While filming an episode of Running Wild With Bear Grylls, actress Kate Winslet opened up about body issues and insecurities. “When I grew up, I never heard positive reinforcement about body image from any female in my life… That’s very damaging, because then you’re programmed as a young woman to immediately scrutinize yourself and how you look,” she says.
Even glamour queens like Winslet face these pressures. “I was bullied at school,” she says. “I was chubby, always had big feet, the wrong shoes, bad hair. There was one girl who was particularly horrible to me.” Winslet says that she ran into the bully again after becoming successful, and thanked her “for being such a bitch” because it made her a stronger person.
In the Winslet household, positive body image is cultivated every day. “I stand in front of the mirror and say to [my daughter] Mia, ‘We are so lucky we have a shape. We’re so lucky we’re curvy. We’re so lucky we’ve got good bums.’ And she’ll say, ‘Mommy, I know, thank god.’”
