Why Whitney Way Thore Chose to Start Weight Loss Medication

As Whitney Way Thore shared ahead of the next season of My Big Fat Fabulous Life, she started using weight loss medication. The TLC star explained to E! News what led her to try it.

Years into her effort to have a baby, Whitney Way Thore felt willing to try almost anything.

So when her fertility doctor suggested that the My Big Fat Fabulous Life star consider a weight loss medication, which can affect ovulation and reproductive hormones, she agreed.

"She said, 'Just take it, and then if you get pregnant, stop,'" Way Thore told E! News in an exclusive interview. "And so that's why I started it."

She said she did not experience major side effects and found the experience physically manageable.

"I didn't really have any side effects or anything like that," said the 42-year-old, who is returning with a new season of her TLC series. "I think physically it was easy."

But taking the prescription was only one part of her fertility journey. A larger moment came during a difficult conversation with her then-boyfriend, now-fiancé Jake Beaudoin.

Although the couple is engaged now, they were dating more casually when Way Thore told him about her plans to become pregnant.

She said she was nervous to share that she had found a sperm donor and hoped to get pregnant through intrauterine insemination.

"I was obviously very nervous to tell him that that was my plan," Way Thore said. Still, she added, "I hadn't really expected that it would matter to him because I didn't expect that we would be in a serious relationship."

At the time, she assumed the conversation might end their relationship.

"I thought, 'Well, I'm going to tell him this and obviously, and understandably, you're not going to stay with me through this,'" Way Thore recalled. Instead, she said, "He was so supportive and so excited, and he never wavered on that once and still hasn't. So, that was really amazing."

Whitney Way Thore/Instagram

That kind of support, she said, has defined their relationship.

After going through a number of disappointing romances, Way Thore said she was watching closely for warning signs from the DJ.

"Obviously if you're still single at this age, you've been through some s--t," she said. "I've almost never dated a man that I leave the relationship having any shred of respect for."

She added that long experience with disappointment has made her cautious.

"You want to protect yourself and you want to not be as stupid as you might have been," she explained. "Or, you might want to approach things in a smart way."

Still, she said there is a difference between being careful and being overly guarded.

"I think there's a balance between doing that and being hyper vigilant because I think that kind of hyper vigilance can definitely stop a relationship before it has a chance to really get off the ground."

She also admitted that Beaudoin raised a red flag when he ghosted her after they first connected years ago.

"Basically we met, we only hung out a couple times," she explained. Even so, "I bring it up constantly. He, for the longest time, would try to defend it, and then it became this thing, and I just got so annoyed."

But that has not been her main feeling about him.

"When you go from thinking you're just in a casual relationship to all of a sudden we're going to try to have a baby together, things move very quickly," Way Thore said. "And that can expose a lot of weaknesses that you might feel. But I continue to be pleasantly surprised at every turn, even though I was really, really, really looking for reasons to believe that it wasn't right."

She said she is glad he proved her wrong.

"He proved me wrong," she said. And she is also excited to be wearing an aquamarine ring on her left hand. "I think when you're in love, you naturally want to share that," she explained of opening up her engagement journey to viewers.