Ed Sheeran Reveals Eating Disorder

Ed Sheeran has a thriving career, a wife, and two small children he adores, but he's in the music industry and tells Rolling Stone he's not immune to its dark side. "I have a real eating problem," he says, per Yahoo News. "I’m a real binge eater. I’m a binge-everything. But I’m now more of a binge exerciser, and a binge dad." The singer says that he's "self-conscious anyway," and his eating disorder came about because "you get into an industry where you’re getting compared to every other pop star. ... I’m like, ‘Well, why don’t I have a six pack?’ And I was like, ‘Oh, because you love kebabs and drink beer.’ Then you do songs with Justin Bieber and Shawn Mendes. All these people have fantastic figures. And I was always like, ‘Well, why am I so … fat?'"

Sheeran compares his struggles with those of Elton John, who wrote about bulimia in his autobiography. Sheeran says his wife provided support and pushed him toward therapy. And while his revelation makes him "mad uncomfortable," he says, "It’s good to be honest…because so many [men] do the same thing and hide it." Stuart Murray, USC's director of its Eating Disorder Program, tells USA Today that even though it's not talked about as much, eating disorders affect males as much as females. "If it's more acceptable for girls to talk about this than boys, we're going to confine boys to what can become a chronic illness and reduce the window for treatment," he says. "What Ed Sheeran is doing is normalizing the conversation." (More Ed Sheeran stories.)