Eva Longoria’s “I was not eating” confession on Friday’s The Dr. Oz Show is guaranteed to send something of a mixed message to the eating disordered viewers out there.
In her frank conversation with Dr. Oz, the 38-year-old Desperate Housewives star acknowledged that she lost a significant amount of weight after her divorce in 2011 from Tony Parker. She had filed for divorce after only three years of marriage, reportedly after discovering hundreds of text messages to her husband from another woman. Oops.
She also stopped eating because she was so depressed that she’d lost all appetite.
“The time I got the most compliments [was] because I was so skinny,” said Longoria. “I was not eating. I was depressed. I was sad. My diet was coffee.”
Well, nobody’s going to call that a healthy way to lose weight. And I’m sure that Longoria meant the story as a warning.
Tired all the time and lacking real energy, Longoria eventually had to undergo a series of health tests.
Because of the near-starvation diet, “I was just depleted of every vitamin. He [her doctor] said it’s as if somebody took a straw and sucked everything out of your body. You don’t have any iron, your liver’s overacting.”
The problem is, the eating disordered fan doesn’t hear that stuff. She figures she’ll take care of the lack of energy by sheer willpower. And she doesn’t give a flying you-know-what if her whiny liver is crying out for vitamins.
All she cares about is that Longoria got the most compliments and was “so skinny” because of the coffee diet.
In my humble opinion, I think this is one episode with a heck of a potential for backfire.
Most people aren’t going to try to live on coffee. They already know that it isn’t a good idea.
But the women who will try won’t be discouraged by Longoria’s “I was not eating” story. They’ll actually find it thinspirational.
[Eva Longoria photo by Featureflash / Shutterstock.com ]
