Star Jones appears on Oprah today in an episode about losing weight in the public eye. From the advance clips she actually comes off as somewhat humble and less self-involved than she was before she was axed from The View.

Star says she had gastric bypass surgery in 2006 not to take an easy way out – it wasn’t – but because her weight was so drastically affecting her health that her doctor told her she was going to die. Jones says she was – for all intents and purposes – an addict, and despite the consequences to her health, she simply could not stop eating.

Star Jones — whose rapid weight loss played into her rocky exit from “The View” in 2006 — denies she took an easy way out having gastric bypass surgery and without the changes, Jones was told she would have died.

“I’m still 300 pounds in my head some days,” Jones told Oprah Winfrey in a taped episode airing Wednesday. Jones admitted she was scared to disappoint people and ashamed that she wasn’t able to control her weight.

“… I was an addict for all practical purposes, that I had never stuck to a real diet, that I’d never stuck to a real exercise program, and that when confronted by my doctor and the doctor said if you don’t make changes, you will die. I had no choice.” Jones said. “When you hear people say, oh, you took the easy way out, I would have longed for an easy way. It was not an easy way. It was this — the hardest struggle of my whole entire life and I still struggle.”

Jones responded to remarks by former co-host Barbara Walters that after the surgery, the show’s audience couldn’t relate to Jones anymore.

“I was hurt and upset initially,” Jones said. “I’m so sorry that I placed a burden on my colleagues. I never asked them to lie.”

[From the Chicago Sun-Times]

I’ve always been sort of confused by the accusation that people who get gastric bypass or gastric band surgery are taking the easy way out. It seems like a pretty extreme, hardcore, and painful way to go about it. I’d rather do a million diets than have to go that route. To me it’s what people do as an absolute last resort – whether it’s because they can’t otherwise control a food addiction, are suffering from diabetes (it has a high instance of reversing the disease even before significant weight loss is achieved), or simply have bodies that are resistant to weight loss. And the side effects sound really miserable, and they can be permanent.

I think the reason The View’s audience couldn’t relate to Star after her surgery wasn’t that she was thin; it was how obnoxious she was. She already came across as self-absorbed and full of herself at times (the whole fiasco about her constantly using the show to promote her wedding didn’t win her any fans), and the weight loss appeared to magnify those personality traits in her. Getting fired from the show did seem to humble Star, and when she admitted to the surgery she became a little less disliked in the public eye.

It’s time for Star to become something other than “the lady who got weight loss surgery and was fired from The View.” Her CourtTV show was canceled, and it doesn’t seem like she’s been up to much since then. Dragging up tired feuds is getting old.

Here’s Star Jones leaving her Manhattan hotel on January 20th. Images thanks to WENN .