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Jillian Bell opens up about anxiety struggles

 

Comic actress Jillian Bell has opened up about her anxiety struggles after suffering from panic attacks as a teenager.

The 35-year-old comic actress has admitted to suffering from panic attacks since she was a teenager but is eager to be open about her anxiety to help other young girls.

Talking to The Guardian newspaper, Jillian said: "I would have liked to know when I was younger who was also going through this and that I wouldn't feel as alone."

Jillian recently had a panic attack whilst filming but praised her co-workers for their understanding, admitting they were very "warm" towards her.

She explained: "I got through it, but it was really hard. I thought I was going to quit, but, thank goodness, I had another job I had already committed to. The people there were very warm, and I was very open about what happened."

The 'Brittany Runs a Marathon' star also admitted to struggling with her body image as she is "overweight by Hollywood's standards".

Speaking about how her latest film sees her play a dangerously overweight character, urgently needing to lose 40 pounds by running a marathon, she said: "There's only so much you can shake off the character. You have to figure out what your own story is. And [after making the film] I feel I'm in a much better place. It's still rocky at times, but I try to be as kind to myself as I can. What would it be like if I really enjoyed the things I was doing and focused less on how I looked? To look at all the seeds that have been planted in my brain from a very young age of what women should look like, and re-examine those thoughts and see if they're feeding me or not? And most of them were not feeding me."

Jillian also thinks it's important to play female characters as "real human beings".

She said: "I think it's important to play women as real human beings. A lot of times the word 'likeable' comes up, especially as a writer. They want to make sure that all the women are very likeable and I think that's unfair because we've had a lot of male characters who are incredibly unlikable that we root for. I'm hoping women start to do that more: play characters who are flawed and make mistakes."

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