The Hunger Games’ Sam Claflin Shares Struggles With Body Dysmorphia

The Hunger Games star Sam Claflin opens with her struggles with body dysmorphia.
“I’m incredibly insecure,” Claflin, 39, who played Finnick Odair, said on Monday, February 2. Fearne CottonThe “Happy Place” podcast.
He continued, “I just went to a screening of the movie I was in, and everyone immediately after that, the director, the producers, [said] ‘How was it?’ I was like, ‘I hated myself.’ I don’t like my face. I don’t like myself.”
I Daisy Jones & The Six the actor admitted, “I have a kind of body dysmorphia, I think,” which he said was based on his upbringing.
“I think that may have come from being a teenager and coming of age, and not feeling like I’m pretty, or too short, or not strong enough,” Claflin explained. “I remember PE class in particular where I couldn’t pull up when everyone else in my year was doing pull-ups, and I just felt incredibly embarrassed.”
According to the Mayo Clinic, “body dysmorphic disorder is a mental condition in which you can’t stop thinking about a feature or flaws that you think are more or less about your appearance—a feature that seems small or invisible to others.” Those with this condition may be “obsessed with it.” [their] appearance and body, by repeatedly checking the mirror, grooming or seeking reassurance, sometimes for hours each day.” The disease “can cause you significant stress and affect your ability to function in your daily life,” according to the academic medical center.
Claflin said her body insecurity has also affected her career as an actress.
“Being in the industry that I’m in, and especially now that the whole world has the opportunity to have their opinion, I think, yes, it really affects you,” she said.
“A lot of the roles I played early in my career … I had a blank scene in one of my first movies, but I wasn’t told, it wasn’t in the script,” he said. “I was told, like, a week before they took me out, and I was like, ‘S***, I’m not done yet. What am I going to do? This is like my first introduction to the world.’
He added, “I think it affected me a lot, and I’d say a lot of guys I talked to, anyway, to some degree. But mine was worse.”
The British actress said, among other things, “I overthink everything, so I won’t eat … I don’t eat breakfast, I drink juice in the morning and I exercise twice if I ate badly the night before.
“It’s a real struggle, it’s like a daily struggle,” he said, adding that he also struggles to please people.
“It worries me that people might not like me, or think I’m a good person or whatever, or [I] it may not look good,” he said.
Despite his personal challenges, Claflin said, “I’m not sad, I’m very happy,” noting that he’s really enjoyed being a father.
“I fully embrace this role. I was born to be a nurturer. … Having children has given me purpose in my life, I feel,” said Claflin, who shares his son Pip, 10, and daughter Margot, 8, with his ex-wife, an actress. Laura Haddock.





