Valerie Bertinelli, an actress, has come forward to discuss her struggles with weight and has decided to stop weighing and criticizing herself. The “Hot in Cleveland” actress is on the path to self-empowerment and love with the publication of her memoir, “Enough Already: Learning to Love the Way I Am Today,” which she once said made her feel “like the most famous dieter in America.”
Since she began her her career as a young actress in the 1975–1984 comedy “One Day At A Time,” Bertinelli has spent a lot of time in the media’s spotlight. Alongside Mackenzie Phillips, who played her character’s sister, she co-starred in the television series as Barbara Cooper Royer. In her book, she described how, at the time, she frequently compared herself to Phillips, telling a reporter once that she felt like “a ton of lard” next to her.
She stated, “In private, I had rarely thought of myself as anything other than a failure.” “I had pretended to be the bubbly optimistic all-American girl,” she said.
Bertinelli, however, had already been subject to criticism in her youth before she rose to fame as a teenager. She stated in the memoir, “I observed my father treat my mother horribly when she would put on weight. A fifth-grade teacher prodded my belly and instructed me to keep an eye on it. I therefore discovered at a very young age that gaining weight makes you unlovable. And I’m discovering that being lovable has nothing to do with your physical appearance.
Two years after becoming a spokesperson for Jenny Craig at the age of 47, she posed for the cover of People magazine in a bikini in 2009, determined to win her struggle against her own body.
Bertinelli may have looked gorgeous in the photos, but that didn’t offer her the inner contentment and satisfaction she had been seeking.
She explains in the biography, “I wasn’t attempting to get healthy or deal with the reasons I had gained weight over the years.
“Eddie Van Halen and I had broken up, and I wouldn’t accept money from him. I had to earn money because I was a single working mother. She wrote, “Jenny Craig was a terrific job,” alluding to her 2007 divorce from the rock singer. She claimed that she had shed 50 pounds for the cover, but it had cost her dearly because she had to “starve myself and work out twice a day.”
She made a startling disclosure when reflecting on that 2020 photo session.
The green bikini was a size large, which is comical. There’s a lot of pride and a lot of guilt involved with that cover, she continued, adding that even at my lowest weight in decades, I was still wearing a large. I put forth a lot of extra effort. physically, unquestionably. Thank God I didn’t put as much effort into maintaining my mental health.
Bertinelli also admitted in her book that she gained virtually all of the weight she had fought so hard to shed following the shoot.
“As soon as the photo shoot was over, I began to gain weight. Some people, but not me, can look that way without doing it. Shame also comes from contributing to the illusion that it is possible for others by being a part of the issue. I swallowed it whole, but I didn’t take care of my head and my heart, and I think that’s where it truly starts,” she wrote.
Bertinelli is now deciding to choose a different route for herself, one based on self-acceptance and love.
Ertinelli stated in her book that she was determined to shed “the same 10 lbs.” of recalcitrant weight in 2020. Before realizing as she walked to the scale, “No. I had been attempting to lose for the past 40 years. I cannot repeat this action.
Two years later, at age 61, the Food Network celebrity is determined to go on a new journey without a scale.
She wrote, “The purpose is to live in the moment and not according to the scale.”
She acknowledged that she has “many decades of thinking I have to look a certain way for people to accept me and to appreciate me,” so she acknowledged that this may not be simple.
She continued, “We’re all a part of this diet culture that isn’t really improving our mental or emotional wellness. “I’m attempting to undo what I learnt that has become engrained in me. And I’ve discovered that a lot of others share my exact sentiments. Some of us received incorrect instruction.
Eliminating everything that hasn’t been useful or brought her joy is one of her first steps. Bertinelli penned, “I gave up the blasted scale.” “Since I finished writing the book, I haven’t weighed myself, but all I know is that my jeans fit whenever I put them on. I don’t need to recline to put these on! Every time I want to step on the scale, I ask myself, “Valerie, why would you do that?” because the number is not the most important factor. There won’t be any before and after pictures. Whatever occurs, occurs.
Bertinelli continued, “I’m done criticizing myself. “I want to treat myself with more kindness and acceptance.”
