Camila Mendes Gets Candid About Her Eating Disorder During Season One of ‘Riverdale’: “It Was This Terrible Cycle”

Camila Mendes is sharing her struggles with an eating disorder and eventually getting the help she needed.

The Do Revenge actress told Eileen Kelly on Thursday’s episode of the Going Mental podcast that she has grappled with body image issues at different points in her life, but that it returned during the first season of The CW’s Riverdale. She said, “I would watch every episode and be like, ‘Oh my God, my stomach there…’. I was like so insecure, and it really fueled my eating disorder.”

“When you’re in your early 20s, like, your body is fluctuating…my body hadn’t settled into itself yet,” she added. “I was looking at myself, picking myself apart, my stomach, you know, my arms, my chin, anything — I would, like, obsess over [it]…. It kind of got in the way of my acting, because when I was acting on camera…it really fucks with your process.”

Mendes told Kelly that it was at that point that she started seeing a therapist and nutritionist to get help and “heal.”

“I was really afraid of eating carbs,” the Palm Springs actress explained. “And what would happen is I would avoid it for a long period of time, and then I would binge and eat a bunch and then purge. So it was this, like, terrible cycle, and she helped me overcome that by reintroducing bread into my life to be like, ‘See, it’s not going to kill you….’ Now, it’s something that rarely comes up in therapy.”

Throughout her journey, she detailed that it was difficult when people told her, “you look so good,” after she would lose weight. “When I don’t hear that, I think I look terrible — when no one’s commenting on how thin I look.”

As she reflected on her experience with therapy, the actress shared that she appreciated the help she received, saying, “I don’t know if I could have done it alone.”

Mendes has previously been open about her eating disorder. In 2017, she announced that she partnered with the nonprofit, Project HEAL, which raises money for eating disorder treatment. She wrote on Instagram at the time, “I can say from experience that eating disorders are serious mental illnesses. Growing up, I watched my big sister suffer from one for many years, and I’ve experienced periods of my life when I’ve suffered symptoms as well.”