Lizzo, the award-winning singer and performer, shared deeply personal reflections about her relationship with her body and the cultural shifts reshaping conversations around weight. In a thoughtful essay published on Substack on Nov. 23, 2025, titled “Why is everybody losing weight and what do we do? Sincerely, a person who’s lost weight,” she opened up about her concerns regarding the growing normalization of weight-loss medication use and how it is reshaping the visibility of plus-size women in society.
The artist explained that although she still weighed more than 200 lbs. and remained “still a proud big girl,” she felt troubled by what she saw as a diminishing presence of larger bodies in fashion, entertainment, and online spaces. She wrote about the growing cultural impact of medications such as Ozempic, describing a pattern in which body diversity and size inclusivity appeared to be slipping from mainstream attention.
“So here we are halfway through the decade, where extended sizes are being magically erased from websites. Plus-sized models are no longer getting booked for modeling gigs. And all of our big girls are not-so-big anymore,” she reflected. Lizzo emphasized that “plus-size women are being ‘erased’,” calling for a collective effort to address the consequences of what she referred to as the Ozempic boom.
Her essay not only examined social pressures but also reflected on the emotional labor and identity challenges that come with navigating fame while living in a larger body. By sharing her perspective, Lizzo hoped to spark more honest conversations about body image, representation, and how to build a more inclusive culture that recognizes the complexity of individual health journeys.
Lizzo (2019), (IMAGO/MediaPunch)
In her essay, Lizzo also acknowledged that weight-loss conversations are complicated – deeply personal, layered, and often intertwined with identity. She explained that although the cultural shift around weight concerned her, her own decision to lose weight came from a place of emotional exhaustion and frustration with how her body overshadowed her artistry. She shared that she was “sick and tired” of her identity being “overshadowed” by her weight.
She wrote: “People could not see my talent as a musician because they were too busy accusing me of making ‘being fat’ my whole personality.” Lizzo added that she had spent years confronting stereotypes:
“I had to actively work against ‘mammy’ tropes by being hypersexual and vulgar because being a mammy by definition is being desexualized.”
The singer went on to explain that her weight-loss journey began during a period of intense depression in the fall of 2023, a time she described as extremely dark. She revealed that she was “deeply suicidal,” but something shifted when she made a conscious choice to break old patterns and “turn my extreme inaction into action.”
She wrote about long-standing coping mechanisms:
“The old me would tend to binge when sad and depressed… But this time I just didn’t feel like doing that.”
Instead, she channeled her pain into movement, beginning Pilates as a way to “process my pain through my body.”
She also started going to therapy, where she came to understand that she had been using her weight as a “protective shield” and realized she “wanted to let-it-the-f— go.” Toward the end of her essay, Lizzo urged readers to embrace deeper nuance, writing that the movement must grow beyond rigid categories of “good and bad.”
As she powerfully stated:
“I want us to allow the body positive movement to expand and grow far away from the commercial slop it’s become. Because movements move.”
apost.com
Lizzo (2025), (IMAGO/AFF-USA)
Lizzo’s honesty reminds us that body image is a deeply personal journey shaped by more than what we see on the surface. How do you think society can better support people of all sizes? Let us know, and then pass this on to spark conversations of depth and compassion!