Rebel Wilson feels ‘so sad’ she didn’t love herself the ‘right way’ for so long, which led to her piling on the pounds.
40-year-old actress Rebel Wilson has undergone a dramatic body transformation after shedding 40lbs (about 18kg) over the last year and she admitted she piled on the pounds because she didn't love herself "in the right way".
She said: "I wasn't loving myself in the way that I should from 20 to 40 – that's 20 years.
"I feel so sad that I did that to myself, just not loving yourself in the right way."
Rebel began to gain weight in her late teens, putting on 25kg when she went to college thanks to "comfort and emotional eating", an unhealthy diet, and a diagnosis of polycycstic ovary syndrome (PCOS) meant she struggled with her size.
She said: "I'd eat with any emotion. If I was stressed or had exams coming up.
"But then I'd also eat if I was really happy, like I went out on an awesome night and had a great time.
"Other people would just go home and go to bed but I'll be like, 'What am I going to do? I'll just eat these chips and then go to bed.' "
The 'Pitch Perfect' star is cautious of celebrating her slimmed-down frame because she doesn't want to send the wrong message.
Speaking to Ant Middleton on 'Straight Talking', she said: "It's hard because I was so self-confident and don't want to project a message to people that girls can't be happy with themselves at bigger, plus sizes, because I was living the life."
And the 'Bridesmaids' actress admitted she's been subjected to trolling online since her weight loss.
She said: "People go, 'You're not the same, you're not funny anymore', and I'm like, 'Screw you guys'."
And when Ant pointed out the praise Matthew McConaughey received for losing weight for 'Dallas Buyers Club', she added: "Yeah, and they're like, 'Give him an Oscar'. But when women do it, it's like, 'How dare she?' Or 'She's trying to get a man.' "
But Rebel admitted her size helped her career.
She said: "I start gaining all this weight and I'm like, you know what's good for bigger girls? Comedy.
"I'm fatter now, I'm getting more laughs, people want to pay me millions of dollars then to be hilarious.
"There is a philosophy that people don't like laughing at good looking people, they just don't. They normally want to sleep with good looking people. But funny looking people they want to laugh at."
However, her success has caused her to be "pigeon-holed" as a plus-sized actress and she admitted producers just want her to "play Fat Amy in multiple movies and call the character something a bit different."