Actress Vidya Balan has made a strong case for body positivity. But it took the actor a long time to get to the point where she could embrace and love her body. Vidya recently opened up in an interview about her childhood struggles with body image. Vidya Balan early explained how early exercise and dieting routines caused by her mother’s concerns about her weight had a major adverse effect on the actor’s relationship with her body.
Speaking about how her mother put her on a diet early on, Vidya Balan said, “My mother had this fear that I was a chubby girl. So she was constantly doing things to make me lose weight because she grew up a big girl. She was scared about the fact that I would be judged like her. Parents are always worried for their children and I see that today. I used to be very angry with my mother, ‘Why does she make me go through the early exercise and dieting routines ? Why is she making me diet so early?’ Maybe it’s because she was worried for me. I grew up hating my body. I had developed hormonal issues very early on in my life because it was the rejection of the body.”
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The journey to self-acceptance wasn’t easy, and Vidya acknowledged the effort it took to get to where she is today. She said, “It’s taken me a lot of work to reach this stage. People always come and tell me, ‘You must not be exercising.’ And only if they knew that I love exercise and I am consistent at it because I love it. But for whatever reason, I don’t have the quintessential heroine body, I have not been able to figure that out. I have been through a time where I have put in all the effort and I have not seen the result. The journey of acceptance started around the time I was maybe 30-31 and it’s only been getting better.”
Neeyat, a newly released movie that struggled at the box office and received negative reviews, featured Vidya Balan as CBI inspector Mira Rao. She will star in the upcoming movie Lovers, directed by Shirsha Guha Thakurta, along with Sendhil Ramamurthy, Ileana D’Cruz, and Pratik Gandhi in significant parts.
