Ashley Graham felt "disgusted" by her appearance as an 18 year old.
Ashley Graham
The brunette beauty has emerged as one of the world's most famous models in recent years, but Ashley was forced to feel embarrassed by her famously curvaceous figure during her youth.
Asked when she became accepting of her figure, Ashley explained: "It would be so much easier to be like, 'This is the date, time, and experience I had,' but there really isn't one. It was more about experiences in my life of devaluing the fact that I was an average, normal girl living in the city.
"But being told, 'You're fat,' 'You're ugly' or 'You're just not good enough,' and trying to live in these model standards, that was my normal.
"I think I hit bottom around 18. I was disgusted with myself and told my mom I was coming home. And she told me, 'No, you're not, because you told me that this was what you wanted and I know you're supposed to do this. It doesn't matter what you think about your body, because your body is supposed to change somebody's life.'"
Ashley admitted it took her time to accept that it's "okay to have cellulite".
Reflecting on the conversation with her mother, she told V Magazine: "To this day that sticks with me because I'm here today and I feel that it's okay to have cellulite."
In fact, the Sports Illustrated model's mother helped her to realise that cellulite was a "non-issue".
She shared: "I remember my first signs of cellulite, in middle school. I remember telling my mom, 'Isn't it disgusting? It's so ugly.' She pulled her pants down and said, 'Look, I have it, too.' And I was like, 'Gasp!' She looked at me, then at it, and just rolled her eyes. She didn't tell me that it's beautiful or ugly. She just made it a non-issue. It doesn't define my worth.
"If women like you and me continue to preach that, then I feel like younger girls are going to grasp it and they're going to be like, 'Who cares!'"
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