Julie Tan considered plastic surgery after ‘flat-chested’ and ‘flat nose’ comments

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Julie Tan

Julie Tan may be one of the most popular local artistes but filming her latest Channel 8 drama, The Lead, brought her back to when she was 20.

On the show, which airs on weekdays at 9pm, she plays an actress sporting buck teeth, unruly eyebrows and messy hair who ends up going for plastic surgery when she is bullied over her looks.

Julie, 24, shared with The New Paper, “All along they say beauty is on the inside and we preach that, but actually people still judge. They really gave me the cold shoulder when I was dressed as my character and in that moment I understood why some people wanted to undergo plastic surgery.”

What she experienced and witnessed while filming The Lead also brought her back to when she was 20.

She recalled how she was body-shamed online so badly that she almost went under the knife herself.

Haters called her “flat-chested” and pointed out her “high forehead” and “flat nose”,

eventually caused her to have depression and become bulimic, which then led to thyroid problems.

Julie said: “I had very bad anxiety attacks and during that period of time, I couldn’t cope with the stress and pressure. As much as I say it didn’t affect me, as a young woman, it really did.

“Whenever I looked in the mirror, I actually hated myself and would start slapping and hurting myself, wondering why am I so ugly and alive.”

It came to a point when her mother even followed her to consult a plastic surgeon to enhance her breasts and sharpen her nose, but Julie didn’t go through with it in the end as she felt she needed to embrace her flaws.

Said Julie: “I fought through that period for two to three years, and these are parts of my life that people don’t see. I struggled with it every single day. On normal days, I would be fine and act like I didn’t care, but when I got home, it hit me very badly… and I carried (the struggles) by myself.

Fortunately, she’s now at a place where she has finally accepted herself, in order to set an example for her fans.

“Especially after working on The Lead, I realised that I am who I am, and I don’t need anyone’s approval,” she said.


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If you’d like to contribute your story to us, drop us an email at editors@sureboh.sg and we’ll review it. We read each submission that comes to us within two weeks of receiving it.

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