“I had to be very, very strict with myself.”
Mel C has discussed her struggle with anorexia and depression during her early years in the Spice Girls.
The singer said that she was almost kicked out of the band before they were officially launched in 1996 following a “scuffle” with Victoria Beckham.
After that, she said that struggled to relax for fear of losing her place in the band.
“We’d all had a few bevvies and on the way out there was a little scuffle between myself and Victoria,” she told Lauren Laverne on BBC 4’s Desert Island Discs.
“I was told if that behaviour ever happened again, then I would be out. I began to be really, really hard on myself.
“I think that is where the start of some of my problems came because I had to be very, very strict with myself. I couldn’t allow myself to relax because if I did I might mess it all up.”
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Mel C said that she developed anorexia, before eventually experiencing a binge eating disorder.
“I went to my GP and I was diagnosed with depression,” she says. “It was such a weight lifted off my shoulders.
“It was such a relief because I thought, ‘Oh my God, there’s a name for it and I can be helped.'”
The Spice Girls reunited – minus Victoria – for a series of arena shows across the UK and Ireland last year.
Beckham said that she decided not to take part in the shows to focus on her family and work.
“Saying no requires courage,” she told Vogue Germany.
“For example, it took me a lot of courage not to go on tour with the Spice Girls again, but to be the one who says, you know, I’m not doing it because things feel different now than they used to.
“I’d rather concentrate on my family and my company.”
