You guys, I think I have become a Demi Lovato Convert. I used to not really care about her, but I have increasingly become a fan. I sing along to her songs, I give her props when she openly thirst-traps Henry Cavill, and I found myself nodding along with her as I read this People Magazine interview. Demi has always been open about her body image struggles and her eating disorders, and she’s come to the point – at the age of 25 – where she’s just stopping the cycle. She no longer diets, but she admits that it will always be a struggle to avoid disordered eating patterns. Some highlights:
The struggle with body positivity: “It’s a daily battle. Some days I feel great and some days I don’t feel great. And sometimes it’s periods of times. I stopped dieting and have gained a little weight so it’s been a struggle but at the same time, I’m happier because I’m not restricting myself from certain foods and I’m no longer food shaming myself.”
Giving up dieting & giving up food shaming: “I think that’s something in our society we get caught up in diet culture. Every commercial on TV is either about a weight loss pill or piece of fitness equipment or it’s all food-based. As someone recovering from a food disorder, it’s something that I want to put out there that you don’t have to diet in order to be happy. I don’t think I’ve heard that message out there in the public and of course, it’s important to be healthy and everything in moderation is fine.”
Why she’s been open about all of this on social media: “I wanted to put that message out there for other people especially with the new year coming in because it’s very triggering for people that are in recovery because everything is about weight loss. Because new year’s resolutions are about going to the gym and it’s really important that there’s somebody out there to speak up and say, ‘Hey your weight doesn’t define your self-worth and it definitely doesn’t define your beauty inside and out.’ ”
Why she posts sexy photos on social media: “I think posting sexy pictures are so empowering and liberating. Anytime you can put yourself out there the more empowering I feel. Also it doesn’t hurt when you look good and you have a good bathing suit on and then a cute guy likes your picture. Doesn’t hurt.”
I’ve said that I feel like some young women simply “outgrow” disordered eating patterns. For some women, obviously, it will be a lifelong struggle. But I always felt like I simply outgrew my own disordered eating patterns from my teenage years, like I just got to an age and mindset where I stopped caring so much about being a certain size and just started enjoying my life and eating what I wanted to eat. I feel like Demi has sort of come to a similar conclusion – obviously, she still struggles and she’s had a lot of therapy, but she’s also just… matured. And let’s not forget, “diet culture” is a real thing, and in Demi’s circles, diet culture is being called “wellness” and “clean living” and such. It’s just dieting by another name, really. Anyway, I applaud Demi for her growth and for talking about it publicly.
PS… I’m not trying to be mean with these photos, I honestly love how f–king crazy her outfit is. Denim garters!!!
Photos courtesy of WENN.
That is the worst outfit I think I’ve ever seen
Which one, both are so bad. That denim monstrosity should be illegal
Yes, agree 100%. Both outfits are ridiculous.
Diet culture here in the US isn’t really about thinness. We have screwed up our food and eating patterns SO badly, and as a culture stubbornly refuse to try to fix it. The diet culture is directly related to that – a quick fix so you don’t have to do stuff like “eat vegetables” and “exercise regularly”. It’s ridiculous and scary, and obviously interconnected with a lot of things.
I think diet and wellness culture is about putting men and women into their boxes of masculine /feminine norms. For women, that means thinness (or even like Oprah, not thin, but just working at it), niceness, prettiness, and for men that means leanness, muscularity, and stoicism.
Diet /wellness culture is not just a gendered issue but also a class and race marker, wherein white /black people of high class feel morally superior for being healthy, or thinner because of foods or exercise they choose over ‘those other’ (usually fat, unhealthy, or disabled) people.
In short, diet and wellness culture makes us all anxious messes.
The kicker is when you do everything right and then you still develop disease (mental or physical) and you realize how much of a farce diet and wellness culture is and sometimes sh*t happens.
Food here in the US has so many issues – it’s far more than just what we put into our bodies. As much as diet culture is about looking a certain way, I think it goes far, far beyond that. We can’t talk about “diet culture” without talking about the way the average American diet relies on massive quantities of heavily processed food, as well as of course the social and economic barriers when it comes to both accessing and preparing fresh foods. We are fucked right now.
If you told people to exercise, eat vegetables, become vegan etc and they gained weight doing so, they wouldn’t keep it up. Diet culture is 100% about thinness and appearance.
I think diet culture was around even in George orwell’s times. In research of povety, he found newspaper letter writers who asked why the poor in england eat rubbish, and why can’t they eat like the rich. Rich people complained about seeing toothlessness and how if the poor spent their money more wisely they could be in better health.
Diet culture is a class, appearance, gender and behavior issue. And will continue to be so.
“If you told people to exercise, eat vegetables, become vegan etc and they gained weight doing so, they wouldn’t keep it up. …”
@ Domino — so true!
Does anyone else think Demi is a mean girl? I’m not a fan but I think it’s great to have the conversation though.
Always liked Demi Lovato. She does look great and she has a wonderful voice. My daughter and I even watched her TV show together. I don’t think Wilmer is into building a woman’s self-esteem, but I hope she’s in good place and will dump him again if necessary.
I like both of her looks here. Jet-black is her best hair color.
Demi > goop.
I agree with her. Every time one of my completely normal-sized friends goes on one of these “clean eating” or “paleo” or whatever diets, I inwardly cringe and roll my eyes. About three years ago, I lost a significant – almost scary – amount of weight due to some health issues. So I started looking into ways to gain weight, it was hard for me to eat much at one time so I was looking for calorie-dense foods that I could hold down. I was overwhelmed with all the weight LOSS articles but almost nothing on weight gain, when the whole purpose of food is to be fuel and nurture us, not to eat as little of it as humanly possible. I’d never been a big dieter before this anyway, but it really changed the way I looked at food. These days, I don’t even own a scale.
My husband and I outlawed the word ‘diet’ when our daughter was born. We’ve always discussed eating in moderation, or balanced. Im so happy a celebrity is talking about this. Dieting, is such a fad. Everyone is on one. Its scary. Eat food. Good healthy food. Eat a piece of cake. Run a mile, swim, play with the dog! Wear clothing that fits your individual body type, and style! No diets, not in our house
Can I “unsee” this outfit please? I can, and will hold this against her, I promise.
I’m sorry, but I’m not buying what this girl is selling… especially since she was shilling teatoxes and diet pills just weeks ago, and bragging about spending 6 hours a day in the gym.
I’ve had an ED for over 12 years, and I know how insidious they are. I don’t think you just ‘get over it’… maybe disordered eating, but not a full on eating disorder. And I just don’t think Demi should be a spokesperson for recovery when she clearly has so much she still needs to sort out.
YASSSSSSS. EDs are like any addiction – recovery is for life. I’ve been physically “clean/sober” (meaning not profoundly underweight) for about 15 years and and emotionally/behaviorally for about 8. I’ve also been in therapy for 20+ years. All the same, just last week I caught myself experiencing EXTREME jealousy after reading that a woman who died from her ED reached a lower weight than I ever did.
I am a smart, capable, responsible, grown woman, and (just for a minute or two) I actually felt like a failure for not reaching the weight of a dead woman.
EDs are CRAZY powerful, not to mention manipulative and sneaky as f-ck. Recovery takes enormous vigilance, and that awareness has to stay with you for life (as far as I can tell, anyway).
Also @Lucy, wishing you strength and support on your journey. In case you need to hear it: keep going, it does get better, and it’s worth the fight, as are YOU.
(if that isn’t helpful trash it, no offense taken!)
@Tootsie45…. this actually helped me so much and warmed my heart. I am SO proud of you and you’ve actually given me hope. Thankyou.
Anyone else see a huge ‘want to lose weight ad right in the middle of the interview? Not exactly the best choice! May be randomly appearing, but still!
” Because new year’s resolutions are about going to the gym and it’s really important that there’s somebody out there to speak up and say, ‘Hey your weight doesn’t define your self-worth and it definitely doesn’t define your beauty inside and out.’ ””
I am tired of women’s drive for physical strength and ability being reduced to ~ur weight does not define u, love yourself <3 ~ and discouraged.
" “I think posting sexy pictures are so empowering and liberating. Anytime you can put yourself out there the more empowering I feel. Also it doesn’t hurt when you look good and you have a good bathing suit on and then a cute guy likes your picture. Doesn’t hurt.”"
This is a very harmful way of thinking.
@Hikaru: It’s not harmful, it’s something you happen to disagree with (most likely because it goes against what you’ve been taught women ‘shouldn’t’ do if they want respect, safety, and equality). She’s not telling other women what to do- if you prefer modesty for whatever reason, that’s fine. She’s just speaking on HER experience and one of the things she finds empowering and liberating. Women are not a monolith.
Making your sense of self worth dependant on men’s validation of your sex appeal is mentally damaging to girls and women. It literally leads to anxiety, body-fixations, eating disorders, body dysphoria, depression, addiction to body modifications, self-objectification, self harm and other unstable and unsafe behaviour. None of this gives us any power nor frees us from anything and it is extremely irresponsible to be selling this dangerous lie to young generations of girls.
…Except she said nothing about a woman’s worth being dependant on men’s validation of her sex appeal, she just admitted at the end that she does like it when a cute guy finds her attractive. Those two things are drastically different.
Women are sexual beings. As long as that remains true, and there’s more than one sexual orientation among the human race, there are going to be women who want men to want them in that way, which is not the same as putting all of your eggs in one basket and thinking being hot to men is all that matters. The desire is always going to be there, (although it doesn’t always manifest in everyone the same way, and some people will try to hide it more than others) and it’s not something that women need to be cured of. Shaming women for not pretending to be asexual, strictly homosexual, or interested in feigning modesty and androgyny in order to cater to a certain breed of feminists is just selectively taking a page out of the right’s playbook and slapping a ‘progressive’ label on it. THAT’S what’s extremely irresponsible, dangerous, and dishonest.
Also, one person does not get to dictate what is or is not empowering for someone else. She happened to grow up in the public eye being sent the message that it’s okay for people to disrespect her if they don’t find her ‘chaste’ enough on top of the troubles she had with eating disorders and hating her body. But even without that added context, women don’t have to pretend to be asexual or virginal to please you.
“‘Hey your weight doesn’t define your self-worth and it definitely doesn’t define your beauty inside and out.’ ”
I have struggled with this since I was a child, ever since relatives would make comments about my body and weight. Mind you I was not overweight, but I wasn’t rail-thin like the rest of the women in my family. I was muscular and shortish as a teen, so I looked “thick.” I’ve never had a full-fledged ED, but I’ve certainly used different ED “techniques” here and there because of my poor body image. Now, after dealing with an autoimmune disease and hypothyroidism for the last couple of years I am overweight. No matter my activity level or food choices, the weight does not want to come off. Even when I’ve been a healthy weight for my body type I have felt fat, ugly, and less-than. It’s really hard and even though I am reassured by a loving husband that I am “gorgeous” inside and out I can’t help but mentally beat myself up over my body (at least I haven’t physically “beat” myself up for a long time now, e.g. extreme calorie counting). I try my best to just remember that working on my health is the most important part (not the way I look), that it’s one step at a time, and validate myself in other ways, but it doesn’t always work. While removing “diet” from our vernacular may be a good suggestion, I think posting pictures of oneself can be a slippery slope to seeking external validation if a person is not careful to monitor their thoughts/feelings/motivations when doing so, particularly when a person is in recovery from something (e.g ED).