Rebel Wilson has opened up about how she discovered her sexuality and the reasons for her 80 pound weight loss.
The actress, 44, appeared on Loose Women on Thursday, where she was interviewed by Judi Love about her new memoir, Rebel Rising.
Talking about sharing intimate details about her life in the book, Rebel discussed her journey with her sexuality, after getting engaged to fiancée, Ramona Agruma.
She admitted that she was ‘forced’ to come out to the world and that she had been ‘very nervous’ to tell her mother.
Rebel recalled: ‘I announced I was in a relationship with a woman on social media. But, there’s a bit of a story though because an Australian journalist was threatening to essentially out me… So, I was forced to kind of make it public.
Rebel Wilson has opened up about how she discovered her sexuality and the reasons for her 80 pound weight loss
The actress, 44, appeared on Loose Women on Thursday, where she was interviewed by Judi Love about her new memoir, Rebel Rising (pictured)
Talking about sharing intimate details about her life in the book, Rebel discussed her journey with her sexuality, after getting engaged to fiancée, Ramona Agruma (pictured together)
‘Not that it was something I was hiding, it was just something that I was slowly telling people because it’s a bit of a shock when you’ve only been dating men to all of a sudden say, “I’m in a relationship with a woman”.’
Rebel and her fashion designer girlfriend were forced to publicly announce that they’d been dating in June 2022 by a journalist, despite some of their family members not even being aware of their relationship.
Sydney Morning Herald columnist Andrew Hornery himself revealed he gave Rebel ‘two days to comment’ upon learning of their relationship.
He later reflected in his column: ‘Big mistake. Wilson opted to gazump the story.’
The Pitch Perfect star came out with a gushing Instagram post in which she introduced her girlfriend of six months.
Sharing a loved-up snap of them, she wrote: ‘I thought I was searching for a Disney Prince… but maybe what I really needed all this time was a Disney Princess’.
Rebel spoke about how she told her mum, Sue Bownds, the news, telling Judi: ‘I remember being very nervous to tell my mom and then I had to tell her because she was flying over to LA and she was gonna meet Ramona.
‘I had to tell her and I’m like, “Mom, you know, Ramona, who you heard on the phone?” I go, “She’s not just my friend. She’s my girlfriend”.
She admitted that she was ‘forced’ to come out to the world and that she had been ‘very nervous’ to tell her mother, Sue Bownds (pictured)
Rebel and her fashion designer girlfriend were forced to publicly announce that they’d been dating in June 2022 by a journalist, despite some of their family members not even being aware of their relationship
Rebel explained that she had realised that she was attracted to women while watching a tennis player at Wimbledon, saying it ‘opened up my heart’
Rebel and Ramona met in 2021 before they began dating and announced their engagement in February last year (pictured this February)
‘She was like, “Oh, that’s great darling! Now what colour should I paint this side of the fence? Olive Green? Brown?”‘
Rebel explained that she had realised that she was attracted to women while watching an unnamed tennis player at Wimbledon, saying it ‘opened up my heart‘.
She said: ‘I did have a situationship, I guess you could say, that’s what the young people call it… With a professional female tennis player.
‘I was at Wimbledon and I was watching this woman play and I was like, “Whoa, like, she’s really good at tennis” but like I was feeling stuff.
‘That experience kind of, I guess, opened up my heart in a way. I kind of described it as like, when you open up a can of tennis balls and you’re like, ‘Oh!’ and I felt all these feelings and then I really wanted to explore it.’
Previously, Rebel had only publicly dated men and admitted in her memoir that she never felt fully invested in those relationships.
She wrote: ‘Sometimes, when I was dating men, people would even comment. They’re like, “God, Rebel, you can take them or leave them. You weren’t that ever invested.”‘
‘And then, here was somebody where [I] felt so invested in and even thought at one point, “Oh, I could give up my career for this person, travel around the world on the tennis circuit”.’
Rebel also spoke about her motivations to lose weight, after she shed 80 pounds by switching up her diet and doing more high intensity exercise (pictured in 2023 left and in 2014 right)
She also spoke about her motivations to lose weight, after she shed 80 pounds after switching up her diet and doing more high intensity exercise
Rebel and Ramona welcomed their first child, Royce Lillian, via surrogate in November 2022 (pictured)
‘I describe it as cracking open my heart. Like you could open a fresh can of tennis balls…that’s what it did to me.
‘And, I guess, when I saw people write love songs or poetry about love, I was like, “Oh, that’s nice”. But I don’t think I’d ever understood that until I felt that for a person.”
‘It could have been that just the guys I was dating just weren’t the one. Or that, also, I wasn’t open to intimacy that much back then, so I never allowed myself to feel real feelings. And then the first time was with the tennis player.’
Rebel and Ramona met in 2021 before they began dating and announced their engagement in February last year.
Rebel also spoke to Judi about her motivations to lose weight, after she shed 80 pounds by switching up her diet and doing more high intensity exercise.
She said she ‘didn’t think being bigger stopped me from anything’, but that she felt ‘ashamed’ of her unhealthy eating habits.
But she added that she worried that by losing weight she would lose her ‘pigeonhole’ and feared that she would then ‘lose my career’.
However, she explained that it was her desire to have kids that was the trigger, saying: ‘I do believe in body positivity and beauty in any shape and size.
‘Didn’t think being bigger stopped me from anything but what I was ashamed of was, these unhealthy eating behaviours, which was basically normally late at night by myself.
‘What really motivated me, it was actually not for me, not for my own physical appearance or health, but it was really when I went to see a fertility doctor and he said that if I was healthier, I’d have a much better chance of having a child.”
She added: ‘I guess logically, I knew at the time I, you know, struggled with obesity and, ‘Do I change my health for the better?’ but then I’d lose this pigeonhole I had in the business and I might lose my career.’
Rebel revealed in November 2020 that she had hit her ‘goal weight’, but assured fans that her focus was purely about ‘being healthy’ rather than the figure on the scales.
In regards to how she achieved her weight loss, she focused on becoming more active by walking and doing high-intensity interval training (HIIT) with her personal trainer.
She also switched her carb-heavy diet – where she revealed she was eating around 3,000 calories a day – for high protein alternatives where she would no longer be left feeling hungry.
Rebel and Ramona welcomed their first child, Royce Lillian, via surrogate in November 2022.
She told Judi that she now has ‘two loves of her life’ after becoming a mum and gushed: ‘I’ve got an amazing partner and now I have a gorgeous baby Royce.
‘IVF, the process I went through is an emotional rollercoaster. One day you’re happy and one day you’re really sad.’