Kirsten Haglund battled anorexia prior to winning crown
Published: May 06, 2020
Kirsten Haglund, who won the battle for and was crowned Miss America in 2008, first had to overcome her battle with anorexia four years prior to the pageant. The former Miss Michigan says the eating disorder began when she was just 15 years old. “There is a lot of pressure and extra stress in a college student’s life,” Colorado Daily quotes her as saying. “Many young women struggle in this diet culture … it’s like a big melting pot, which can lend toward the formation of an eating disorder.”
Apparently, her strict dance schedules, lowered self esteem, and puberty together drove young Kristen Haglund to opt for a restricted diet chart. Following this her health declined and her weight became considerably low, which also led her menstrual cycle to cease. She could no more give her best to her passion, ballet, and soon she went into a state of severe depression. “The lie that nobody ever tells you is that I thought I was supposed to be happier and stronger by dieting and losing weight,” she said. “But that is just not true. All of these things that were supposed to be getting better by dieting were getting worse.”
Kirsten’s parents noticed she was getting thinner and thinner, and eventually took her to the doctor, where she was diagnosed with anorexia. The condition led her heart beat to drop drastically and her bones to stick out. “I would feel fatigued walking up six stairs,” thehollywoodgossip.com quotes the 21-year-old as saying. “I was a completely different person. It’s not a pretty sight.”
The stunning beauty never disclosed her weight during the competition, despite having an amazing figure, because she didn’t want to set standards for young women obsessed with losing weight.
After being crowned Miss America in 2008 and even now, Kirsten Haglund relentlessly works to spread awareness about eating disorders and a distorted self image that many growing young girls and boys are affected by these days. She describes the problem as: “Eating disorders have become an epidemic these days.”
Celebrities who have suffered from eating disorders include Mary-Kate Olsen,Sharon Osbourne, Daniel Johns and Jane Fonda.
Images: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kirsten_Haglund_Miss_America.jpg, Author: philpottm; http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kirsten_Haglund_headshot.png, Author: Matt Billings
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