Singer Jackie Evancho says she was diagnosed with osteoporosis after suffering a broken back in a car accident last year.
“They were abnormal breaks, breaks that you see in 80-year-olds,” Evancho told People. “That’s how I learned that my eating problems created osteoporosis. So now I’m a 22-year-old with osteoporosis.”
Evancho, who burst into the spotlight after finishing as runner-up on Season 5 of America’s Got Talent in 2010, said she has struggled with anorexia since she was 15 – sometimes going days without eating.
“In my head I said, ‘I know that this isn’t normal.’ I felt exhausted, moody, tearful, but after a bit of time, I started to feel nothing,” she recalled.
Evancho said things got especially challenging during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown.
"The urge to restrict what I’m eating, on top of eating because I’m bored, and panic because I have this distorted view of myself in the mirror … it made everything really difficult,” she said.
The singer checked in to a treatment facility last October and is currently working with a nutritionist and therapist.
“I’m still struggling, but I’m fighting, which is good because a year ago I was giving in to it completely,” she said, “and that’s so dark and painful.”
In September, Evancho with release Carousel of Time, a collection of covers of songs by Canada’s Joni Mitchell.
If you are, or someone you know is, struggling with an eating disorder, call Canada's National Eating Disorder Information Centre toll free at 1-866-633-4220 or visit nedic.ca