Body love: Coleen Nolan has revealed that she has finally come to terms with her figure despite a TV boss telling her she needed a gastric band
She champions women’s issues on her daytime TV show but although Coleen Nolan is outwardly confident, inside she has been battling with her weight for over 25 years.
While the TV presenter has learnt to love her body as a size 16, she has revealed how one TV executive told her to have a gastric band fitted.
The singer, who was at a size 20 at her heaviest and a size ten at her lightest, was meeting with television bosses to discuss a new show when one executive outlined that her size 14 figure would be a problem.
In an interview with the Daily Mirror Coleen explained that the man in question had been staring at her throughout the meeting before dropping the diet bombshell.
She told the paper: ‘He just said: “I wonder what we are going to do about that,” all the while he was looking me up and down, nodding we’d have to do something about my weight.’
‘Oh my God I was only a size 14, hardly obese! “Then came the biggest shock. He said: “Well we really like you and we think you’ll be great but we have a particular look in mind for the host…everybody’s going on about these gastric bands at the moment, why don’t you think about that?”’
Weight gain: Coleen has seen her weight creep up to a size 16 (left) after she stayed a size ten for three years (right)
The Nolan singer said she was ‘gobsmacked’ at the suggestion which made her realise she didn’t want to sacrifice her life, or her size for her career.
She said: ‘I was so angry on the day, but in another way it was good as it was so shocking it gave me confidence to say no to that sort of c***.’
‘It’s such a horrible thing to say and it’s completely unhealthy for someone my size at the time, a size 14 to be pushed into surgery. It’s a major thing and you should only do it if you really need it.’
Loose Women: Coleen with her fellow TV presenters Kate Thornton, Lisa Maxwell and Sherrie Hewson at The National Television Awards
She added: ‘More importantly, I’m not going to be forced into an operation because of some TV exec with a bad attitude about women.’
Coleen, who stuck to a size 10 for three years, has seen her weight creep up over the past year, but she isn’t fazed by her weight gain despite acknowledging that there is a pressure for women in the media to look a certain way.
While there is a distinct lack of curvier women on television Coleen has said she is happy to be a poster girl for larger ladies.
The Loose Women presenter said: ‘I can’t think of a singer fuller-figured woman on prime time TV anymore.’
‘Even Vanessa (Feltz) has had a gastric band and is decreasing by the day. Fern Britton is slimmer than ever thanks to hers. Soon I’ll be the only one left but if I have to be the poster girl, then bring it on!’
Her acceptance of her figure has come at a time when her career is an at all-time high across all areas.
In September last year she returned to ITV flagship This Morning in a new presenting role and still appears regularly on the Loose Women panel.
She has hosted programmes on Sky has weekly columns in a national newspaper and a magazines and is about to launch her third book, a novel called Denial, which is out next week.
Source:Dailymail