Not everyone was initially in support of Rebel Wilson’s weight-loss journey — and the reason might surprise fans.
The Pitch Perfect star, 41, revealed during an interview on the BBC Breakfast morning show on Tuesday, December 7, that her decision to focus on her health in 2020 led to some uncomfortable conversations with those closest to her.
“I got a lot of pushback from my own team, actually, here in Hollywood, when I said, ‘OK, I’m going to do this ‘Year of Health.’ I feel like I’m really going to physically transform and change my life,’” Wilson claimed. “And they were like, ‘Why? Why would you want to do that?’ Because I was earning millions of dollars being the funny fat girl and being that person.”
The Bridesmaids actress set out to transform herself last year after a visit to her doctor. However, her “Year of Health” wasn’t just about slimming down.
“It first started when I was looking into fertility stuff and the doctor was like, ‘Well, you’d have a much better chance if you were healthier,’” she revealed in a July Instagram Live video. “That’s kind of what started it, that if I lost some excess weight that it would give me a better chance for freezing eggs and having the eggs be a better quality. … It wasn’t even really myself, it was more thinking of a future mini-me, really.”
By the end of 2020, the Australian comedian had lost 70 pounds. Last month, she exclusively told Us Weekly about some of the “weird things” that happened to her body as a result.
“My feet have shrunk,” she told Us in November. “It is the weirdest thing because every time I put on high heels, they are always too big and I look like an idiot … It’s the most annoying thing ever because who would have thought that your feet would lose weight?”
While Wilson’s transformation drew plenty of attention, her goal was never to be thinner. The Super Fun Night alum told BBC Breakfast on Tuesday that she was “very confident being bigger” and could always “rock a red carpet” despite being “double the size or sometimes triple the weight of other actresses,” but there were some aspects of her lifestyle that she wanted to change.
“I knew deep down inside that some of the emotional eating behaviors I was doing was not healthy. I did not need a tub of ice cream every night,” she said. “That was me numbing emotions using food, which wasn’t the healthiest thing.”
The Pooch Perfect host realized that the pressure of “not being a natural performer and having to perform almost every day” led to her stress, which she often dealt with through emotional eating.
While Wilson is proud of herself for choosing to do what she believed was best for her — instead of following other people’s advice — the Isn’t It Romantic actress does find the heightened focus on her body very strange.
“I know what it’s like to be a woman who was essentially invisible to most people because of not being seen as traditionally, like, beautiful or whatever,” she told BBC Breakfast. “It’s crazy to try and fit that. [It’s] better to be the healthiest version [of yourself].”
In October, the How To Be Single actress told Stellar, a magazine from Australia’s Daily Telegraph, that she was had found the psychological root of her issues surrounding food. “I’m not totally cured. I don’t think you can be,” she said at the time. “But I’ve learn[ed] to manage it — and it’s not by reaching for a bowl of ice cream.”
