When Us Weekly interviewed Tori Spelling about her 45-pound weight loss after the birth of her son, she gave the customary vanilla answer about eating a diet full of vegetables and lean protein combined with regular cardio exercise. But in her new memoir Spelling It Like It Is, she admits that was all a bunch of bologna.

The truth is a little tougher to stomach: Spelling writes in her book, “I took off my weight the old-fashioned way. I like to call it the Just Keep Your F-King Mouth Shut and Eat Air diet. It’s all the rage.” In the months immediately following the birth of her son, she basically starved herself back into her skinny jeans.

Inspiring? Not so much. Pretty common among celebrities? Probably.

Here’s what we should be taking away from this story.

3 Lessons We Should Learn from Tori Spelling’s “Eat Air” Diet

1. Be skeptical of celebrity assertions.

Celebrities want us to believe they’re just regular folks like you and me, but that ignores a very key difference between those with fame and those without: For celebrities, their bodies are a key part of their brand, their image, their product. When it’s your job to look good in front of a camera, you are going to pull out all the stops: Expensive personal training sessions, in-home healthy chefs, or – in this unfortunate case – extreme, dangerous dieting techniques. So when we read interviews with movie stars that are all “I easily lost the baby weight and you can too!!!” we should take it with a grain of salt.

2. Don’t even bother comparing.

It seems like a no-brainer – why should I judge my post-baby body based on what I see in the magazines? – and yet we still fall prey to the comparison game all the time. Even though we’re fully aware that the images and reports portrayed in the media are totally falsified, be it through airbrushing, photoshopping, or celebrity fibs, we still bemoan the fact that our thighs are thicker than Jessica Alba’s and our abs are flabbier than Kate Hudson’s. Tori Spelling’s admission is further proof that such comparisons are completely and utterly futile.

3. Be realistic about your own post-partum weight loss.

There’s a lot of truth to the saying, “It took 9 months to put the weight on, it will take 9 months to get it off.” Crash dieting is never healthy, but – despite Tori Spelling’s example – starving yourself is particularly harmful right after giving birth. A breastfeeding mom requires extra calories, not fewer, to ensure an adequate milk supply, and forget about getting through the sleepless nights and daytime demands of having a newborn without the proper fuel. All the more reason to ignore the pressures to drop the baby weight quickly through an extreme diet.

The Bottom Line

Forget the magazine photos. Forget the interviews with super-svelte celebrity moms. Aim to take care of yourself as best you can during those post-partum months, without crash dieting or other extremes. Your body – and your new baby! – will thank you.

What do you think of Tori Spelling’s admission to lying about her post-baby weight loss plan?

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