Madison De La Garza, a former child actor on Desperate Housewives, has spoken about the devastating online backlash she received when she was just six years old.
The actor and filmmaker, who is the younger half-sister of musician Demi Lovato, played Juanita Solis, the daughter of Gabrielle Solis (Eva Longoria), on the popular series.
According to De La Garza, she became the target of abuse on social media following her role in the show, which caused her to develop an eating disorder.
She opened up about the time to Elizabeth Vargas on the Heart of the Matter podcast.
“They said things like they wanted me to die because of what I looked like,” De La Garza said. “It was just horrible, like, ‘ugly fat cow,’ and ‘I hope you get cancer and die because you’re so fat’.
“Just horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible things and this was when I was six, seven, eight years old.”
She said that reading the comments had “definitely affected my mental health”, and had “ultimately played into” the development of an eating disorder “at a very young age”.
“My family had no idea that this was going on,” she continued. “My mom had no idea that I was seeing these things, that I was reading these things, because I was very, very sneaky about it. I don’t blame her at all. I mean, it was literally impossible to stop me from seeing those things.”
As Desperate Housewives viewers might recall, her character’s weight and appearance was frequently mentioned on the show itself.
“This was talked about literally in the script of the show,” De La Garza explained. “The whole joke of my character was that Eva was this thin, beautiful model, and her daughter turned out to be quite the opposite.”
Asked if the production staff knew about the cyberbulling, she responded: “Yeah, I think if they did, they never came out and said anything to me, other than going out of their way to tell me that I was beautiful and tell me that I looked really pretty that day, or that outfit looked really cute on me and things like that.
“And the wardrobe on the show was very aware of making me feel comfortable.”
In the interview, De La Garza also spoke highly of Longoria’s influence on set, stating that she would regularly offer her young co-star praise.
“She went out of her way to make me feel special,” De La Garza added.
The actor went on to appear in Bad Teacher and could most recently be seen as herself in the YouTube documentary Demi Lovato: Dancing with the Devil.
De La Garza said she is now two years into recovery for an eating disorder. She is also eight months sober.
For anyone struggling with the issues raised in this piece, eating disorder charity Beat’s helpline is available 365 days a year on 0808 801 0677. You can visit their website here.
NCFED offers information, resources and counselling for those suffering from eating disorders, as well as their support networks. They can be reached by phone on 845 838 2040 or their website here.
