Ariana Grande’s health: A timeline of the obsession surrounding her body image

Ariana Grande ought to be celebrating.

The actor and singer is receiving rave reviews for her comedic turn in John M. Chu’s big-screen adaptation of the hit Broadway musical “Wicked.” With her onscreen partner in crime Cynthia Erivo, the two have traversed the globe to promote their movie, which serves as a prequel to “The Wizard of Oz” and follows the evolution of Glinda (Grande) and Elphaba (Erivo) from frenemies to best friends at Shiz University in the magical world of Oz. 

Ultimately, “Wicked” is the tale of friendship overcoming how Elphaba has been ostracized for her unusual appearance: her bright green skin. However, this message about superficial prejudice has not fully penetrated to people online who continue to pick apart Grande’s appearance.

Over the last several weeks as the stars have promoted their film, viral posts across several different social media platforms have been pointing out Grande’s slender frame while also sharing their opinions about the artist’s mental health. It’s a disturbing pattern Grande herself had to address last year. But despite her plea for people to refrain from commenting on her body and anyone’s body, that hasn’t stopped the unfounded diagnoses.

Salon goes over the timeline of the focus placed on Grande’s body and mental health over the years:

June 2018: Grande discusses mental health issues after 2017 Manchester concert bombing 

At her 2017 sold-out Manchester, England concert, Grande was present during a terrorist attack that claimed 22 lives and injured more than 500 people.

In an interview with Elle, the star opened up about the residual trauma from the deadly attack. 

“When I got home from tour, I had really wild dizzy spells, this feeling like I couldn’t breathe,” she said. “I would be in a good mood, fine and happy, and they would hit me out of nowhere. I’ve always had anxiety, but it had never been physical before. There were a couple of months straight where I felt so upside down.”

April 2019: The singer posted a scan of her brain, opening up about her PTSD

After the Manchester attack and the sudden overdose of her off-and-on boyfriend and rapper Mac Miller, Grande shared a photo of her brain scan. 

In a follow-up post, Grande said she was doing her best even though her brain “looks like the world map.” She continued, “Didn’t mean to startle anyone with my brain thingy.

“I love science and seeing the physical reality of what’s going on in there was incredible to me. Someday, when I’m more healed up, we can talk more about it. I am constantly working on my health/learning how to process pain (aren’t we all),” she said.

April 2023: Grande posts a TikTok addressing people’s comments about her body

Body-shaming comments seem to have hit a nerve with Grande last year. The star was still filming “Wicked” in the Spring of 2023 when her Instagram was flooded with comments and concerns about her thinness and what people perceived as a visible weight loss.

The singer then took to TikTok to address the rampant speculation and “concern” around her weight. On the video was a caption that stated, “You have talked a lot about it over the past decade or longer so I’d like to join in this time.

“I think we should gentler and less comfortable commenting on people’s bodies — no matter what. If you think good or well-intentioned — whatever it is — healthy, unhealthy, big, small, this or that. We just shouldn’t. We should work towards not doing that as much,” she emphasized.

She suggested that people should aim towards tweaking their compliments or ignoring something that bothers them so they don’t comment at all to “keep each other safer.”

Grande added, “There are many different ways to look healthy and beautiful. I know personally for me, the body you’ve been comparing my current body to was the unhealthiest version of my body.”

The singer revealed that in the past, “I was on a lot of antidepressants and drinking on them and eating poorly and at the lowest point of my life when I looked the way you consider my healthy. But that in fact wasn’t my healthy.”

She also reiterated she didn’t have to explain this but wanted to have an openness and vulnerability with her audience to enact some positive change. 

“You never know what someone’s going through. Even if you are coming from a loving place and a caring place, that person probably is working on it or has a support system that they are working on it with,” Grande said. “So, be gentle with each other and with yourselves.”

October – November 2024: Numerous popular posts claim Erivo and Grande have eating disorders

While Grande has already addressed the concerns around her weight the hypervisiblity of the “Wicked” press tour has revived the discourse. But this time it included Erivo too.

In viral posts across platforms like Reddit, X, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok, people are speculating about why both Erivo and Grande look thinner. As their proof, they are posting photos of the actors years before they filmed “Wicked” comparing them to photos after filming the movie, while they’re promoting the movie

Others on TikTok are claiming that they have insight into the actors’ weight loss and bodies. One post said, “Anyone who’s been in a mutually destructive competitive ED friendship knows exactly what’s going on.”

Influencer Chloe Forero said, “You could not pay me to say that Ariana Grande looks healthy because she does not. She looks sick . . . I want to approach this with sympathy because I understand that Ariana Grande is in the limelight and that comes with so much pressure. We have no choice but to acknowledge she is a role model and she does set an example for a lot of people. Little girls might see the billboard on the highway of Ariana looking strikingly thin and think they should look like that.”

In a USA Today interview, an eating disorder expert, Dr. Elizabeth Wassenaar at the Eating Recovery Center explained, “These comments about how your body is acceptable or unacceptable, it reinforces again that you are not worth more than your body and that you have to present yourself a certain way for the world to find you acceptable.”

She continued, “It just reinforces that sort of superficial, body-focused idea that we know is so painful and harmful for every single one of us because we are so much more than this vessel that carries us.”

Nov. 6: On “Las Culturistas,” Grande calls out people who try to diagnose her

On the podcast “Las Culturistas,” Grande, along with her “Wicked” co-star Bowen Yang and podcast co-host Matt Rogers were joking about the internet’s intrusive ability to diagnose a celebrity with a mental illness without the full picture.

Rogers said, “I have a mental illness that no one can tell me what it is!”

Grande chimed in, “Well, Twitter will tell you!”

Rogers replied, “One day they all came for me like ‘Matt has ADHD’ and I was like ‘Pfft stop!’ Now I’m like, ‘I do!'”

Grande then shared, “They tell me I have a lot of things . . . You’re actually invasive and scary, and triggering. Just wrong and loud, and unhealthy — that’s toxic.”