Portia DeGeneres says people hiding
their sexuality affects troubled gay teens.
DeGeneres makes her remarks in an
interview airing Monday on the Oprah Winfrey Show.
The 37-year-old Australian-born actress
also tells Oprah that her wife Ellen DeGeneres saved her from her
out-of-control eating disorder.
“It wasn't that I was proud of it,”
she tells Oprah. “But it was certainly a recognition of my self
control. I definitely had some pretty amazing willpower to get down
to 82 pounds. And that's what I was holding on to. I didn't think
about anything else.”
The Ally McBeal and Arrested
Development star says she once existed on 300 calories a day.
DeGeneres' memoir Unbearable
Lightness: A Story of Loss and Gain also arrives on Monday.
In her book, she talks about the fear
that kept her in the closet and the power of coming out gay.
“Hiding your sexuality is the most
horrible way to live,” she writes. “It really does a huge
disservice to society because if everybody who is gay came out in
every profession – teachers, doctors – if everybody came out and
said, 'I'm gay, who cares?' it would make a big impact on what's
happening with all this teenage suicide.”