Shonda Rhimes is not OK with people treating her differently just because she lost weight.
The TV queen, who has blessed us with shows like "Grey's Anatomy" and "Scandal," recently opened up about her weight loss of "close to 150 lbs" in her new Shondaland newsletter. In her note, the 47-year-old revealed that both men and women started to treat her as a more valuable person only after she shed some pounds.
"Women I barely knew gushed. And I mean GUSHED. Like I was holding-a-new-baby-gushed," Rhimes revealed. "Only there was no new baby. It was just me. In a dress. With makeup on and my hair all did, yes. But...still the same me. And men? They spoke to me. THEY SPOKE TO ME. Like stood still and had long conversations with me about things. It was disconcerting. But even more disconcerting was that all these people suddenly felt completely comfortable talking to me about my body. Telling me I looked 'pretty' or that they were 'proud of me' or that 'wow, you are so hot now' or 'you look amazing!'"
What the hell did they see me as before?
Rhimes was rightly confused by men and women's new attitudes towards her and went on to call out the ridiculousness of it all.
"After I lost weight, I discovered that people found me valuable. Worthy of conversation. A person one could look at. A person one could compliment. A person one could admire," she wrote.
"You heard me. I discovered that NOW people saw me as a PERSON. What the hell did they see me as before? How invisible was I to them then? When I was fat, I wasn't a PERSON to these people. Like I had been an Invisible Woman who suddenly materialized in front of them. Poof! There I am. Thin and ready for a chat."
The famed TV producer then ended her newsletter with a powerful message: "Being thinner doesn't make you a different person. It just makes you thinner."
Rhimes rarely opens up about her weight loss, which is what makes her message that much more important. She is reminding us that self-worth is not determined based on your appearance.
And while losing weight might be healthy for some people, equating self-worth and appearance can actually be dangerous and can lead to eating disorders or mental health problems, such as depression.
So thank you Shonda for the little reminder that people are people no matter what.
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