Iman’s Daughter Zulekha Haywood Drops 170 Pounds

“Imagine you are the daughter of a supermodel,” Zulekha Haywood, Iman’s 31-year-old daughter, says for the latest issue of Glamour magazine. And then she adds what had been a cruel reality for her for her entire life, until a year and a half ago: “Now imagine you weigh 330 pounds.” Zulekha was once so overweight she needed time to muster the courage and the strength to get out of bed in the morning, she says for the mag.

Having parents who were so famous for their looks and physical abilities did not help her self-esteem either: Iman, her mother, is one of the highest paid models, a woman so beautiful and famous she only needs one name. Her father, NBA legend Spencer Haywood, was in excellent condition. Zulekha was caught in the middle for most of her life, she now reveals, being on some diet or another as early as eight years old.

A pediatrician told Iman her daughter would be overweight when the child was only four years of age. In this light, it’s easily understandable why Zulekha would try anything to lose the extra pounds: from her mother’s “Basta diet” (which emphasized portion control by sheer will) to her father’s “Eat like a pig, Run like a horse” routine (which allowed her to eat as much as she wanted as long as she worked out afterwards). In the end, by the time she reached 28 years of age and 330 pounds, Zulekha understood only gastric bypass could help her tackle the problem of her weight.

“My life was full of love, fun and adventure, but eventually it would have been hampered by health problems – and possibly cut short. My BMI was a soul-crushing 46 (healthy is between 18 and 25). Being that morbidly obese could cut my life expectancy in half, doctors had told me, and put me at risk for diabetes and heart disease. I already had osteoarthritis, hence the slow climb out of bed each morning, and high blood pressure. So I celebrated that twenty-eighth birthday – and then made an appointment with a surgeon who specializes in gastric bypass. After dozens of questions and medical tests, I walked out with a presurgery packet,” she says of the moment in which she decided to go in for surgery.

It wasn’t an easy journey, though – but it was all well worth it in the end. “It’s hard to explain how it feels to lose so much weight so fast. I tell my friends that it’s like becoming famous overnight – suddenly all eyes are on you. But there’s more to it than that. The difference between Stacked Zu and Slender Zu is like being a fluffy Angora cat and then suddenly being shaved,” she explains.