PREVIEW

Tom Daley has opened up about his struggles with an eating disorder. The retired Olympic diver reflected on his history of bulimia and body dysmorphia, in the lead-up to the release of biographical documentary Tom Daley: 1.6 Seconds. ”In 2011, my performance director told me that I was overweight and that I needed to look like I did when I was 14 - I was nearly 18 at the time," Tom, 30, told Fashion magazine. ”That was the first time I felt like somebody was looking at my body - not from a performance point of view but by what it looked like.” He explained he went on to suffer from a range of mental health problems. ”I struggled with all kinds of different issues around body dysmorphia and bulimia," Tom said. It was particularly hard, he said, because at the time there was a broad perception that eating disorders didn't affect men and boys. ”It was not something that men talked about," Tom recalled. "It was like, 'Well, that only happens to girls'. So I felt very alone in that experience.” When he reached his late 20s, however, Tom had expanded his view of the world and his place in it. ”By the time the Tokyo Olympics came around (in 2021), I realised I was more than just a diver. Between 2016 and 2021, I got married, we had a kid and my priorities shifted.” Tom and his husband Lance Black share sons Robert and Phoenix, who were born via a surrogate in 2018 and 2023, respectively.
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