WATCHING the comments roll in, Tally Rye feels a wave of relief as her followers compliment her ‘amazing transformation’, dubbing her an inspiration.
It was 2013, the peak of and Tally was the fittest she’d ever been with her social media following lapping up her #weightloss and #bodytransformation posts.
Tally Rye is happy and healthy at a size 16 and practices intuitive movementCredit: Supplied
But she was previusly known for her dramatic before and after transformation photosCredit: Instagram/@tallyrye
Her diet consisted of plenty of ‘zoats’ (zucchini porridge) with the fitfluencer sharing regular snaps of artfully displayed strawberries each morning before recording what she ate in her app.
Her size 6 transformation snaps were an inspiration to thousands but deep down Tally was battling a dark disorder known as orthorexia which sees sufferers become obsessed with healthy living.
Tally’s fixation saw her counting her steps on holidays, bringing her own food to takeaway nights and increasingly withdrawing from plans in order to maintain her ‘healthy’ lifestyle.
Now 35, Tally’s job hasn’t changed.
She remains a fitness influencer, boasting 135,000 Instagram followers after another dramatic transformation, having gone from a size 6 to a 16 but she’s never been happier.
“My quality of life improved when I stopped being so rigid around food and exercise,” the trainer explains.
“Being able to act spontaneously, have fun and go on holidays without worrying about what I was eating or how my body looked was a real wake up call for me.”
Tally now embraces an approach to both moving and eating, meaning that she rejects strict diets and fitness regimes and exercises to feel good while eating a balanced diet without restrictions.
It’s an approach that the body positive movement lapped up over the past five years with celebs like and subscribing to an anti-diet attitude.
But as many celebs are now happily embracing weight loss jabs, Tally worries that the super skinny body ideal is returning.
“There has been a real regression when it comes to ” she says.
“It’s healthy for people to see that bodies do come in all shapes and sizes and unfortunately a lot of people in the public eye feel like they have to be small to be successful.
“And for young people that’s dangerous especially when weight loss jabs are touted as this quick fix without any sustainability to a healthy lifestyle.”
Tally says that growing up she was always curvier and was raised with a healthy body imageCredit: Instagram/@tallyrye
But she became obsessed with ‘clean eating’ and fitness, developing a condition called orthorexiaCredit: Instagram/@tallyrye
She says that embracing an intuitive approach has lead her to be healthier and happierCredit: Instagram/@tallyrye
Tally says that growing up she was lucky to be brought up by parents with a body positive attitude.
She says: “Growing up emphasis was never put on my body.
“Both my sister and I were always a little bit curvier but that was never an issue and we were never given the message that our value was on the way we looked.”
Her introduction to the clean-eating movement came in the form of Pinterest ‘thinsperation’ posts as she started drama school at the age of 21.
“I wanted to be the fittest performer I could be and I looked online for inspiration around the same time Pinterest and Instagram were just getting going,” Tally recalls.
“The overwhelming message was that in order to be fit I’d need to be lean with a super low body fat and a six-pack born from working out all the time.
“I naively went along with that ideal and spent hours in the gym six days a week on top of the physical demands of drama school.”
Where to get eating disorder help and support
IF you're struggling with an eating disorder, there are various ways you can get help.
For urgent help or medical advice for yourself or someone else please contact 999 and select option 2 – the mental health option.
If you’re looking for non-urgent help, the Samaritans are available on 116 123.
Or you can speak to your GP, or 111 for out of hours advice.
Beat also provides support via phone line, webchat and email – find details here .
And you can text SHOUT to 85258 for support via text message.
After leaving drama school, Tally went on to work as a trainer in various London gyms and began to share her fitness content online which only fuelled her desire to stay lean.
“I look back now and realise it was really disordered, it was really all consuming for me and it took up a lot of my time, my energy and my headspace,” she says.
“I was tracking everything I ate on MyFitnessPal, and weighing my food out while going to the gym as much as possible.
“My body changed drastically and I was losing a lot of weight and I was really thin, but of course I took that as a positive because the message online at the time was thinner equals better.
“It was also reinforced by the praise I was receiving, people would ask me what my ‘secret’ was and it felt like I had cracked the code that everybody wanted to get their hands on.”
But while Tally was receiving plenty of compliments, eventually those closest to her began to share their concern.
“I wasn’t naturally thin so eventually people did begin to pull me aside and ask me if I was OK,” Tally says.
“The turning point came when my flatmates expressed their worry about my obsessive food tracking.
“I agreed to stop using MyFitnessPal and I quickly realised how freeing it was to not be ruled by what I was eating.
“I was also at the point where sustaining that lifestyle was making me really miserable and I needed to find a relationship with food and fitness that was free of guilt and shame and was about self-care rather than self-punishment.”
When Tally married her husband Jack in 2023, cruel trolls told her she was ‘deluded’ if she thought he loved herCredit: Instagram/@tallyrye
But Tally says she only feels sorrry for her trolls as only ‘hurt people, hurt people’Credit: Instagram/@tallyrye
Tally embraced intuitive movement and in 2020 she released her book Train Happy: An Intuitive Exercise Plan for Everybody.
The approach was one that the body positive movement embraced as a much-needed departure from the ‘thinsperation’ movement and Tally’s following grew.
Naturally, her healthier approach meant that Tally gained weight and is now happily a size 14-16.
While Tally totally embraces her curvier figure now, she admits that she did initially struggle with her weight gain.
“At first it felt like a failure and it took a lot of unlearning of what I had sought out online and accepting my worth comes from who I am not what I weigh,” she says.
But while Tally and her long-term boyfriend, now husband, Jack happily embraced her larger size, she admits she faced criticism online.
While the response to her intuitive approach to fitness received an overwhelmingly positive response, Tally has faced some truly heinous comments from trolls particularly surrounding her wedding in 2023.
After sharing photos from her big day, many trolls took to the comments section to berate Tally over her ‘mixed-weight’ relationship, telling her she was ‘deluded’ if she believed he loved her.
WHAT IS INTUITIVE EATING?
As Dr Sarah Jarvis, GP and Clinical Director of Patientaccess.com , tells us: “Intuitive eating is about rejecting the diet mentality, recognising your hunger (and taking notice when you’re full), respecting your body and learning not to use food as a coping mechanism.
“It also means no foods are off limits, and many people worry that if they ‘let go’ of control, they will end up gaining more weight.
“But intuitive eating is also about learning to value your body and the foods that make it feel good.”
The eating plan was developed in the Nineties by two American dietitians based on their experiences of working with overweight people, and the growing popularity of the non-diet movement.
And a recent review of about 25 studies showed that people following intuitive eating generally weigh less than those following restrictive diets.
“I feel really sad for those people but clearly someone has told them along the way that they wouldn’t be lovable if they’re bigger,” she says.
“I feel really lucky and fortunate to be with someone who loves me for me rather than for what my appearance looks like.
“The foundation of our relationship is based on more than just a physical attraction.
“People who leave comments like ‘should you be eating that?’ or posting a pig emoji are obviously not lucky enough to be in that position.
“Jack and I always say that hurt people, hurt people.”
Body-phobic comments such as these are becoming rife on social media especially with the growth of ‘skinnytok.’
The controversial TikTok trend sees people glorifying extreme thinness and restricted diets – something that is all too familiar to Tally.
“It does really worry me, especially as the people who tend to be watching these videos are young, easily-influenced girls,” she says.
“Of course once you have watched one of those videos, your algorithm will continue to feed you that sort of content.
“Your social media becomes an echo chamber of this kind of message and I know from experience how dangerous that can be and I really hope I can provide an alternative message.”
Believe me when I say being skinny never solved anything
Tally Rye
And for those who are drowning in fat-phobic messages and Ozempic ads this January, Tally hopes they can take some of her own lessons on board.
She adds: “I know everyone’s telling you to focus on how you look but focus on how you feel.
“Think about how you feel physically, think about how you feel emotionally and focus on those things.
“We’re taught that if we’re smaller all of our problems will disappear, but believe me when I say being skinny never solved anything.”
Tally worries about the future of weight loss trendsCredit: Supplied
Eze Chidiebere Paul
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