‘Dieting’ Has Been Brittany Snow’s Best Friend

When Brittany Snow, 21, landed the role of Susan Lemay on TV's Guiding Light,She descended into the dark world of eating disorders.

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"I remember looking around at all these women who were on the soap opera who were working out and dieting," Snow says.

A 12-year-old Snow tried her first diet, taking her cue from them, called Eat Right 4 Your Blood Type.” I took it to the extreme.”, which included a two-month stint when she "lived on pineapple." she admits.

"It kind of progressed into this thing where I needed to always be dieting and losing weight and more weight," she says.

"It became my life and I didn't have any friends and this was definitely my best friend and I held on to it really tight." she added.

After losing 10 lbs. on the diet, Snow says she heard compliments and felt accepted from those around her. Soon it was a feeling she couldn't get enough of.

I knew that was a really low number and I knew that my hair was falling out and I had really weird skin. My face looked really weird and I was getting this fuzz on my face and I was always cold – always to the point of uncontrollably shaking," she says. “But I was more scared that 85 lbs. wasn't good enough. I wanted to be lower."

"I would look at the scars and what I had done to myself and that would convince me not to eat," she says. "I also was crying for attention and I also really wanted someone to see my scars and help me and give me a hug."

By 19, Snow was in rehab and things took a turn for the better. She stopped cutting and got help for her depression. "But the eating stuff was still really hard to deal with," she says. "It's still a struggle."