Shekinah Garner has only appeared in a handful of episodes of 90 Day Fiance: The Other Way, but she’s already made an impression on viewers and has faced a boatload of criticism.
90 Day Fiance viewers were instantly drawn to Shekinah and her Turkish love interest Sarper Guven’s storyline this season.
One factor that stuck out to viewers, aside from their international love story, was Shekinah and Sarper’s shared love of perfecting their appearances, whether that be with makeup, exercise, or some nips and tucks here and there.
As a personal trainer, Sarper is a bit obsessive about outward appearances, and not just his own. The self-proclaimed “retired bad boy” expects Shekinah to look a certain way, and that includes keeping her weight at a certain number on the scale.
During the September 25 episode of 90 Day Fiance, The Other Way, Sarper brought out a scale and weighed Shekinah after they discussed her sleeping on top of him on the couch (because she was too disgusted to sleep in his worn-out bed).
After suggesting it, Sarper took a step back, looked at Shekinah, and told her, “But you are not too skinny for that. Do you want me to weigh you? You know your target [weight],” and told her that it was 128 pounds.
Shekinah stepped on the scale and weighed in at 132 pounds. However, she was four pounds over her “target” weight. Admittedly, Sarper doesn’t like his women to be muscular and confessed that if Shekinah stays at or below her target weight, she’ll have the “physique that he wants.”
Following the episode, Shekinah recorded a video and uploaded it to her Instagram Story after revealing that she’s received quite a bit of backlash about Sarper’s antics with the scale.
Shekinah Garner has a message for 90 Day Fiance haters criticizing her ‘plastic’ appearance
“I just came here to say that I think it’s so funny that people are so upset about my boyfriend weighing me,” the aesthetician began.
“But they’re the same people that are criticizing how I look in extreme detail, saying I’m botched, that I look completely fake, plastic, I look like AI, that my lips are too big, and the list goes on.”
In another slide, Shekinah told her fans that her weight typically fluctuates between 125 and 132 pounds and that Sarper is not “controlling” her weight or dictating how much she weighs.
Shekinah defends Sarper weighing her: ‘I can’t be mad’
Instead, Shekinah said that Sarper is simply “choosing a weight that he thinks is best for me that’s within my usual range,” adding, “So, I can’t be mad at that.”
Shekinah also noted that because Sarper is a personal trainer, it’s his professional estimate based on what he does for a living, and she doesn’t have to compromise her lifestyle to be a certain weight.
While Sarper has come under fire for what many 90 Day Fiance: The Other Way viewers perceive as enormous controlling red flags, it seems that Shekinah is perfectly happy with her man’s behavior.
On top of that, Shekinah admitted that she’s “unfazed” by all of the hatred she and Sarper have received since appearing on 90 Day Fiance: The Other Way this season.
Shekinah confessed that just like Sarper weighing her, she isn’t bothered by the hate she receives online because she’s confident in who she is, and she doesn’t care what strangers online think about her either.
90 Day Fiance: The Other Way airs on Mondays at 8/7c on TLC.