‘Today’: Valerie Bertinelli’s Surprising Statement During Her Emotional Visit to the Morning Show
Valerie Bertinelli checked in on Today this week to give the crew and viewers an update on her weight loss and wellness journey. The actress last appeared on the morning show in early January to announce her intention to make 2020 her “year of choosing happy.”
It’s been a long road with her weight loss struggle for the Food Network personality, a lifelong one, in fact. And Bertinelli is adamant that this year is when it all changes.
Find out about her emotional visit to the Today Show this week and her surprising statement.
‘I just want to know what true joy feels like’
Valerie Bertinelli announced in her visit this week on Today, that for her, her goal will have less to do with the scale and more to do with knowing happiness and contentment.
“I’ve been working so hard for so long…I just want to know what true joy feels like,” she tearfully said yesterday on the morning show.
Bertinelli got painfully honest with Hoda Kotb, speaking in halted pauses, while holding back tears. It’s clear the 59-year-old has been looking honestly at her habits and the emotional pain that’s been held back from years of turning to food to comfort herself.
“I use food…as a way to not feel sadness.”
Bertinelli’s honesty struck a chord with viewers
“When you spoke out,” Kotb told Bertinelli yesterday about her Jan. 7 visit to the morning show, “there was a chorus, like an army of people who nodded their heads.”
“One woman said, ‘I’m you,'” Kotb told the Food Network cook. “This one said, ‘It’s like I’m looking into a mirror into my soul.'”
Bertinelli said, “Wow,” moved by the outpouring of support and understanding from viewers. “That’s validating, and I hope that I do all of them justice.”
The Valerie’s Home Cooking host said, “When I first started this, I thought ‘For 2020, I want to lose ten pounds!’ and then I started to think about it, ‘I’ve been losing the same ten pounds for the past fifty years.’ It just can’t be about the ten pounds anymore. It just can’t.”
“I have to learn how to love myself today, as is.”
What Bertinelli is realizing – and how a life coach is helping her
“Sometimes I feel like I’m screaming into a void, and I’m not heard. So when things do happen that hurt my heart, and my soul, I’m not allowed to complain. And I think I was taught that from a very young age. ‘Make people like you, you have to be liked.'”
“I’m just like everybody else. I have a very blessed life and I’m incredibly grateful. But I have a lot of pain in my life, too, that I don’t get to express.”
Bertinelli has been seeing mind/life coach Angie Johnsey who showed the actress, and viewers, how to organize her feelings in an effort to handle them more effectively without food. She worked with Bertinelli on a mind map, a tool to help her deal with her negative thoughts.
Bertinelli’s jaw-dropping statement
While the goal she stated earlier in the month was to lose weight, Bertinelli made a baffling statement, that at the same time, makes a great deal of sense, considering the emotional burden she has been feeling.
“I may not lose any weight on this journey,” Bertinelli said, tearfully. “But I may just lose the weight that’s sitting on my shoulders and on my heart. I think we may make a difference in some people’s lives. And, selfishly, hopefully, mine.”
The professional home cook’s homework? To keep listening to Johnsey’s meditations, as Bertinelli calls them, and practicing them.
“By continuing to listen to Angie speak and her meditations . . .right now it’s not hard, but I know if I don’t listen and I don’t practice it every day, it will get more challenging.”
It will be great to see the One Day at a Time star’s progress in her next visit on Today!
Read more: Who is Food Network Star Valerie Bertinelli’s Husband, Tom Vitale?
