Prison Break star Wentworth Miller shuts down fat-shaming meme

It takes more than a mean-spirited meme to bring Wentworth Miller down. The Prison Break and Legends of Tomorrow actor took to social media Monday to defang an image that surfaced online and ridiculed his past weight gain.

“Today I found myself the subject of an Internet meme,” Miller wrote on his Facebook page. “Not for the first time. This one, however, stands out from the rest.”

Posting a screenshot of the image, which juxtaposes a shirtless photo of him looking trim and a photo in which he’s visibly heavier, Miller opened up about his battles with depression and eating.

“I’ve struggled with depression since childhood,” he wrote. “It’s a battle that’s cost me time, opportunities, relationships, and a thousand sleepless nights. In 2010, at the lowest point in my adult life, I was looking everywhere for relief/comfort/distraction. And I turned to food. It could have been anything. Drugs. Alcohol. Sex. But eating became the one thing I could look forward to.”

During that period, paparazzi caught him out on a hike with a friend one day, yielding the aforementioned photo and stories with headlines like “Hunk to Chunk” and “Fit to Flab.”

Despite the toll the unwanted attention took, Miller said he’s glad the pictures are still around. “I survived. … Now, when I see that image of me in my red t-shirt, a rare smile on my face, I am reminded of my struggle,” he wrote. “My endurance and my perseverance in the face of all kinds of demons. Some within. Some without. Like a dandelion up through the pavement, I persist.”

Miller, who has spoken about about social issues such as mental health and LGBT discrimination in the past, concluded by urging people who are or know someone who is struggling to reach out for help.

Read Miller’s full post on Facebook.