Madison de la Garza says cyberbullying from 'Desperate Housewives' fame led her to 'an eating disorder at a very young age'

Madison de la Garza is sharing more about her struggles with body image and an eating disorder, opening up about her "first memories of trying to starve myself" at 7 years old.

"The reactions that I got to my character on Desperate Housewives were… I mean, it was just shocking," the 21-year-old, who is best known for playing Juanita — the daughter of Gabrielle Solis, portrayed by Eva Longoria — told Elizabeth Vargas on Heart of the Matter podcast. "A lot of people came at it in a way that they were 'concerned' for my health. And I personally believe that that's just not true, that it was a cover-up so that they could just judge a 6 year old."

The actress, whose sister is singer Demi Lovato, was cast in the role at 6 years old and recalled not being able to go on the computer unsupervised at the time. She managed to do so sneakily, however, which she said, "affected my mental health and ultimately played into me developing an eating disorder at a very young age."

"I would just spend a crazy amount of time reading through these [online] comments and most all of them were just atrocious. I mean, they said things like they wanted me to die because of what I looked like. I mean, it was just horrible. I mean, ugly fat cow and I hope you get cancer and die because you're so fat. Just horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible things. And this is when I was 6, 7, 8 years old."

She says her family "had no idea that this was going on."

"My mom had no idea that I was seeing these things, that I was reading these things because I was very, very sneaky about it. I don't blame her at all, it was literally impossible to stop me from seeing those things. And I was also very good at hiding and throwing away meals, then saying that I ate them," de la Garza continued. "A lot of this happened while I was at school so there was no way for my parents to know that I was restricting."

Adults working on Desperate Housewives and behind-the-scenes didn't bring the online comments to de la Garza's attention. However, she recalled their efforts to help build her self-esteem.

"They never came out and said anything to me, other than going out of their way to tell me that I was beautiful and tell me that I looked really pretty that day or that that outfit looked really cute on me and things like that," she explained. "The wardrobe department was very aware of making me feel comfortable. I was able to speak up and say, 'Hey, I really don't like the way I feel in these clothes. I feel very uncomfortable.' At one point, they let me bring in my own jeans."

While she "really appreciated" their efforts, de la Garza also recognized that her body was made to be a punchline on the show, which was evidenced by the nature of her on-screen dynamic with Longoria.

"There was one episode where I went to school with a bunch of makeup on because girls in my class said that I wasn't pretty enough to be her daughter. So this was talked about literally in the script of the show," de la Garza said. "The whole joke of my character was that Eva was this thin, beautiful model and her daughter turned out to be quite the opposite. And so I think she was very aware that this was going to affect me."

She continued, "We never explicitly talked about it, but [Longoria] definitely went out of her way to make me feel like I was pretty and like I was special and she made me feel like I was family. If I ever did want to go to her with these things, I absolutely could've. I just, I felt so ashamed that these comments were even being written that I didn't even want to talk about [it]."

The actress has since spoken publicly about the cyberbullying that she faced and told Vargas that she's been in and out of eating disorder recovery over the years.

"I would starve myself and then would go into months of struggling with a binge eating disorder. So it's definitely morphed and changed and gone back and forth," de la Garza said. "Right now, I would like to say I'm about two years into recovery. Things are going really, really well, which is great to be able to say that. But I don't think it's something that will ever be completely gone or it will ever be completely fixed."

If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, call the National Eating Disorders Association hotline at 1-800-931-2237.

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