Victoria's Secret Model Bridget Malcolm Gave Up Dieting and Gained Weight: 'I Am Much Freer Now'

Victoria’s Secret model Bridget Malcolm feels “free” after ending a years-long obsession with dieting.

The Australian model, 26, decided in August to finally “make peace” with her body. She got rid of her scales, measuring tape and smallest clothes, and she deleted all the gym selfies and progress shots on her phone.

“Basically, I wanted no point of reference any more of a time when I was smaller, or larger,” Malcolm wrote on her blog. “I just wanted to stop looking in mirrors and telling myself that I was ‘too fat,’ and ‘not doing enough.’ Easy to say, insanely hard to do. I was attempting to undo twelve years of being told to lose weight and ‘tone up.’ ”

Instead she focused on eating for health — no more skipping meals or limiting herself to small portions — and working out to feel strong. But it was a struggle at first.

“I cannot tell you how many times I went to bed with my head whirling — trying to get me to latch onto how much I ate at dinner, or during the day, or trying to convince myself to change my diet, start training hard again, start tracking my size, just start doing more,” Malcolm said. “It felt like two steps forward, one and three quarters step back.”

Frustrated that her new mindset wasn’t sticking, Malcolm talked with a friend.

“He looked at me, and said, ‘You realize that everything you say, you become? In life we have the ego path, the easy, shady path, and the right, harder, harsher way.’ It stopped me in my tracks. It makes sense, and I had heard it said before (and believed it cognitively), but at that point in time I was finally completely ready to hear it.”

Malcolm realized that she needed to look at the “larger picture.”

“From that point on, I said no to anything negative and body related,” she said. “If body talk came up with friends, I shut it down and refused to engage. If I felt the need to look in a mirror, I read a book instead.”

“When I was ordering food for dinner, I ordered what I wanted. And strangely enough — the need to gorge myself is slowly fading away. I was okay with being done when I was full. When food isn’t a scarcity we stop feeling so desperate around it. But most importantly, when I saw my body reflected back at me, I said nice things to myself. I chose to empower my self.”

Malcolm said she has since gained weight, and she’s happier for it.

“There are far bigger fish to fry in the world than your thigh size. There are so many better uses for your brain,” she said. “My life is so much more than my jean size. And every day when that voice in my head tries to tell me I am worthless, it gets a little easier to shut it down. I am setting myself free slowly.”