Camila Cabello speaks out about feeling ‘self-conscious’ after being photographed at the beach in her bikini

Camila Cabello has never shied away from making body-shaming comments, but the singer still struggles with insecurities when she’s photographed in a bikini, she admitted in a candid new note to fans posted to Instagram on Saturday.

In her note, Cabello shared a day she spent at a Miami beach club, where she was often “snapped” or chased by paparazzi. Being photographed in a bathing suit always makes her feel “super vulnerable and unprepared,” and this weekend’s visit was no exception. Despite having a new bikini and a “whole cute outfit” to show off, the “Havana” singer felt “uncomfortable” and was well aware that the paparazzi had documented her time on the beach and was very happy for her. The “Havana” singer still felt “uncomfortable” and was well aware that the paparazzi had documented her time on the beach and had taken pictures of what might appear and how they made her feel about her body.

“I clung to my core, my abs hurt, didn’t breathe, barely laughed and kept feeling so self-conscious about where my dad was that I couldn’t let go and relax and do what we were supposed to do we were out in nature,” Cabello wrote, adding that she also avoided eating before going to the beach “anything too heavy.” “I’m tired of pretending they’re not there, but I can’t do it, I hold my breath from my sun lounger to the ocean. …… I know I look ‘good’ in photos and think I’ll feel accomplished, but my “time at the beach has never been worse. I felt the emptiness and sadness of our culture’s thoughts, and those thoughts became my thoughts.”

The former Fifth Harmony member also shared how she used to feel carefree at the beach, until being photographed and body shamed made the experience worse.

“I wore a bikini that was [too] small to care about how I looked, and then saw the pictures online and got very frustrated,” Cabello admitted, adding that she felt “insecure” about her body after paparazzi photos last summer. Some of her people went viral online and generated some negative comments.

In a conversation with Bustle last August, she described feeling “less insecure about my body” after turning off body shamers online. “No matter what pictures come up or what people say, I’m in control of the narrative now,” she added.

But in a heartfelt post on Saturday, Cabello noted that while she recognizes how harmful society’s body standards can be and is trying to distance herself from it, she still wants to “look ‘good’.”

“When it affects my self-esteem, I remind myself that I’m thinking about what the culture thinks, not what I think about myself,” she writes. “For many women, this culture has become accustomed to what a ‘healthy’ female body looks like, which is completely untrue. photoshop, restrictive diets, excessive exercise and choosing angles that make our bodies look different when we breathe deeply, when we eat, when we let how they look in the moment and in their natural form when the waves twist us around. I remind myself to listen to podcasts about intuitive eating that focus on women who are accepting their cellulite, stretch marks, belly, bloating and weight fluctuations …… Still. I’m a single woman in my 20s who is on a lot of promotions and I want to feel like I look “good” ‘”

After a recent run-in with paparazzi on the beach, the Cuban-born star felt compelled to come clean about how she feels about this pressure.

“We see pictures of women and praise them for looking good, looking healthy or ‘fit,’ but what is health if you’re so focused on your physical appearance that your mental health suffers and you can’t enjoy life? ? If I can’t relax and unwind and have a nice day at the beach and have fun and frolic, who am I trying to make look attractive and am I even attractive to myself? She wrote. “I’m not at the point in my journey where I can’t give. Rationally, I know that how I look does not determine how healthy, happy or sexy I am. Emotionally, the message I get from it our world rings loudly in my own head.

“Ironically, all of the therapy, all of the inner work, was to get myself back to the 7-year-old me on the beach,” continues Cabello, who recently spoke with Elle Mexico about trying to reconnect with her childhood self by speaking Spanish. “Today I’m mourning her. Happy, silly, breathing, pretending to be a mermaid, for free.”

Cabello, whose vulnerable posts have garnered plenty of support, also spoke out against body shaming during an appearance on The Late Show last year.

“I was like, you know what, it’s normal. It’s like my weight goes up and down,” she told James Corden. “Also, we get these crazy beauty standards from the Instagram of people who have been Photoshopped, or if they haven’t been Photoshopped, it’s not every woman’s body.

She continued, “We are real women, we have curves, we have cellulite, we have fat. It’s only these crazy, unrealistic standards that make us feel bad about ourselves and make us feel well organized, which is like a lot to go out and I have to hide my body or put on a big T-shirt.”