Shailene Woodley talks about health fears on the set of “Divergent”

• Shailene Woodley had a number of health problems while filming “The 2014”. Divergent.
• The actress said she turned to an “inner holistic place” after her health scare.
• Woodley said her symptoms were affecting both her physical and mental health.

Shailene Woodley talks about a mysterious health problem that she experienced while working on the Divergent film franchise.

Appears in the episode of Tuesday, September 24, of YOU MD In a podcast with Mary Alice Haney and Dr. Thais Aliabadi, the 32-year-old actress recalled how she was plagued by debilitating physical symptoms in her early twenties.

“I lost my hearing. I could not walk for more than five minutes at a time without having to lie down and sleep for hours. Everything I ate hurt my stomach,” said the Three women the star said, adding to the hosts that she would not reveal the cause of her symptoms because it “feels like a personal thing.”

“I've always eaten very healthy and I'm very athletic, so it was a confusing process for me to ask myself, 'What am I doing wrong? Why do I faint every month when I get my period? Why do I have an underactive thyroid? Why do I have all these things?' And one doctor was like, 'It's probably endometriosis.' And another doctor was like, 'It's probably this.' And another was like, 'It's probably that.' 'You have a tilted uterus. You have a heart-shaped uterus.' Every person I went to gave me conflicting information, and so I went on my own journey,” she continued.

The Big little lies The star went on to say that she had a “long journey” to feel comfortable again, adding that it took “about a decade of relaxation, healing and recovery.”

Woodley admitted that she “took her health into her own hands.” She spent a lot of time educating herself and “approaching the issue from a holistic internal perspective,” and the health issue “ultimately resolved itself physically.”

“And now… I'm not taking any thyroid medication. I'm not taking any medication at all. My hormones are so balanced. Everything is going the way it's supposed to,” she continued, adding that she is “very healthy now.”

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However, there were psychological symptoms as well as physical ones. “A lot of other things came from feeling so physically uncomfortable,” she said. “Now I'm suddenly afraid of food. And then body dysmorphia and confusion about my identity and whether I feel comfortable in my own skin.”

“It forced me to really look deep and think,” she explained. “That was, I think, the way for me to acknowledge the spiritual side of the healing process for myself, in addition to the physical healing, which meant dealing with real trauma and real PTSD that I had experienced at different times in my life without going into detail about what they were.”

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Based on the popular book series by author Veronica Roth, the first Divergent The film was released in 2014, followed in 2015 Insurgent and 2016 Allegiant.

Woodley played a young girl living in a dystopian future Chicago, where society is divided into five factions: Abnegation, Amity, Candor, Ferox and Erudite, alongside greats such as Theo James, Kate Winslet, Zoë Kravitz and Miles Teller.

A fourth and final film entitled Ascendingwas supposed to complete the franchise, but was never realized because Allegiant's lackluster box office results.

Woodley had already expressed her health concerns in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter and revealed that due to her illness she had to turn down roles because she was “physically unable to perform them”.

Woodley currently stars alongside Betty Gilpin, DeWanda Wise and Gabrielle Creevy in Three women on Starz. New episodes premiere every Friday on Starz.