Dancing on Ice star Vanessa Bauer has opened up on the impact comments made by skating coaches has had on her life. The ITV star has now spoken out after her battles with eating disorders.
The skating pro said that her eating disorder "destroyed everything" with her unable to think about anything but food.
Speaking to the Sun newspaper, Vanessa said: "All I could think about was food. How I could not eat without people getting suspicious, how to get rid of it without anyone knowing."
The figure skater, 26, said during the troubled time she found herself constantly injured with her breaking her foot and having "broken fingers all the time".
She said: "I was still training eight hours a day on the ice, but I was like a robot. I was so weak that I would faint outside training and I was constantly injured."
The ITV star said she would lock herself in her bedroom for days at time plagued with suicidal thoughts.
Vanessa said she did not skate for three years without the help of painkillers, with her condition having such an impact she finally spoke to her skating coaches about what was going on.
Now the skating star is using her platform to raise awareness of eating disorders, Vanessa reflected on her time at an elite school for skaters in Berlin.
She admitted that before the age of 10, Vanessa and her school friends would compete to see who could eat the least per day.
The young skater would actively try to make tiny amounts of food last for as long as possible, but when she was just 12 years old a friend taught her how to make herself throw up.
She said: "On the ice, coaches would scream that I was a fat cow, and that’s why I couldn’t finish my routine. We all had that for years and years.
"Then, when I was 12, I was scouted and asked to try out for pair figure-skating. Before my trial, one of my friends taught me how to throw up. That’s where it started. But then I couldn’t stop, and I became stuck in this vicious cycle."
At the time, Vanessa assumed that her coaches both knew about and approved of her disordered approach to eating which she now calls "pretty sick thinking".
Vanessa said that her coaches would make her look at pictures at the height of her illness and tell her to look at how much weight she had gained and tell her that she was ugly now.
Shortly afterwards Vanessa chose to quit the skating programme and avoided the ice for a year, focusing on her recovery.
Vanessa has went on to have an impressive career with her making herself a favourite on the hit show Dancing on Ice.
She joined the show in January 2018 and won her very first series alongside former X Factor singer Jake Quickenden.
In 2019 and 2020 she placed second with Wes Nelson and Perri Kiely respectively. Last year she partnered up with Emmerdale ’s Joe-Warren Plant but had to pull out after testing positive for coronavirus.
For help and support on eating disorders contact Beat Eating Disorders on 0808 801 0677
