Duck Dynasty‘s Sadie Robertson, 20, previously revealed she secretly suffered from an eating disorder — one that originated after she transformed her body while competing on Dancing With the Stars — but during an EXCLUSIVE podcast interview with HollywoodLife.com, she told us why the end of a three-year relationship helped cure her of it. “For me, it was hitting rock bottom and it was a wakeup call. Honestly, it was the day that my boyfriend and I had broken up and it had nothing to do with him. But it was just the moment that I was really broken and I was really upset. I remember that day. I was like crying and I looked in the mirror and I literally couldn’t even recognize myself because I actually saw myself for who I am and I actually saw myself for the first time. I believe, for who God created me to be,” she said. Sadie didn’t name names, but it’s no secret that she broke up with her boyfriend of three years, Blake Coward, in March 2016.
Sadie also explained how her eating disorder, which she described as anorexia, came about. “Since I was in the [DWTS] finale, I had three and a half months of this intense training and also I’d come out and I have this body. I’m like, ‘Oh wow.’ Not that I even ever cared about my body or even thought twice about it, but all of a sudden, you have it. So many people are complementing you. Everybody is like, ‘Oh, my gosh. Goals.’ All this stuff. You don’t mean to but that can start to become what you identify yourself with. It becomes your identity,” she said. “When that began to go, I think my confidence began to go, which was a really big wakeup call for me. That’s when the eating disorder started of actually, no, this is not good. My confidence can’t lie. That’s not my identity. That’s not who I am. That’s what people have seen but that’s not who I am. I had to shake that.” Sounds scary, right? And to be honest, there are many of us who can relate to this.
“It was such a mind thing, honestly,” Sadie continued. “You’re constantly thinking about not eating. It’s totally consuming you. You’re thinking about what other people will think of you. You’re way overexercising to the point that it’s just exhausting. You skip meals all the time. You don’t want people to see you eat. Then you have anxiety about eating and it is a full on mind game and problem and it’s all consuming. The minute I came out about it and the minute I just began to tell people about it, it’s just been amazing because, first of all, I’m freed of it and, second of all, other people are finding freedom of it. When you’re in that, when you’re in an eating disorder or fear — anything like that — there seems to be no way out, but there is. I feel like even my duty in humanity is talk about it and get people out of it.”
We love that Sadie’s opening up about her struggles with her eating disorder. We know she’s helping so many people out there, who are going through the same thing. To hear more of Sadie’s story and how she overcame her eating disorder, listen to the full podcast interview here!
HollywoodLifers, have you ever had a similar experience? Feel free to share with us, below.