Whitney Thore is used to the cameras by now. But that doesn’t mean watching herself have a tearful breakdown on TV is any easier.
The My Big Fat Fabulous Life star opened up to E! News about the Tuesday, Jan. 29 episode that not only featured her worried that her longtime pal Buddy had a drug relapse, but it also featured her having a surprisingly candid chat with him about her quest to become a mother.
“It’s easier, I think, than people might think because I know my crew very well and we’re close, and a lot of them have been with me for multiple seasons, and so in that way—that’s something the audience would never see—it doesn’t feel as invasive because I actually know these people,” Thore told E! News about letting her guard down in the scene above.
“But, yeah, it can still be difficult, and at the same time I kind of know that’s what I signed up for. So, if I ever wanting to be vulnerable, I just remind myself to just go with it,” she added.
And that entire conversation she had with Buddy wasn’t planned. “I actually didn’t want to have that conversation, I just found myself starting to cry and I was like, ‘Well, here we go!'” she said with a laugh.
Thore said she’s willing to let cameras follow her every move and document her life, warts and all, to help viewers at home.
“Even things I’ve been most embarrassed or most upset about, I hear from people from all over the world literally every day. Sometimes it’s really small things that I never really thought would matter to people, and then other times it’s the really big things, the bigger things that we explore. I kind of want to put my own ego aside, if that makes sense, because I do believe the show is helping people and that representation helps people, especially in countries where the show airs where there’s way less representation of fat women than we have here in the States. I just remind myself there’s a bigger purpose behind it and I try not to get upset or anything,” she said.
As for her quest to become a mother, she’s still hopeful.
“There’s definitely surrogacy, and I haven’t given up on the idea that I could do it naturally. I don’t really buy into the whole idea, like, just because you’re overweight it’s a high-risk pregnancy automatically. I don’t believe that at all,” she said.
Thore added her friend Heather, who has two children, suffered from gestational diabetes and “things like that they warn fat women about and she’s thin.”
“So, I don’t see that as a reason not to even try and do it naturally. I just have to find the man, that would be the issue. I watched that clip myself today, this is so ridiculous, but I cried watching myself. The reason being, I just—sometimes I forget how old I am and I really just never could’ve thought when I was younger that I would be a person who literally, maybe, wouldn’t have the opportunity to naturally try to have a child. That I wouldn’t have a partner, that I wouldn’t be married,” she said.
Thore said she’s dating, but most of her relationships were before reality TV. “In the recent past, that’s definitely been more of where I’ve been at and it’s a little hard realization for me,” she said about grappling with her current status. “I’ll be in Walmart, Target, and there will just be families all over the place, all walks of people, and I think, ‘Wow, this seems really easy for people,’ and I just never thought that I would be running out of time. I don’t know what kind of person I thought would run out of time, if that makes sense, but I didn’t think it would be me. I guess I thought it was…somebody wants to spend their life with me, they must! That’s been kind of hard to realize. Especially for women, it’s really a matter of time. Men don’t have to worry that much.”
She’s on the dating apps, but being a reality star looking for love (not on a dating show) has proven to be difficult.
“I actually am still on the apps. I might be dating. I just might be and that’s all I’m going to say about it,” she laughed. “To me, it’s a double-edged sword. If they recognize me immediately, a lot of them are probably going to swipe left, let’s be honest, because they’re like this bitch is crazy. But then if they don’t recognize me, then one of the first questions a stranger asks you is, ‘What do you do?’ and I don’t want to say, really, what I do because if you don’t know, I don’t want you to google me and then be like, forget it. So, I’ll just say, ‘I’m in entertainment, what do you do?’ And they’ll ask, ‘Are you a stripper?’ [Laughs.] It’s a very precarious situation either way. I guess the ultimate dream would be for someone to have seen the show and still want to get to know me. That’s the best cast scenario. I feel like I’m better in real life than I am on TV, so. [Laughs.]”
My Big Fat Fabulous Life airs Tuesdays, 8 p.m. on TLC.