Op-Ed: I Judged Serena Williams For Using A Weight-Loss Drug — Now, I Get It

Serena Williams is using weight-loss medication, and people have a lot of thoughts about that.

The tennis icon, who is also a mother of two and now 43, revealed that after TODAY, she said she wanted to share her experience to do away with the stigma that comes with using GLP-1s, this idea that you are taking the “easy” way out.

“I was never able to be at a healthy weight, whether it was my joints or blood sugar levels,” she said on the morning show. “It was just always something that I suffered with, and a lot of women actually go through this. My body was actually missing something, no matter what I did.”

This included playing professional tennis, which she returned to months after having daughter Alexis Olympia in 2017. “I’m playing professional tennis. I’m literally training five hours a day and I would always work my way to one point on the scale and it would never go below that.”

“I literally tried everything,” she added. “Running, walking, biking, stairclimbing. You name it, I tried it.”

Initially, she was not for GLP-1s, but then she realized others were getting the results they wanted—and needed—with help from these options. “I looked at it as a sport. As an opponent,” she said of her weight. “I can’t beat this opponent no matter what I did. I have to try something different…eventually I saw my friends using it, saw a lot of people on it. I tried it and it actually worked.”

Admittedly, my first thought when I read the headlines about the tennis star using this method was, “Well, hell. If Serena Williams can’t lose the baby weight, the rest of us are screwed!”

And by “the rest of us,” I just meant me, really. Like the legend, I am a mother of two. I have also struggled with my weight after both pregnancies, gaining much more than I needed to. This was especially the case for me postpartum as I balanced raising a newborn and deciding what to eat. So, now that I’ve found myself content with two kids, I’ve been on a journey since the year began to get back to feeling like myself. Serena was actually one of my inspirations to get started. Seeing her fit back into a denim skirt she’d bought long ago but struggled throughout 202__ to get back into, until she’d finally gotten to her weight-loss goal, motivated me. Of course, I now know whatever weight-loss medication she was using helped in that. But two things: she also shared that in addition to the GLP-1 she utilized, she was exercising a lot. She would share videos of her workouts. So it’s clear she didn’t lean only on “a shot” to get to her desired results.

And no matter how she got there, she was still motivational to me. I had no idea the ins and outs of her journey, but that determination and the ability to return to fighting shape, even if she wouldn’t step on the court again, got me up early in the mornings to jog, cycle, and lift weights. Thanks to people like her, and others whose stories I don’t know but watched kick a– in the gym on social media out in the world, I’m close to 30 pounds down. A change in diet and exercising five days out of the week, first thing in the morning, has gotten me there. That’s my story.

And that’s what is important to remember. Everyone’s story requires a different outline. And while I’ve watched people criticize Williams, calling her out for “giving into peer pressure” and the like, essentially making others who use these methods feel bad, we don’t really know what they needed. What they tried. Some people look amazing postpartum because of their genetics. Others because of unhealthy methods, including severe restriction of their caloric intake. And some people shed the weight the natural way, just to gain it all back.

Over on Netflix right now is a really engrossing documentary, Fit for TV, that follows what it was really like to make and be a contestant on NBC’s former hit, The Biggest Loser. It ran for 16 seasons. Plenty of people shed pounds by going to great lengths, working out for hours in the gym with celebrity trainers like Bob Harper and Jillian Michaels, some even continuing to work themselves ragged off-camera in the hopes of taking home the prize money of $250,000, and to shed the weight they felt had held them back for so long. And while hard work, diet, and exercise are touted as the end-all, be-all, some of the former contestants were honest about the fact that they’d gained a lot of weight back. Some had their metabolism torn up. One winner had gained all of his weight back, this after losing 239 pounds in six months to win Season 8, and skin removal surgery. Meanwhile, contestants who had admitted to trying GLP-1s were leaner than they’d appeared on the show, one stating it cut out “food noise” that leads to binge eating. And there were others who’d clearly gained some weight back, but through their own journey of diet and exercise, felt good in the skin they’re in.

And that’s what’s most important: “There’s no need to deny it. It is what it is,” Williams shared. “I love how I’m feeling now.” We know Serena Williams is nobody’s “lazy.” We know she trains hard. We know what she’s capable of. We’ve seen her do splits while running for tennis balls, and show off abs that would make you want to throw out all of the junk food in your cabinet at first sight. And we know what childbearing can do to all of us physically.

We also know that she is someone who has spent the majority of her life dealing with comments and critiques, specifically about her body. With that in mind, we should do a better job of supporting her decision to do what is best for that body, whether it is through a choice we would make for ourselves or not. And honestly, if you weren’t seeing your hard work pay off in the way you desire, who’s to say you wouldn’t look into all of your options?

Thankfully, though, she doesn’t care if other people claim that she took the “easy” way out. Because really, what does one of the greatest athletes there ever was have to prove?

The post Op-Ed: I Judged Serena Williams For Using A Weight-Loss Drug — Now, I Get It appeared first on Essence.