MasterChef Australia’s Savindri ‘Sav’ Perera has shared her battle with body dysmorphia and revealed that it almost stopped her from competing on the popular reality TV show.

Sav shared a vulnerable post on Instagram and said that she was grieving her mother’s death at the time of auditions, which further led her to question her decision to go on MasterChef.

“One of the hardest battles I had to overcome before competing was severe body dysmorphia,” Sav penned on social media.

“The amount of absolute hatred I have for myself after a lifetime of being made to feel ugly for being fat was immense. Yet every morning I put my makeup on & show up, because my desire to compete is bigger than my hatred for my appearance. A big part of me wasn’t ready to go on MC because I was still grieving.”

But there was also a part of me that was scared because I’m not skinny and pretty like TV personalities usually are.”

Sav said that she struggled to watch herself on MasterChef

Sav revealed that she’s been in therapy for her body dysmorphia, but still struggles to come to terms with it.

“It is sometimes really really hard for me to watch myself purely because of the intense fatphobia I have towards myself,” she explained.

“The hatred I have towards my body at times is awful. Years of therapy later & it’s better but it’s not easy. That self loathing manifested in a way that led to me convincing myself that I don’t deserve to take up space in this world. Sometimes I see comments online that often talk about how I don’t smile, how my voice is awful, how my smile is awful.. and whilst I don’t engage with these things, I still see it & while I can ignore it on most days, after a while I wonder if it’s actually true when I know it isn’t.”

Sav shared her story to help others

The MasterChef contestant said that she decided to share her story in the hope that it would help others who are going through something similar.

“I want to talk about this openly because my experience is not unique. There are many people, women, men, just people, who feel like they cannot take up space because they don’t fit society’s demands of them. I hope you know, you should do what you wanna do anyway. I hope it doesn’t stop you from going where you want to go.”

Watch MasterChef Australia from Sunday – Wednesday on Channel 10 and 10 Play.

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