Lady Gaga Discusses Bulimia And Bullying At Women’s Conference

Becky Bain | February 8, 2012 3:10 pm

People around the world will soon get a chance to see Lady Gaga live, but a group of lucky young women were treated to the pop star’s presence just last Saturday. Gaga was the surprise guest at “It’s Our Turn”, a young women’s conference which took place at Los Angeles’ Brentwood School. During her 30-minute talk with Maria Shriver, the pop star reflected on the troubles she faced as a teen — namely, being the target of bullying and suffering from bulimia.

“I started having trouble with girls in middle school,” Lady Gaga said. “I always knew that I wanted to do something very career oriented, and I always wanted to be a musician.”

“That alone set me apart,” the Grammy-nominated artist added. “I had such strong convictions and I was pretty delusional, in the same way that I am now … in wanting to change the world and end bullying in America and do whatever I can to promote peace around the world. It might sound kind of silly coming from someone in red lipstick with a bunch of jewels on my jacket, but that’s just the way I have always been.”

After recounting a few personal stories about combating bullying as a teenager, the founder of The Born This Way Foundation asked if anyone in the crowd had a question. A long line formed almost immediately. One woman asked the pop star, “I struggle with body issues, and I know you’re so confident in the way you dress. And I am wondering how you deal with such issues?”

Lady Gaga answered her by revealing that she used to suffer from bulimia. “I used to throw up all the time in high school,” Gaga said. “So I’m not that confident. And maybe it’s easier for me to talk about it now because I don’t do it anymore.”

“I wanted to be a skinny little ballerina but I was a voluptuous little Italian girl whose dad had meatballs on the table every night,” she continued. “I used to come home and say, ‘Dad, why do you always give us this food? I need to be thin.’ And he’d say, ‘Eat your spaghetti.'”

“It’s really hard. But … you’ve got to talk to somebody about it. And the fact that you stood up in front of this whole room and said that is so incredible.”

“Every video I’m in, every magazine cover, they stretch you; they make you perfect,” added Gaga. “It’s not real life. I’m gonna say this about girls: The dieting wars have got to stop. Everyone just knock it off. Because at the end of the day, it’s affecting kids your age. And it’s making girls sick.”

As to why she decided to stop throwing up, Gaga told Shriver, “It made my voice bad. So I had to stop. The acid on your vocal chords — it’s very bad. But for those of you who don’t sing, you maybe don’t have that excuse until it’s too late. It’s very dangerous.”

“I’m encouraging you to know what you’re worth,” the singer declared to the full auditorium. “And know that no matter who has more money in class, who has more stuff, who has a country house – nobody is worth more than anybody else.”

[Via Huffington Post]

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