Olly Alexander: “I had eating and body issue for a decade”

Years and Years frontman, Olly Alexander reveals that he has suffered from eating and body issues for a decade.

Olly Alexander spoke to Buzzfeed News via Facebook Live Chat moments before a concert in Wembley Arena.

Buzzfeed reports that Alexander “battled a fixation on food” during his childhood through to his early 20’s as he came to terms with his sexuality, his parents’ divorce, anxiety and depression.

In the video, Alexander said his battle began at the age of 10 when he started to attend a local gymnastics class.

“It was the first time I was starting to have an awareness of my body and strength and [thought], ‘Older boys, they’re really muscly and they could do things that I couldn’t do’ and that’s the point, from then onwards… I started to have body issues and not eating, like I wouldn’t eat.”

He explained how he was stuck between being “really, really, really skinny and hating it” but he also didn’t want to “put weight on because that was bad as well.”

“For ten years at least really I would I would say I struggled with that.” He said that the struggle would involve him “skipping meals and constantly thinking about food and… obsessing over what I ate and what was going into my body and hating my body in the mirror.”

Alexander states that his relationship with his body and food has improved because of a “good support network” and “years of therapy”.

You can read the rest of Buzzfeed’s interview here.