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Brandy gets it. You think she’s pregnant. Her weight gain is such a surprise to you that it can’t be anything but pregnancy. But in reality, the star said that the story behind her fluctuation in weight over the last year or two is actually because she wanted and needed a break from eating healthy 24/7.
But first, the pregnancy rumors.
“You know what’s crazy? When I was 23, I fibbed about being married because I wanted to have my baby, and I thought that if I didn’t say I was married — I didn’t want to lose my fans,” she said about the last time she was actually with child in a chat with TrueExclusives. “I didn’t want to disappoint anybody, which is why I said, I don’t want to just go down the aisle just to go down the aisle because I’m pregnant. I want to be ready to do that. Let’s just say that I’m married or whatever. Which was the wrong thing to do.”
But as for now, at the age of 39, Brandy says that if she was indeed pregnant, she would have made it plain long ago.
“I would not be embarrassed. I was pregnant out of wedlock then. If I was pregnant out of wedlock now, why would I be ashamed of a baby?” she asked. “And it’s funny how people are telling me I’m pregnant. First of all, you don’t know what’s going on in my stomach. First of all, you can’t do that. ‘I know you’re pregnant.’ ‘You are pregnant!’ ‘When is the baby due?’ It’s just like, girl, you don’t know me to say that. And you don’t know what’s going on.”
And while many people saw such assumptions and the pressure people put on the singer to admit she was carrying to make sense of her weight as body shaming, Brandy says she actually didn’t take it personally.
“I didn’t think the pregnancy thing was body shaming. Like people were calling that body shaming. I didn’t feel that from people who obviously thought I put on weight and ‘She’s got to be pregnant.’ I didn’t take offense to that for years,” she said. “But it’s been years now. I went on a foodcation because I’d been eating clean for seven something odd years, in the gym, every day, playing tennis. I was like, ‘Yo, I’m tired of this crazy discipline. I need something to eat! I want some pasta! I want some pizza! I want some cake! I want something other than salmon, broccoli and asparagus and water! Every day! Right after Roxie in Washington D.C., I went on a foodcation, honey. And I’m telling you, it’s been very tough for me to want to get off of it.”
Some of her favorite treats right now? Wendy’s (a “number 10 with a strawberry lemonade, large”), cake, and apple pies from McDonald’s. But she admits that her time away from healthy eating and consistent exercise will soon come to an end. However, don’t expect her to go back to her slim post-Afrodisiac days. That’s over.
“I know that it’s time for me to drop,” she said. “My goal is 15 because I don’t want to go back to that skinny Brandy that looked too skinny. I didn’t have any boobs and I don’t have the butt I have now. I want to keep some of that. I just want a flat stomach and that’s it. Because I don’t want to be looking pregnant if I’m not.”
And for the record, the few extra pounds look great on her.
