‘Fear was ruling my life – but meditation saved me’
Former soap actress Rita Simons opens up to Closer’s Neeru Sharma (right) about coping with anxiety, overcoming OCD and not being ashamed of her body
She’s best known for playing S feisty vixen Roxy Mitchell in Eastenders for over a decade – a role that saw her nominated for countless “Sexiest Female” awards – but away from the camera, Rita Simons admits she’s nothing like her former on-screen character.
“Me, sexy? You’ve got to be kidding!” Rita laughs. “Apart from the blonde hair extensions, I’m nothing like Roxy. Men thought she was sexy when she landed in the Square, but if they saw me in the morning, it wouldn’t be a pretty sight.”
BEING STRONG
In fact, when it comes to her body, Rita, 41, is refreshingly honest. Just moments after we sit down, she lifts up her top to show off the stretch marks she gained while pregnant with her 12-year-old twin daughters, Maiya and Jamiee. The actress – who wed hairdresser Theo Silveston in 2006 – explains, “I have issues with my body, but I scrub up all right. I have scoliosis [abnormal curvature on the spine], so my right rib cage protrudes, and I’ve got big stretch marks. I used to have a six-pack but my twins were big, and my stomach became so stretched the skin would bleed. The marks are visible, but I’m not ashamed – I still wear a bikini.”
The size 8-10 star keeps in shape with Pilates and follows a sugar-free diet, but draws the line at weighing herself. She says, “I reckon I’ve lost a stone since Eastenders. My lifestyle was sedentary – I’d do a 14-hour shift, come home and just eat. Now, it’s easier to fit in exercise and I steer clear of processed foods. I think weighing yourself is a mug’s game. My daughters are starting to get body conscious, but I remind them that it’s about being strong, not thin.”
Meanwhile, Rita’s body confidence is a far cry from her days during girl band Girls@play, where she was on the verge of an eating disorder. Recalling the pressure to look thin, she says, “Looking a pictures, we were so skinny, but our stylist told us we were fat. We went to London Fashion Week and were told we needed to look like the girls on the catwalk, but they were a bunch of stick insects! We were impressionable, and I started to have a hard time with food. I thought I had to be thin to look good. I went to a girls’ school, and there were eating disorders left, right and centre. I very nearly went there myself.”
HEALTH STRUGGLES
But perhaps Rita’s biggest battle is learning to cope with a string of health issues, including OCD, anxiety and “ADHD tendencies”, which have plagued her since she was a child. The star – who appears in new film The Krays: Dead Man Walking – explains, “I was 14 when I developed OCD. I was a light switcher and a tap checker, and I couldn’t walk on any cracks in the pavement because I thought everyone I loved was going to die. My mum caught me hyperventilating once and took me to a therapist. Cognitive behavioural therapy was fantastic – it reorganised the pathways in my brain and I stopped having those urges.
“I also have traits of ADHD – I have overactive adrenal glands, which means I have to train a lot to get rid of excess energy.”
And although she still suffers with anxiety, Rita admits that meditation saved her life. She adds, “I’m confident, strong and not afraid of confrontation – you wouldn’t want to mess with me, but I do have anxiety. I’ve been anxious for as long as I can remember. For two years, I religiously meditated every day for 15 mins, and it was life-changing. I used the Headspace app – it really helped calm me down.”
Rita also suffers with insomnia and, shockingly, survives on as little as four hours’ sleep. She explains, “It’s been on and off since I was a kid. Some nights,
I pull an all-nighter because my brain is overactive. I’ll stay up worrying about the same thing and, by 4am, it’s become the world’s biggest problem. I tend to stare at the wall for 12 hours, which is horrible. I feel horrendous all day, but I have to work and I’ve got kids to look after, so I get on with it.”
Meanwhile, the star has been open about Maiya being diagnosed with deafness at six months, and was accused of “abusing” her child after deciding she should undergo a cochlear implant operation aged seven, which would give her hearing in both ears.
She says, “Maiya was six months old when she was diagnosed, and the day I found out, I had a meltdown. I got a lot of stick for choosing to integrate her into a hearing family, rather than learning sign language to integrate ourselves into a deaf world. Because of the implant, her hearing’s brilliant. She wins awards at school, loves acting and she sings beautifully.”
‘Me, sexy? You’ve got to be kidding!’