Revealed! ‘Precious’ Star Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss Journey

Thestyle Writes
thestylewrites
Published in
11 min readMay 27, 2020

‘PRECIOUS’ ACTRESS WEIGHT LOSS | The Stunning Transformation Of Gabourey Sidibe

Actress Gabourey Sidibe catapulted from college plays to the big screen when director Lee Daniels hired her to star in the 2009 film Precious. Since then, she’s had a vibrant career and served as a great role model for plus-size women. Today, she’s confident in herself and comfortable in her own skin, but it took a long time for her to get there. Let’s take a look at Gabourey Sidibe’s Weight Loss and her stunning transformation through the years.

Let’s have a look on all the types of struggles she went through and achieved the place where she is now!

HARD TIMES: ‘Precious’ Actress Weight Loss

Gabourey MaLingair Sidibe was born on May 6, 1983 in Brooklyn, NY. According to Nylon, her first name means “ the one with the beautiful cheeks” and her middle name means “my queen” Entertainment is in Sidibe’s blood. Alice Tan Ridley, her mother, has been singing on subway platforms on the side for 30 years, trying to build a career. Ridley finally got featured on America’s Got Talent at age 57.

And made her first record at age 63.

While Sidibe has singing talent herself, she initially wanted no part of show business. In a 2015 interview with Buzz Feed, the actress said “Watching her struggle made me want to get a 9-to-5 job”…”I didn’t want to struggle”. I didn’t want to wonder where my next pay check was coming from.”

DADDY ISSUES: Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss

The actress told Nylon in 2017 that her father, Ibnou Sidibe, beat her and called her fatso when she was young. The actress admitted that her childhood gave her a lot of acting practice. She told the magazine “I grew up pretending I was okay when I wasn’t”. She admitted that she’s long disregarded by her father, and that she’s tried to move on. The little girl in her may still be upset, but she no longer believes that she is a victim anymore.

DIETING: Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss

Vulture covered her 2014 speech at the Ms. Foundation’s Gloria Awards and Gala. In it, she said. “I got made fun of at home too, my older brother hated me, my dad just didn’t understand me, and my mom, who had been a fat girl at my age herself, understood me perfectly” Though her mom had the same weight problems, she berated Sidibe because she knew what she was up against. Unfortunately, this made Sidibe feel that, even at home, she was unsafe. She swallowed her feelings by eating even more, sardonically noting, Nothing says, ‘You hurt my feelings. F- you!’ like eating a delicious cookie. Cookies never hurt me.

TEENS CAN BE MEAN: Precious Actress Weight Loss Struggles

When Sidibe appeared on Andy Cohen’s Watch What Happens Live in 2016, a caller asked for help because her adolescent daughter was being bullied in school due to being overweight. Her answer, “Find out what she loves about herself and to keep it with her every time somebody bullies her”. The way Sidibe got through her adolescent years? “I knew every song on the radio, and so I sang a lot. Older classes, like the senior girls, would come to find me in school and have me sing their favorite song, which is weird. That’s kind of what I found that I liked about myself.”

LESSONS FROM A SEX OPERATOR:

In her 2017 book This Is Just My Face: Try Not to Stare Sidibe talks about how when she was 21, her therapist at the time suggested she get a telemarketing job to pay the bills. But, she says, for some reason, she took telemarketing to mean phone sex operator. She recounted part of her story with Glamour. Sidibe learned quickly that the job was really about keeping the callers on the line long enough to ring up the bill. She also had to pretend to be white on the phone, because, it was a rule that you were not allowed to be any other race than white.

She says, “According to what I had already seen at this company, the average talker was a plus-size black woman. That’s right, white dudes! You might think you’re talking to Megan Fox, but you’re actually talking to…well…me! After three years on the job, she learned a lot that would benefit her acting career. She says, “I took what I learned about secrets, shame, and pleasure, and applied it to the real world around me.”

LANDING PRECIOUS:

Sidibe had dabbled a little in acting, but wasn’t very serious about it. Then she heard about the opportunity to play the part in the movie Precious, based on the novel Push, by Sapphire. Precious Jones is an obese, illiterate New York teenager who has had one child by her father, and is pregnant with the second. While not a happy story, it does become a more hopeful one and, one especially close to the heart, for a young actress with a real history of an abusive father.

According to The New York Times it had taken months to find the right person to play Precious, and it was Sidibe, who showed up late but blew everyone away. She cried real tears in the audition. Explaining her portrayal of the character, she told The Times, “I kind of had in my mind that she wasn’t the ugliest person in the room, but she felt like she was”.

TAKING OFF:

Sidibe has landed numerous plum roles since ‘Precious’. She appeared on The Big C, several iterations of Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story, Difficult People, and the 2011 movie Tower Heist. She currently co-stars in the hit FOX series Empire as Becky, a one-time assistant at the record company, who worked her way up to vice president of the company.

The Los Angeles Times wrote that the role was originally supposed to be a “boyish, petite white girl, but Sidibe stole their hearts. She told them. “I enjoy the fact that out there is some little girl that is exactly like I was and she doesn’t see herself on TV”. She sees herself in me on the Empire. “If it has to start with me, why not?”

HATERS GONNA HATE:

The actress continues to break barriers in Hollywood. Sidibe’s character Becky had a rooftop s-scene on Empire in 2015. It was treated matter of factly on the drama, but some people trashed her for it.

She regularly blogs about the show for Entertainment Weekly, and said. “I keep hearing that people are ‘hating’ me on it. I’m not sure how anyone could hate on love but that’s okay. You may have your memes. Honestly, I’m at work too busy to check Twitter anyway.#Booked”.

ALWAYS A STRUGGLE: Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss

In Sidibe’s 2017 book, she talks about her battle with depression, anxiety, and bulimia after her parents divorced. Radar Online published an excerpt from her book, where she said. “The bulimia stuck around for about three years”. Throwing up made me feel high. I felt a release around my head like a halo that made me feel lighter physically and emotionally. She revealed to Nylon that she also struggled with panic attacks and depression, even contemplating suicide.

Successful therapy helped change her life for the better. But it’s still not always easy. The actress admitted to the magazine, I have been struggling with weight my entire life. I realize that as long as I have a body, it will be a struggle.

WRITING CHOPS:

Entertainment Weekly readers who check out her Empire blog or who read her Instagram account know that Sidibe is also a talented and funny writer. In 2017, the rest of the world discovered this, with the release of her memoir, “ This Is Just My Face: Try Not to Stare”.

When she announced in 2015 that she was working on the book, Sidibe shared in a statement to Vulture, “I’ve been writing since I was a child and have always had so many stories to tell that are too long, shady, and impolite to share in interviews”. She has been compared to Mindy Kaling and David Sedaris. Sidibe knows that she’s got an amusing style, but notes in the book that we don’t all have the same sense of humor, and that if we did, “We’d all be making out with each other all the time and we’d never get anything done”.

BODY WAR: Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss Journey

Body war Sidibe has said that she tried for years to lose the weight, but nothing stuck for good. In 2017, she told People that she had under gone weight loss surgery the previous year.

The actress admits that the surgery was her savior. She wouldn’t have been able to lose the weight without it. She told the magazine that she now works out regularly by swimming and riding a big tricycle, has a nutritionist, and is eating better. It has taken me years to realize that what I was born with is all beautiful. “I did not get this surgery to be beautiful. I did it so I can walk around comfortably in heels. I want to do a cartwheel. I want not to be in pain every time I walk up a flight of stairs”.

While she made an intentional decision to keep the number of pounds dropped to herself, she is significantly thinner than she was before the 2016 surgery. She told the magazine after her surgery, “I was in a war with my body for a long time. If I’d started treating it better sooner, I wouldn’t have spent so many years hating myself. But I love my body now”.

THE FUTURE IS BRIGHT:

Not only does Sidibe have a thriving acting and writing career, and is going on her very first book tour for Try Not to Stare, she is trying her hand at directing. In 2016, she helmed a short film called The Tale of Four, which gets its plotline from the Nina Simone song ‘Four Women.’

The actress continues to be a role model ass he loses weight and ups her fitness level, her sense of humor always shining through. She told Nylon, “Listen, I’m a solitary, selfish person…But I hear people tell me about how my struggle shave helped them”, and I’m glad that my selfishness is helpful to someone else…I love my body and I deserve love. We all do, at any size”. It’s hard to argue with somebody with so much life experience who isn’t afraid to tell it like it is.

Bravo, Sidibe. We’re with you every step of the way.

GABOUREY SIDIBE NET WORTH, SHORT BIOGRAPHY, CAREER HIGHLIGHT

  • Born: 6 May 1983 (age 37 years), Bedford-Stuyvesant, New York, United States
  • Height: 1.65 m
  • Upcoming movie: Antebellum
  • Books: This Is Just My Face: Try Not to Stare
  • Award: Satellite Special Achievement Award For Outstanding New Talent -2009 — Precious, Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead 2010 — Precious, NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture 2010 — Precious

Gabourey Sidibe Networth

American actress Gabourey Sidibe was born on the 6th of May 1983 in bed first row vaunt New York City of pert single E’s ancestry. Through her father and is an actress probably best known for her debut title role as Clarissa precious Jones and the movie precious directed by Lee Daniels. Sidibe’s acting in this movie was praised by many and she was nominated for an Academy Award.

There might occur the question on how rich is Gabourey Sidibe. As admit 2017 celebrity dot money estimates that Gabourey is net worth is over 6 million dollars accumulated during her acting career which only began in 2009 so it would be no surprise of her net worth was to rise.

Sidibe mother is singer Alice tan Ridley. Who appeared on America’s Got Talent, while her father Ibnou Sidibe is a cab driver. She was educated at the borough of Manhattan Community College City College of New York and graduated from Mercy College.

Before her career as an actress started work as a receptionist in Fresh Air Fund. Sidibe debut and precious won her such awards as a golden globe Sundance Film Festival grand jury and two Academy Awards. Later Gabourey acted and yelling to the sky in which she had an opportunity to work with victoria Mahoney, Zoe Kravitz, Jason Clarke, Tim Blake Nelson, Shakira ups, and many others.

Other Movies at cabaret has appeared and include Tower Heist white bird in a blizzard and Seven Psychopaths among others. All these appearances not only made the activity more popular and acclaimed but also positively affected the growth of Gabourey Network. In addition to her roles in movies Gabourey has also appeared in several television shows, Saturday Night Live, Glen MartinDDS, American Dad, and the Big C to name a few. What is more she is appearing in the television show American Horror Story hotel following the original American Horror Story Kovan and the first sequel American Horror Story freak show. In which she works with Connie Britton, EvanPeters, Dylan McDermott, plays affirm, EAGAZachary Quinto, Jessica Lange’s, and others.

For the last three seasons she has starred in the TV series Empire as Becky Williams. So her net worth continues to rise. Also Sidibe has appeared in music videos including don’t stop, color on the walls by Foster the People, and I want him Channing all over your tatah by Jamie Foxx and Channing Tatum. They have also added two Gabourey net worth. During her career Sidibe has won several awards and gained many nominations. They wore says she has won include is Chicago International Film Festival, Detroit Film Critics Society, Florida Film Critics Circle, Hollywood Film Fest Eva, and Phoenix Film Critics society Awards. In her personal life there is no hint of any romantic relationships but she is very open about other aspects of her life including behavior and likes and dislikes.

Also Watch: Gabourey Sidibe on her weight loss surgery: The Only Mattered Was Mine

Top 10 Tweets By “PRECIOUS” Movie Star Gabourey Sidibe

Here are the top 10 tweets by this empire queen actress will make you realize how confident she is about her after having a lot many struggles in her life!

Let’s have a look at her top 10 Tweets below.

Before And After Images- Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss

Below are marvelous images of the stunning actress Gabourey Sidibe Weight Loss that will leave you absolutely stunned about so far how has she changed her completely.

Aren’t these images absolutely rocking! It’s great to see how far the actress has come and made her journey pretty graceful despite all the struggles and hurdles in her life.

Takeaway-

I bet after going through Gabourey Sidibe’s weight loss journey you all might be definitely inspired in any of the perspectives. But her struggles will make you give a second thought about your problems and will boost up your confidence and energy to conquer them gracefully the way she did!

Originally published at https://thestylewrites.com on May 27, 2020.

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