Al Roker celebrated two decades of improved health on Tuesday, and fans celebrated with him. Roker made an Instagram post on the 20th anniversary of his gastric bypass surgery, reflecting on how his life has changed since losing all that weight. Fans congratulated the weatherman on staying healthy and inspiring others to do the same.
Roker posted three photos on Instagram on Tuesday, the first of which showed him holding up a pair of jeans that were about twice as wide as his waist. In the two pictures that followed he tried to put on the jeans, holding them out to show that there was practically enough room for a second person within the waistline. He wrote: “Hard to believe it was 20 years ago today, I wore these size 54 Levi jeans to my gastric bypass at 340 lbs and here I am today.”
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“It’s still a struggle but I’m never going back,” Roker continued. “I have setbacks and struggle every day, but I never forget how far I’ve come.” The post picked up over 100,000 likes, and many commenters let Roker know how much his public journey has meant to them.
“YAY AL! YOU ARE AN ANGEL ON THIS PLANET!” wrote meteorologist Hollie Strano. “THANK YOU FOR INSPIRING ME AND MORE PEOPLE THAN YOU CAN EVER IMAGINE. I ADORE YOU! AND I’M PROUD TO HAVE THE PRIVILEGE OF KNOWING YOU!” Roker’s TODAY Show colleague Savannah Guthrie added: “You are so inspiring. Every day. Every minute,” while the official Hoda and Jenna account wrote: “No one better than our pal, Al” with a heart emoji.
Roker was born in 1954 and began his broadcast career in 1974, joining The TODAY Show full time in 1996. He has held that job continuously ever since, so the national audience has watched his journey towards better health in real-time. Roker got a total knee replacement in the summer of 2001, and in March of 2002, he underwent gastric bypass in order to lose weight.
With the public eye on him, Roker was candid about his previous attempts to lose weight without surgical intervention. He admitted that he had tried and failed to stick to numerous diets, and he did not advocate for others to go straight to surgery without trying other methods first. He reportedly dropped over 100 pounds within 8 months of his surgery.
Roker wrote about his weight loss and his unique perspective on health in his memoir Never Goin’ Back: Winning the Weight Loss Battle For Good. It was published in 2013. The book is available now in print, digital and audiobook formats wherever books are sold, and Roker himself narrates the audiobook version.
