Actress Brittany Snow was Anorexic

Star of Hairspray Tells of Her Struggle with Weight and Cutting.

Pressure to be thin was too much for actress Brittany Snow, so she went on the Eat Right 4 your Blood Type Diet and struggled with anorexia, weight and cutting.
In yet another admission by a Hollywood actress, Brittany Snow reveals that she struggled with anorexia, her weight and cutting. She was concerned with her weight at only 12 years old when she was shooting the soap opera “Guiding Light.”

It began with her co-stars recommending this or that diet to lose weight (these are adult women advising a 12 year old who wasn’t overweight). Brittany began the Eat Right 4 Your Blood Type diet and was complimented for losing weight.

This fed her self esteem and made her even more extreme in her behavior. She ended up way below 100 pounds and was still feeling like she wanted to be thinner. She was constantly weighing herself throughout the day and lived for a 2-month stint on pineapples.

“It kind of progressed into this thing where I needed to always be dieting and losing weight and more weight. It became my life and I didn’t have any friends and this was definitely my best friend and I held on to it really tight” (half of us, 2007).

The end of the rope came when she started cutting herself. The pain was unbearable but whenever she saw the scars, it would remind her to punish herself further by not eating.

“I knew that was a really low number and I knew that my hair was falling out and I had really weird skin. My face looked really weird and I was getting this fuzz on my face and I was always cold– always to the point of uncontrollably shaking.  I was more scared that 85 lbs. wasn’t good enough. I wanted to be lower” (People magazine, 2007).

When Brittany was 19 years old, she went to rehab to tackle her eating disorder and cutting behavior. This led her to deal with depression and what was causing her to do herself harm.

She advises others who are going through something similar to take small steps. Her recommendation to talk to someone is great advice and she says that most people will relate in some way.
She now feels better about herself and is striving to not let the pressure to be thin get to her again. Now 21, she hopes that by speaking out she can help those who might be going through the same thing.

As more and more celebrities admit to suffering from an eating disorder, media coverage has become almost daily on the issue. The attention on underweight models is hopeful, but there is so much work to be done. Imagine living in a world one day where people are satisfied with the way they look. What a concept.

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