Oprah Winfrey Admits She 'Starved Myself for Nearly 5 Months' Over Body Shaming

Oprah Winfrey revealed she went to drastic measures to keep weight off her body back in the day during her new ABC special, An Oprah Special: Shame, Blame and the Weight Loss Revolution.

“In an effort to combat all the shame, I starved myself for nearly five months and then wheeled out that wagon of fat that the internet will never forget,” Winfrey, 70, said of the 1998 moment. "After losing 67 pounds on [a] liquid diet, the next day, the very next day, I started to gain it back. Feeling the shame of fighting a losing battle with weight, is a story all too familiar."

"All these years, I thought all of the people who never had to diet were just using their willpower and they were for some reason stronger than me," she explained. "And now I realize y'all weren't even thinking about the food. It's not that you had the willpower. You weren't thinking about it. You weren't obsessing about it. That is the big thing I learned."

“The thing that’s been the biggest relief for me, and I hope that many of you watching this episode of Shame and Blame, will release the shame for yourself,” she added. “Because I, as I said at the beginning of this, took on the same for myself and carried it for myself. And now that I know that I’m just holding my breath underwater, I have been able to release that shame, and it doesn’t matter what anybody says.”

As OK! previously reported, the actress recently revealed she used weight-loss drugs to help her stabilize — however, she didn't specify which medication she's taking.

"I know everybody thought I was on it, but I worked so d--- hard. I know that if I’m not also working out and vigilant about all the other things, it doesn’t work for me," she said, adding that she took the meds before Thanksgiving "because I knew I was going to have two solid weeks of eating, and "instead of gaining eight pounds like I did last year, I gained half a pound . . . It quiets the food noise."

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Winfrey also clarified she uses it "as as a tool to manage not yo-yoing."

"The fact that there's a medically approved prescription for managing weight and staying healthier, in my lifetime, feels like relief, like redemption, like a gift, and not something to hide behind and once again be ridiculed for. I’m absolutely done with the shaming from other people and particularly myself," she added.