Lizzo is pushing the conversation around body image into new territory.
In a newly published Substack essay, the Grammy-winning artist speaks candidly about her own weight change and raises concerns about how the rise of GLP-1 medications is reshaping the cultural landscape for plus-sized women.
In the piece, Lizzo writes that she currently weighs over 200 pounds and still sees herself as “a proud big girl.” But she also says she’s watching the visibility of women her size disappear.
“Extended sizes are being magically erased from websites. Plus-sized models are no longer getting booked for modeling gigs,” she wrote, adding that “we have a lot of work to do to undo the effects of the Ozempic boom.”
Her comments arrive at a moment when the numbers confirm the shift she’s describing. A Gallup/National Health and Well-Being Index survey published in October found that the percentage of U.S. adults using GLP-1 drugs—including Ozempic, Wegovy, Zepbound, and Mounjaro—more than doubled in the last 18 months, rising from 5.8% to 12.4%.
During that same period, the U.S. obesity rate dropped from 39.9% to 37%. Usage is highest among adults ages 50 to 64, and the survey shows that obesity rates in that age group fell by five percentage points.
Lizzo also reflects on her personal decision to lose weight, revealing that she began “releasing” pounds during a period of severe depression in 2023. She says she didn’t begin exercising with aesthetics in mind but out of a need to “process my pain through my body.”
She explains that therapy helped her understand her weight as a “protective shield” she had been carrying for years: “I wanted to let-it-the-f*** go.”
Still, the singer makes clear that the broader issue isn’t about individuals choosing to change their bodies—it’s about how the industry and the culture shift around them. She writes that conversations around weight loss have grown more polarized, even as many women “are tired of being judged.”
By the end of her essay, Lizzo calls for a return to nuance. “We release ourselves from the illusion that there is only good and bad,” she wrote, urging readers to allow the body-positive movement to grow beyond what she calls its “commercial slop.”