Tieghan Gerard wants people to stop commenting on her body.
The Half Baked Harvest blogger spoke candidly about how getting constant comments about her weight has impacted her mental health in a New York Times profile published Monday.
Gerard insisted that she does not have an eating disorder — despite the hundreds of comments she receives on a day-to-day basis suggesting otherwise.
The foodie, 30, explained that she has long suffered from social anxiety and separation anxiety, which she has been treating “privately.”
To cope with her stress, she throws herself into work, admittedly often forgetting to eat and sleep.
In fact, Gerard’s anxiety has kept her living just “a few hundred yards” from her family for nearly her entire life.
While the influencer, who boasts over 5 million followers on Instagram, tried going to fashion school in Los Angeles, she quickly dropped out due to homesickness.
Her mother, who runs the business side of Half Baked Harvest, also slammed fans for commenting on her daughter’s body, which she deemed “sexist and judgmental.”
“It’s unfortunate that people feel entitled to comment on someone being underweight, when they would never do that if the person was overweight,” Jen Gerard said.
Tieghan started her blog in 2012 when she was just 19 and has posted a new recipe nearly every day since.
However, as her page continued to grow, so did her number of critics — so much so that she has hired multiple full-time employees to delete negative comments across her blog and social media accounts.
While Tieghan has been called out for cultural appropriation and stealing recipes in the past, it wasn’t until last year that she noticed people focusing more on her body than her recipes.
During an appearance on the “Mimi” podcast in July, she said the negative comments had increased dramatically after she started to “become more forward-facing.”
“I think because I’m in food and I’m a very tiny person, I get a lot of negative comments about my weight and all these things,” she said, “and it’s just like, you don’t know me. You don’t know how I live my life.”
“It is so sad, and at first it killed me,” Tieghan added.
While she won’t reply to anyone that leaves comments about her weight in a “public space,” she will engage if it’s done via direct message, regardless of whether the trolls are trying to be “hurtful” or “genuine and kind.”
“I’ll just respond with the truth. I have nothing to hide. I think that’s all you can do,” she said.
If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call 988 or continue to contact Crisis Text Line by texting “NEDA” to 741741.
