Victoria Beckham opens up about struggling with eating disorder

Victoria Beckham confessed to having an eating disorder and an "unhealthy" relationship with her body in her new Netflix show, Victoria Beckham.

In the show, which premiered on Oct. 9, the entrepreneur opened up about the pressure of maintaining a certain look.

It started when she attended theater school, where she felt that she looked different from other girls.

“I didn’t look like a lot of other girls … that’s where I started getting a lot of criticism about my appearance, my weight,” she recalled.

Jackie Adams, Beckham's mother, recalled the time her daughter was put in the back of dance routines because she was “overweight.”

The criticisms continued when she joined the British girl group Spice Girls. Beckham was "weighed" on national television when her eldest son, Brooklyn, was six months old.

"We laugh about it, we joked about it…but I was really, really young, and that hurts," she said.

Posh Spice, as she was fondly called, explained that the pressure to maintain the pop star body type became increasingly difficult as she aged.

"I really started to doubt myself and not like myself, because I let it affect me," she shared. "I didn't know what I saw when I looked in the mirror—you lose all sense of reality. I was just very critical of myself. I didn't like what I saw."

The 51-year-old Beckham confessed that the incessant media scrutiny, which included cruel nicknames like "Porky Posh" and "Skinny Posh," triggered an eating disorder that she secretly battled.

She thought that if she didn't have control over the articles and photos being taken of her, she could "control it with the clothing." 

"I was controlling [my weight] in an incredibly unhealthy way," she said.

"When you have an eating disorder, you become very good at lying. And I was never honest about it with my parents. I never talked about it publicly. It really affects you when you're being told constantly you're not good enough," she continued, confessing that she thinks the feeling has "been with me my whole life."

In a 2022 interview, the former singer's husband, David Beckham, revealed that she has eaten the same meal for the last 25 years.

“Since I met Victoria, she only eats grilled fish, steamed vegetables. She will very rarely deviate away from there,” he said in an interview on iHeart.

“The only time she’s ever probably shared something that’s been on my plate was actually when she was pregnant with Harper, and it was the most amazing thing. It was one of my favorite evenings. I can’t remember what it was, but I know she’s not eaten it since,” he continued

Victoria Beckham docuseries offers an intimate look at the fashion icon's life, tracing her journey from pop stardom to global brand builder. It takes viewers inside her family life, her struggle to reinvent herself, and the preparation for Paris Fashion Week.