She began the drug before Thanksgiving “because I knew I was going to have two full weeks of eating,” she recalls, and “rather than gaining eight pounds like the previous year, I gained half a pound… It muffles the sound of the meal.”
Despite being seven pounds shy of her desired weight of 160 pounds, Winfrey maintains, “It’s not about the number.” Instead, she is satisfied with the progress she has made in the two years following her operation. “It was a second shot for me to live a more vital and vibrant life,” she said.
“I live on a mountain in Hawaii, and there’s this gigantic hill. Every morning, I’d look out the window and say, ‘God, one day I want to go up that mountain.’ I did it over Christmas last year. It felt like a rebirth.”