Jazz Jennings has never felt better since losing 70 pounds.
“70 pounds down! Feeling happier and healthier than I’ve been in years,” Jennings, 23, wrote via Instagram on Friday, January 19. “I still have a ways to go, but I’m so proud to finally be taking the necessary steps toward bettering my mind, body and spirit 💜💜💜.”
Jennings’ empowering caption accompanied a bathing suit pic, in which she flashed dual peace signs while hanging out on a beach.
Jennings has long been candid about her weight loss journey, first revealing in 2021 that she struggled with binge eating.
“As many of you have noticed, over the past few years, I have gained a substantial amount of weight,” she wrote via Instagram in June 2021, detailing her food addiction. “My binging, along with an increased appetite I experience from some of the meds I’m on, has caused me to gain almost 100 pounds in a little less than 2 years.”
She added at the time, “I’m ready to change my ways; I’ve been saying I’m ready to turn over a new leaf, but I’m running out of trees now. I’m ready to take the initiative and create positive changes when it comes to my health and body. I have a fabulous team supporting me, both professionals and family/friends, but at the end of the day, I have to be the one committed toward bettering myself. I know I have the power in me to lose the weight.”
Months later, Jennings revealed on her TLC docuseries, I Am Jazz, that her struggles began when she was dealing with “severe” mental health issues in 2019. (Jennings deferred her admission to Harvard University that year amid her mental health battle.)
“Having all this extra weight, I can’t do so many things with my body that I used to be able to do,” she recalled during a November 2021 episode. “I do experience fat-shaming from my family. It makes me feel really humiliated.”
Weeks later, Jennings explained in another episode that she was ready to lose the weight.
“I honestly feel beautiful [at] every shape and size. I love my body the way it is. But I will say that I am trying to lose weight for health reasons,” the LGBTQIA+ activist said in a December 2021 episode. “I have to feel good, too, and I don’t feel good with some of the foods that I have been eating. I really am working on this weight loss so I can be healthier and more me.”
Jennings rose to fame in 2015 when her I Am Jazz series premiered on TLC, which documented her childhood after she publicly came out as transgender. She underwent gender confirmation surgery in 2019.
