Child star Raven-Symoné has revealed why she decided to withdraw from the spotlight at the height of her career.
The actress, singer, and director has been in the world of showbiz since she was 16 months old and enjoyed levels of success which young starlets could only dream of.
But according to the That's So Raven star, who turns 40 today (10 December), fame isn't all it's cracked up to be - as she's been through years of 'therapy' to help navigate the trauma that her celebrity status left her with.
She has been candid about the struggles she faced while growing up in the public eye, such as her teenage body being under constant scrutiny.
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Raven previously explained she was regularly warned to 'be careful' with what she ate and that her 'sizes are getting bigger' when speaking to Business Insider in 2022.
"Everybody just felt like they could say anything about you when you turned 15," she said, while revealing she realised she was a lesbian three years earlier, but didn't come out as her sexuality wasn't 'sellable'.
Suggesting it would taint the 'Raven-Symoné brand' she had built since starring on The Cosby Show as a toddler, she added: "In my head, it was: 'You stay in your shell until you leave the industry when you're 45, 60 years old.'"
Raven, who shared her sexual orientation with the world in 2013 and is now married to Miranda Pearman-Maday, has now spoken out about how else she protected herself from the court of public opinion in her heyday.
"I have a lot of masks up and I go to a lot of therapy and I stay to myself," she told the Sorry We’re Cyrus podcast last month. "Sometimes Hollywood, if you get too into it, you start...you know.
"You have to do the work and leave. Because there's too many stereotypes that can happen when you take the Hollywood life as the actual work.
"And the things that come to me through Hollywood's sneaky ways...I'm like uh, I'm going to get some sweet tea and go stand over here, because bless your little heart.
"I don't believe it. I don't like it. You the devil, get away."
While discussing her venture from acting into the music industry, Raven then revealed why she threw the towel in before her singing career really took off.
Although she 'definitely' wanted to pursue it, the former 'Cheetah Girl' claimed that she refused to bend to the will of music execs who wanted budding stars to be scantily-clad on stage.
"The mandatory outfit [for a young female singer] was a bathing suit," Raven told mother-daughter duo Tish and Brandi Cyrus. "And I'm not going to get in one.
"I just felt there was a time in music where it was like the more naked you are on stage, the better it is. And I'm not going to do that. So I said no.
"Then also, I had some back and forth with the record label that I was with. Somebody literally said to my mother, 'She's so fat. How can she go so long on stage?'
"And I'm like, 'Wow, cool beans...so, we're just gonna leave this and go on tour somewhere else'.
"But the music career never took off like any of the other people from the Disney Channel because I didn't have the machine behind me to push through, which is a blessing and a curse in a way."
These days, Raven prefers to keep fans updated on her life via the podcast she hosts with her other half, which is titled Tea Time with Raven & Miranda.
She also told the hosts of Sorry We’re Cyrus that she was in the midst of writing a memoir about her extraordinary life, promising she'll dish the dirt 'as best she can without getting sued'.
Topics: Celebrity, Celebrity News, Disney, Entertainment, Music, US News
Olivia Burke