Chrissy Metz Continues To Struggle With Body-Image At Forty-Three

Nov 06, 2020 by apost team

From her roles in This Is Us to American Horror Story: Freak Show, Chrissy Metz has graced our screens with genuine talent, while off-screen she's brought positivity and light to the public. But behind her ambitious attitude to life is a struggle with weight and body-image issues that stem from childhood. Her journey hasn't always been easy, but she's still kept her head high through it all. Now aged 43, Metz is on top of the world.

Chrissy Metz may seem like the perfect picture of self-love and acceptance today, but her childhood wasn't always a rosy one and shaped her formative years. 

Born on September 29, 1980, in Homestead, Florida, she spent her first eight years in Japan, where her naval officer father was stationed. Her parents divorced soon after returning to the United States, and her mom raised her and her two siblings alone. Metz has been quite candid about never getting to knew her father. In a 2017 interview with Glamour, the actress recalled the financial struggles her family experienced with just one parent in the picture:

"There were times I'd be nervous walking home from elementary school, thinking, If that red tag from the power company saying our lights are turned off is on the door handle, I don't know what I'll do."

She revealed that her mother wouldn't eat dinner on some nights, claiming she "wasn't hungry." But Metz knew she was putting up a front so that she and her siblings had something to eat. She discussed in the same interview how this likely affected her relationship to food:

"It was devastating. In retrospect, I think that's why food equals love in my family. It's the way we showed love—my grandmother would make me a grilled cheese sandwich every time she'd pick me up from school. I really valued that attention. As I got older, that turned into, 'Oh, I'm happy—let's celebrate and eat. I'm sad? Let me eat my feelings.'"

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At just 11 years old, Metz tried Weight Watchers for the first time.

"I was the youngest person in the damned room, and it was awkward," she recalled in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter. "My mom was trying to figure it out, but it's a process."

Things only became more complicated after her mom remarried. After years of not having much food around, she said she ate as if it would disappear the next day when it was there. Metz's stepfather would taunt her over her eating habits and weight, which she discussed in detail in her 2018 memoir This Is Me: Loving the Person You Are Today. 

"My body seemed to offend him, but he couldn't help but stare, especially when I was eating. He joked about putting a lock on the refrigerator," Metz wrote, according to Women's Health. 

She then shared that her stepfather would force her to weigh herself at 14 years old. "He'd get the scale from the bathroom and clang it hard on the kitchen floor. 'Well, get on the damn thing!'"

After finishing high school, Metz knew she wanted to become an actress – but admits she was a little lost at how to go about it at first.

"I didn't know anybody with connections, I didn't come from money, I didn't go to Juilliard," she told Glamour. "But I never was afraid of the odds, even though they were seriously stacked against me."

Eventually, her sister invited Metz to tag along to an open-call model and talent search in Florida, where a casting director asked the actress if she could act and sing. 

"I sang Christina Aguilera's 'Beautiful'—Lord knows why I chose that big ol' thing," she said. "The following day she called my sister for a modeling contract and told me she'd introduce me to managers and agents in Los Angeles."

Metz then "caravaned" her way to L.A. with two other girls from back home who also dreamt of making it big. They moved into a two-bedroom apartment, with three people staying in each room and barely scraping by on a skint budget. The actor would pick up odd jobs left and right to support herself, while her stepdad agreed to help her with her car insurance payments. "I had two auditions that pilot season, maybe," Metz admitted. "I cried a lot."

After years of getting small parts in T.V. shows, including Entourage and movies Loveless In Los Angeles and The Onion Movie, Metz was unsure of where her career was headed. 

Metz began taking steps towards healthily losing weight and started by walking for 20 minutes every day and eating a 2000-calorie diet. Not only did the pounds stop dropping, but she started seeing a therapist, and thus began her journey to self-love.

At the same time, Metz's acting career also began to heat up — she scored the part in the fourth season of American Horror Story in 2014. While she thought the role would prove her breakthrough in the industry, she quickly found herself back at square one, with no auditions and no prospects of new acting parts. She had even considered moving back to Florida, although her mother thankfully talked her out of it and convinced Metz to keep trying. 

"So I stayed. I kept auditioning, with no savings and no money, credit card debt gaining interest," the actress told Glamour. "I went on unemployment. I bought ramen noodles at dollar stores." Thankfully, she also had the support of her friends, who made sure to ship in whenever possible to help Metz stay afloat. "I never had to—God forbid—live on the streets."

Then finally, she landed the audition for This Is Us. 

"I am so grateful that I had such an amazing support system, but when I booked This Is Us, I had 81 cents in my bank account," Metz revealed. "I could cry right now just thinking about it."

The series would prove to be a bit of a jackpot for Metz, who told the Hollywood Reporter that she felt especially connected to her character, Kate Pearson. "Here was this woman who was actually dealing with weight. Not like, 'Oh my God, I gained a pound.' She was a real woman who was really struggling, and all I could think was, 'Oh my God, I'm Kate.'" 

In the series, Metz portrays a woman who, just like her, had struggled with her body image and fluctuating weight for most of her life. 

"The trajectory is that Kate will be losing weight just as I will in real life to reflect the character in her arc and her journey," she explained. That's exciting for me, especially because losing weight is something I've struggled with and contemplated."

It proved to be a role-of-a-lifetime, as Metz eventually won two Golden Globe awards for Best Supporting Actress, as well as an Emmy nomination. She even sang a song from her movie Breakthrough at the 2020 Oscars, showing off her incredible talents for all to see. 

However, it's her role in This Is Us that has had the most significant impact on fans and women everywhere, with Metz saying that the inspiration she's able to give to others has made her journey worth it. 

"I've had women—average women, older women, teenagers—who say to me, 'Your role and this show has changed my life.' That makes all the struggle, all the ramen noodles, all the times when I couldn't pay my bills, all the times where I was like, I can't do this,' worth it," she told Glamour. "Sometimes I cry on the way to the set still. There is something that happens when you are grateful: You continue to keep receiving blessings. So I will always be grateful."

Having just turned 43 in September, Metz is living her best life full of love, self-acceptance, and being a role model to countless women out there. While she continues to lose weight, both for health reasons and because of her part in This Is Us, Metz says she has no weight goal in mind. 

"Physically, I really am interested in just feeling better and not having to be put in a box," she told People. "I don't want to be limited by anything."

Did you know about Chrissy's life journey? Have you experienced similar struggles and managed to come out on top? We'd love to hear about them. Let us know in the comments, and pass this on to inspire those you know!