Once again, Selena Gomez is getting real about her body image.
On Monday night, the singer took to her Instagram story to reflect on how her body has changed by comparing two photographs taken 10 years apart.
“Today I realized I will never look like this again,” she wrote alongside the first image of her — taken in 2013 when she was 21 — in which she wears a zebra print bikini while on vacation.
She followed up with a second photograph that was taken in 2023 while she was vacationing in Mexico. In this picture, she wears a black, high-waisted bikini bottom with a white bikini top while climbing onto a yacht from the ocean.
Alongside the more recent photo, the now-31-year-old wrote: “I’m not perfect, but I am proud to be who I am… Sometimes I forget it’s ok to be me.”
If you know anything about Selena, you’ll be aware that she’s always spoken candidly about her body, particularly after she was diagnosed with lupus in 2014.
Due to complications relating to lupus, Selena actually underwent a kidney transplant in 2017, and since then she’s said that a “combination” of these medical factors can cause her to experience “weight fluctuation.”
“I have lupus and deal with kidney issues and high blood pressure, so I deal with a lot of health issues, and for me that’s when I really started noticing more of the body image stuff,” she said during a podcast appearance in 2019.
She said at the time that her fluctuations really depend on “what’s happening in [her] life” and the medication she’s taking to treat her condition. She also confessed that public commentary on her weight can be difficult to deal with.
“It’s the medication I have to take for the rest of my life — it depends on even the month, to be honest,” she explained. “So for me, I really noticed when people started attacking me for that. And in reality, that’s just my truth. I fluctuate.”
“That got to me big time,” she said of people’s comments about her body, before adding: “I don’t care to expose myself to everyone and hear what they have to say about it.”
Over the years, Selena has been praised for how vocal she’s been about her experience with lupus and how it impacts her body image.
Shortly after the Golden Globes in 2023, Selena addressed the persistent and invasive commentary about her body by explaining during a live stream that she tends “to hold a lot of water weight” when she’s taking certain types of medication.
“I would much rather be healthy and take care of myself,” she said at the time. “My medications are important, and I believe that they're what helps me.”
She added: “I just wanted to…encourage anyone out there who feels any sort of shame for exactly what they’re going through, and no one knows the real story.”
