invisablebeauty
09-06-2004, 06:42 PM
this is from a paula abdul interview this past winter in Lifetime magazine.
Paula, 41, has been in show business for nearly 20 years, but talks as passionately about the peaks, plateaus and pits of her career as if they all happened yesterday: She’s still very proud of her days as the Los Angeles Laker Girls choreographer, which launched her career. She talks nostalgically about the perks of pop music superstardom in the late ‘80s after her debut album, Forever Your Girl, sold 12 million copies. She recounts her seven-year exile from the spotlight, and she’s truly grateful for her astonishing comeback on American Idol, arguably the most popular variety show since Ed Sullivan’s.
"I’m like the Forrest Gump of the business," Paula says. "It’s been a wild ride." Michael Bolton babysat her when she was a kid, she taught Janet Jackson her signature Control dance moves, and she choreographed Tom Hanks’ famous piano keyboard scene at FAO Schwarz in the movie Big. The list goes on, but Paula’s most amazing story is how she beat bulimia. "It’s one of the biggest accomplishments in my life, equal to my career accomplishments," she says.
Held hostage by her scale
Paula’s bulimia started when she was in high school, but the seed of the illness was planted when she was 7 by a clueless ballet teacher. "It was pointed out to me in front of the entire class that I didn’t have a normal body, so to speak," says Paula, who was not rail-thin like stereotypical dancers. "And I hate to place blame, because I guarantee she didn’t mean to be the root cause of my eating disorder. She didn’t cause it. It was my thought process."
For 16 years-through high school, the Laker Girls, pop success and even a two-year marriage to Brat-Packer Emilio Estevez-Paula hid her self-destructive secret. By 1994, she had sold millions of records, but she wasn’t happy. She had a warped perception of her body and her weight. Bulimia for Paula wasn’t primarily about purging-although she did do that-it was more about obsessively calculating calories and over exercising. "I’ve said in the past I exercised four hours a day, but it was more," Paula says. "It was ridiculous. And it’s a very isolating disorder. I let it consume most of my day, worrying, Oh God, how am I gonna burn off what I just ate? I felt like I was in such hell. But you don’t dare tell anyone about it because they’ll look at you like you’re a freak."
The turning point came in July 1994, when Paula burned out physically from all the exercise and was so emotionally drained that she couldn’t live with the illness anymore. "I realized I deserved to have peace in my life," Paula says. "God did not intend for me to be a prisoner to my closet, to my scale, to keep me isolated from others." She checked herself into the Laureate Psychiatric Clinic and Hospital in Tulsa for a 45-day program. "It’s a difficult disorder. With drugs, you just don’t take drugs, and with alcohol, you just don’t drink. But with bulimia, you have to learn to have a relationship with food."
The program was successful, and today Paula refuses to diet, allows herself to eat "just about anything" and refuses to be "crazy" about exercise. And to ensure that her recovery stays on track, she has followed a system using happy-face stickers. "On a calendar, I check off the days that I’ve eaten at least three meals and done a reasonable amount of exercise," she says. "That is equal to a happy-face sticker. At the end of the month, there are usually more happy-face stickers than not. And I feel like I don’t enter into that zone of having to be bulimic. I’m not going to say that I don’t have my ‘I feel fat’ days," adds Paula, who’s currently a member of the National Eating Disorders Association’s Ambassador’s Council. "Of course I do. I’m just like everybody else. But I don’t let it monopolize my life. People say, ‘How do you stay thin?’ I just say, ‘I got on with my life. I’m not a prisoner.'
Paula, 41, has been in show business for nearly 20 years, but talks as passionately about the peaks, plateaus and pits of her career as if they all happened yesterday: She’s still very proud of her days as the Los Angeles Laker Girls choreographer, which launched her career. She talks nostalgically about the perks of pop music superstardom in the late ‘80s after her debut album, Forever Your Girl, sold 12 million copies. She recounts her seven-year exile from the spotlight, and she’s truly grateful for her astonishing comeback on American Idol, arguably the most popular variety show since Ed Sullivan’s.
"I’m like the Forrest Gump of the business," Paula says. "It’s been a wild ride." Michael Bolton babysat her when she was a kid, she taught Janet Jackson her signature Control dance moves, and she choreographed Tom Hanks’ famous piano keyboard scene at FAO Schwarz in the movie Big. The list goes on, but Paula’s most amazing story is how she beat bulimia. "It’s one of the biggest accomplishments in my life, equal to my career accomplishments," she says.
Held hostage by her scale
Paula’s bulimia started when she was in high school, but the seed of the illness was planted when she was 7 by a clueless ballet teacher. "It was pointed out to me in front of the entire class that I didn’t have a normal body, so to speak," says Paula, who was not rail-thin like stereotypical dancers. "And I hate to place blame, because I guarantee she didn’t mean to be the root cause of my eating disorder. She didn’t cause it. It was my thought process."
For 16 years-through high school, the Laker Girls, pop success and even a two-year marriage to Brat-Packer Emilio Estevez-Paula hid her self-destructive secret. By 1994, she had sold millions of records, but she wasn’t happy. She had a warped perception of her body and her weight. Bulimia for Paula wasn’t primarily about purging-although she did do that-it was more about obsessively calculating calories and over exercising. "I’ve said in the past I exercised four hours a day, but it was more," Paula says. "It was ridiculous. And it’s a very isolating disorder. I let it consume most of my day, worrying, Oh God, how am I gonna burn off what I just ate? I felt like I was in such hell. But you don’t dare tell anyone about it because they’ll look at you like you’re a freak."
The turning point came in July 1994, when Paula burned out physically from all the exercise and was so emotionally drained that she couldn’t live with the illness anymore. "I realized I deserved to have peace in my life," Paula says. "God did not intend for me to be a prisoner to my closet, to my scale, to keep me isolated from others." She checked herself into the Laureate Psychiatric Clinic and Hospital in Tulsa for a 45-day program. "It’s a difficult disorder. With drugs, you just don’t take drugs, and with alcohol, you just don’t drink. But with bulimia, you have to learn to have a relationship with food."
The program was successful, and today Paula refuses to diet, allows herself to eat "just about anything" and refuses to be "crazy" about exercise. And to ensure that her recovery stays on track, she has followed a system using happy-face stickers. "On a calendar, I check off the days that I’ve eaten at least three meals and done a reasonable amount of exercise," she says. "That is equal to a happy-face sticker. At the end of the month, there are usually more happy-face stickers than not. And I feel like I don’t enter into that zone of having to be bulimic. I’m not going to say that I don’t have my ‘I feel fat’ days," adds Paula, who’s currently a member of the National Eating Disorders Association’s Ambassador’s Council. "Of course I do. I’m just like everybody else. But I don’t let it monopolize my life. People say, ‘How do you stay thin?’ I just say, ‘I got on with my life. I’m not a prisoner.'