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Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Model Emily DiDonato: I Lost More Than 20 Pounds After Being Called ‘Too Curvy’ By Agencies

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Katie Jerkovich Entertainment Reporter
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Supermodel Emily DiDonato says when she started out in the modeling world she dropped more than 20 pounds after agencies labeled her “too curvy.”

The 28-year-old Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model shared in a video on YouTube that when she was first looking for a career in modeling after moving to New York City she was told she was “too curvy, too big and too athletic,” per Fox News in a piece published Tuesday. (RELATED: Take A Look Back At Adriana Lima’s Career With Victoria’s Secret)

 

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“To me, to be successful, it was to be thin,” DiDonato shared of how she thought when she was an 18-year-old hopeful model. “So I am going to do whatever it takes, and I did. I was eating as little as possible, I was very obsessed with what I was putting in my body and I was over-exercising.” (RELATED: Check Out The Hottest Looks From The 60th Grammy Awards [SLIDESHOW])

The swimsuit model continued, while explaining after she dropped more than 20 pounds in just a few weeks she suffered from depression after “putting an obscene amount of pressure” on herself to make it in the modeling world.

“I was lonely,” DiDonato said. “I was homesick. I missed my friends. I didn’t know what I was doing in this big city. I didn’t know anyone.”

 

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And even then she would go out to casting and got negative feedback from agencies because now she was looking too thin and skinny. She was told that “she looked better before” and “she doesn’t look super healthy.”

So, the supermodel gained all the weight back “and then some” after feeling “really embarrassed” and like she was “failing” these agencies.

Finally, she decided that maybe Sports Illustrated Swimsuit was the right place for her since they take curvy models and that’s when turned things around.

“I started working more than ever,” DiDonato explained. “I felt free…because there were pictures out there of what I actually looked like and what my body looked like. That Sports Illustrated was celebrating it enough to put it in their issue.”

The swimsuit model said the opportunity, “gave me a reassurance in a way and felt freeing to me.”