Stefania Ferrario

I see her as she is crossing High Street, Northcote, to the cafe at which we’d planned to meet. As I also get to the road to cross, we catch each others eyes and embrace in a warm hug. That’s just it, from the get go, I felt her radiating warmth. We discuss our mornings—I bitch about the traffic on the M1—and then we sit and order our coffees. Considering this is the first time that I have spoken with Stefania in person, one on one, there is no awkwardness. It felt as though I was catching up with a girlfriend that I had not seen in a while—I wanted to know what she was up to. 

As a writer, you generally have expectations of how you believe interviews might go. Some expectations come crashing to the ground, and you can’t help but feel disappointed in how your chat went. Others meet expectations—you knew what to expect and it delivered. Then there are those exceptional chats with exceptional people. Those chats where you feel instantly comfortable and delve into anecdotes that you didn’t even think would be a talking point. This was to be one of those chats.

How long have you been in Melbourne?

I moved here when I was 19. I just got on a coach and thought fuck it, I’ll just move here and pursue modelling. I’ve been based here mostly ever since, I go back to Canberra a lot because of my family.

So it was just an impromptu decision?

Well, I knew that I’d wanted to model for years leading up to it, and in Canberra I was just getting the little odd jobs. I did one small job for The Public Service, some stock image shoot, and nothing was really coming of it…A photographer [in Melbourne] sort of took me under his wing a little bit and started helping me a lot. Because he was Melbourne-based, I thought I’d come here. He said I could stay with him for a little bit—Peter Coulson. He’s a renowned fashion photographer in Australia and I’d been following his work for ages, so it was really exciting! I lived with him and his wife for a couple of weeks and then moved into a hostel for months and, yeah, have been here ever since. 

I absolutely love Melbourne. I feel like it’s a city where you can be yourself. Everyone’s got different styles and you don’t feel—well, I don’t personally feel judged for what I wear. I had a shaved head at the time when I first moved here, so I was a bit alternative, and it just felt like I was at home. Whereas I’ve been to other cities and I didn’t feel that acceptance.

Where you felt a constant judgement?

Not necessarily constant, but a lot more judgement than there is here. 

Sorry, I hope you don’t mind me asking. How old are you?

I’m 24. So I started modelling when I was 16, and then I got my first ever big job when I was 20, so it took four years to get noticed…

But you hustled…

I hustled! Well, I’m still hustling. 

There’s something I want to discuss with you—the term plus size. When I look at you—and I don’t mean this to suck up—you are one of the most naturally beautiful people I’ve seen in a long time, and I wouldn’t consider you to be “plus size”, but that’s the term that I suppose has been coined.

In the industry that you are in, it’s one that does get thrown around. How do you deal with that? Do you deal with it? And how do you go with people breaking you down?

So, I’ll start off with social media. Social media—there’s not too much negativity, but the negativity that comes up is really…strange. It’s so weird, because you’ll get one person saying oh, you’re so fat! And then you’ll get someone saying you’re losing weight, stop losing weight! People just throw things out and I don’t think they really think about what they’re saying, online especially.

I guess it’s that thing as well where people might see something that threatens them, or they feel uncomfortable about, or they’ve got insecurities, or they’re just lashing out. I dunno, I think a lot of it is really empty, like I try not to take it personally. I think if I had a big bombardment of hate all in one go, I’m not sure how I would cope with that. I know when I started #DropThePlus—despite the fact that there was an overwhelming amount of support, and people agreeing with it and pushing for it—there was this underlying group of women that did reach out and attack me about it, saying we find the plus size label really empowering, what you’re doing is so terrible! And then they started attacking me with personal comments. I did try and reason with them, and then I just thought…I just shouldn’t engage at all. The lesson out of that was do not engage, and if you do, try and be nice. Try and reason. If it doesn’t work, then you just need to take a step back.

How do you deal with those hurtful comments, though? Because sometimes I go through [Instagram, Facebook] and I read the comments to or about public figures…Some of them are really hurtful. Because you’re a person, and I think people almost forget that. They might think, she’s this famous model, she can handle this. She probably won’t even see this. But they must really hurt?

Yeah, some of them can really hurt because sometimes they are hitting your own insecurities—I think everyone has insecurities. And I think sometimes they manage to target them. And then you go oh wow, people are noticing this too! And it makes you feel a bit funny…

I’ve got a few techniques [for dealing with trolls]—ignore or reason or be nice. The block feature’s also a really satisfying feature, I love the block feature. That feels great—ignore and block. That’s how I manage it, but I don’t know how I would [cope] if there were lots and lots coming through. I’m not at that stage yet where I’m getting that much, but I see it on public figures all the time. I follow Amber Rose and she is quite a controversial public figure—really sexual and puts herself out there, and she gets some of the most horrible comments, from other mothers as well, and other women! I just don’t understand that—we really are our own worst enemy. I know a lot of women like to blame men but, in my personal experience and what I see, it’s women that are often lashing out. Just seeing other mothers lashing out at Amber Rose saying you’re not a mother! How can you do what you’re doing? It’s just appalling, I just don’t understand it. We should be supporting each other and women should be supporting each other in what we choose to do!

Sorry, I feel like I’m rambling…

No, please ramble! I’m loving this, because I completely agree. You know, I follow Amber Rose, I follow Kim Kardashian…

Oh, Kim Kardashian. The poor thing! She posts a nude photo—like whatever, what is even wrong with the female body? I mean, it’s a beautiful thing! She posts a nude picture and it was women, all women, being like you’re a slut, you’re a hoe, put your body away! Your poor children, your poor husband…

What are your children going to think? Like no, fuck off!

Exactly! It’s more what are her children going to think when they see comments like that coming at her? That is what’s damaging! The reaction that [the trolls] are giving her is what’s hurtful and is what’s going to cause trouble. 

It just doesn’t make sense to me! I wish that women would just support women in doing things that they want to do, even if it’s not something that you would do personally as a woman. I can understand that some women may not want to get their gear off, they might not want to flaunt their bodies, they’re happy dressing up and being more modest—I feel like the word “modest” is a bit, I dunno, I need to think of a better word because the opposite word to that is “immodest”, which I don’t think women that get nude are immodest. 

I think that we should support each other and the things we want to do, and how we want to dress and how we want to express ourselves. Hurting each other definitely opens the door to men thinking it’s okay to use those words [too] and seeing us like that, it just ends up being a vicious cycle, and I think it really needs to start with us supporting each other.

Absolutely. And I think going back to what you were saying before—those hurtful comments, I really don’t understand the thought process behind them. When I’m on social media, I see a lot of things that go against what I might personally believe or something that offends me, but I won’t leave a rude or hurtful comment just for the sake of. What purpose is it going to serve?

And I think that comes down to our society’s reliance on social media, having everything at our constant disposal. 

I definitely wouldn’t be where I am today without that platform, online. And I can put myself out there and I can reach an audience that I would have otherwise had to rely on other people to do for me. Whereas now, I think anyone can create a profile, and if they’ve got something powerful to say, people are going to listen. Even if it takes a while, people are going to start to notice. I think social media is amazing in that sense—it’s creating such a diverse culture in so many ways and bringing the whole world together but, at the same time, there are downfalls just like there are with anything. There’s a lot of expectations, there are these false lifestyles that people are putting out, and I feel like that can put a lot of pressure on people to feel like they have to do that as well. I think we should remember that a lot of it is glorified and is false, and that you shouldn’t compare yourself to those posts or those people that make you feel bad. 

I mean, I get on social media and I’m like I should be in the Maldives! Everyone’s in the freakin’ Maldives at the moment. But then I’m like eh, who cares. I’m happy at my little place in Northcote. Like, I don’t need to be there, but we feel like sometimes we need to be [doing these things] in order to be happy, but we need to remember that we need to be happy how we are to begin with.

In regards to social media and that constant accessibility—because, I mean, I obviously got access to you by sliding into your DMs on Instagram—you must get a lot of creeps.

Shall we look now?

Some are really nice where they’ll say I’m an inspiration for them, but then you’ll get ones that are like anal sex, baby? I guess it just comes with the territory, because when you are out there, anyone can comment, anyone can view you and anyone can access you. There aren’t too many [creepy comments], but they definitely do stick out…I want to see the black hole of that [Stefania reads out whilst looking through her Instagram DMs], and he’s referring to the pants I was wearing in a previous shot.

So yeah, it comes with it, and I think even girls that don’t have big followings do talk about receiving dick pics and do talk about receiving funny comments, and I think you just sort of need to disassociate yourself from those messages, because they don’t know you, and they probably wouldn’t even be like that in person. It’s just that they feel like they can hide behind that profile.

You sound like you have a good method for detaching yourself from it. I dunno, I feel like it would really affect me. I mean, even on Tinder, some guys say the most abrasive things and you just think how is that okay? 

The internet lets them get away with it. In the old days, you used to have the flashers. They’d open up [their coats] and you’d see their doodle. I think I’d still rather dick pics than someone flashing me? Actually, maybe I wouldn’t. Maybe it would be entertaining to see [someone flash]. That takes a lot more balls than sending a dick pic!

Let’s talk about posting “provocative photos”—like when Kim Kardashian posts a nude selfie and people get up in arms about it, I think to myself bloody hell yes! This woman has had three children, trains really hard, is hot as fuck. Why the hell can’t she posts photos like that! 

Your sexuality and the way you portray it in photos, it can be seen as overtly sexual—and I hate that I’m saying that, because it sounds like a negative thing and I definitely don’t mean for it to come across that way. But when you do posts photos, do you ever feel apprehensive about what people might think? 

The thing is, in a perfect world—in my perfect world—I would be walking naked down the street. But it’s not a perfect world. I have so many photos that I think are gorgeous that are nude or semi-nude, that I’d just love to put them all out on the internet, create books and things but, the thing is, people react to that and they can react quite negatively. I’ve also lost a lot of work due to the sort of shots that I’ve done. It can be quite detrimental to peoples careers, and it has been to my career. Just recently I lost a big modelling job—I was booked in for it and they found some of my photos on Twitter or Tumblr and they…pushed back against having me and dropped me from the job. So, that’s the shit thing. [Posting these photos] is something that I want to do, but the reaction from the public causes me to actually have to step back a bit and to keep myself a bit more reserved and to keep me from doing that.

When I see somebody like Kim Kardashian, who is a mother, and is posting a nude photo, I think fuck yes, because we need people like that to break down the stereotypes of how a woman should be and how a woman should present herself. That idea that, as a woman, you should only be naked for your man, or you should only be naked in private situations, but no. What if a woman wants to be naked because she’s proud? Or do it for herself? Not for her man, not in private necessarily. So to break down those stereotypes of what not only a woman should be, but what a mother should be like. There’s this stereotype that, once you become a mother, you just don’t have a sex life anymore, and you’re not sexual, almost like you’re not allowed to be. Um, I’m pretty sure it involved sex making those kids. We’ve all come from sex. It shouldn’t be something that’s so shameful. I messaged [Kim], I know she wouldn’t have seen it…but just the amount of hatred that she got on some of her pictures…I just said “Thank you so much for breaking down the stereotypes and, despite all the hatred, I just want you to know that it means so much for me.” 

It’s easier when there’s a group of people blazing these trails together, but she is really a pioneer for that. I think people like Amber Rose are as well, and Betty Page. You look at Betty Page, and I think her story is so tragic, because she clearly loved what she was doing, she loved the photography she was creating—she was creating fetish images—and it obviously got to her in the end. It’s just such a tragic story if you look into it, and I think it’s the public that did that to her. She was proud of what she was doing, and she loved it, until that point where she just couldn’t handle it anymore. She even got arrested for public indecency at one point, and I just find it so sad—I just don’t think it should be like that. She wasn’t harming anyone. And she is a figure of empowerment for women because she was proud of herself and proud of her body, she wasn’t ashamed of it until everyone made her ashamed of it. 

I don’t know if you’d know this off the top of your head, but do you know if the majority of people making her feel this way were women?

My guess is yes, because her main audience at the time was men. So I can’t imagine why [men] would have an issue with it…I’m assuming it probably was but I don’t know. I wouldn’t quote myself on that.

And it’s funny how we’ve come full circle…

Because it’s women who have kept her alive! Kept her image alive and kept her brand alive. We clearly want it, but at the same time, we don’t want it. I’m not sure what the mindset is! I know personally, I’ve had encounters with women, in person—not on the internet, that have called me a slut and have talked about my work negatively and to spread lies and rumours. When I was living in Canberra, I used to tutor this little girl, and this rumour came out that I made porn and then it got told to her parents, and they didn’t let me tutor her anymore. It’s just crazy!

It comes with a cost. People think get naked on the internet, get famous. It’s not really how it works! Yes, you can get some notoriety possibly and you can get noticed but, at the same time, you have to handle all the feedback that you’re getting from it. It takes a strong woman to do it, and I think a lot of people put it down when they say that it is easy to do. I don’t think it’s easy. I think it does come at a cost. But I think that the pleasure and the freedom and the liberty of actually doing it outweighs that negative criticism. You really let yourself enjoy it.

And it is very obvious that you love what you do!

I do! Like I said, I would be running down the street naked if I could. Sometimes I find clothes so restricting, to me it just doesn’t make sense that it’s illegal? We’re all naked underneath, we’re all born naked…it just doesn’t make sense to me that it’s a shameful thing, it’s indecent. I don’t think there’s anything indecent about the human body and I don’t think there should be. 

It’s funny that we’re almost made to feel shameful in our own skin, even being topless. A guy is topless, there’s no questions asked. A female’s topless and it’s like call emergency services, this is fucking wild! Even on Instagram, you have to blur out the nips. Why? It’s all the same shit.

Exactly. I mean, [nipples] don’t shoot people!

It would be good if they could, though…

Like, be careful or I’ll release the nips!

#DropThePlus—let’s talk about that. The term “plus size”…

The term plus size; so when I started modelling…so Peter Coulson, the photographer I was talking about earlier that really got me into the whole modelling world and he was probably a big part in me getting into the industry, he was actually the one who said to me you would be classified as a plus size model. And I was like what? And I was like well, I’ll take it. At least I’m still a model—I’d rather be a model and be labeled ‘plus sized’ than not model at all. So to begin with, even though I was a bit like that’s a strange label to put on me, I was still totally fine with it. I accepted it, I even had written in my Facebook bio “plus size model”. However, the public and the comments from people, even my friends and people I would talk to or meet with, and I’d tell them what I do and I’d say “Oh, I’m a plus size model”, they’d look really confused. They wouldn’t really get it, so then I’d have to explain it, and even after explaining it it still really didn’t make sense to me because, at the end of the day, you know, I am still a model. That made me a bit hesitant to keep using it. And people would also use it in a derogatory way, like oh, she’s a model but she’s a plus size model as if I’m not really a model. And you’d see people talk about other models that way that are so-called plus size models. I knew there was something wrong with it, but at the same time I was like fuck it, I’ll accept it. 

The reason #DropThePlus came about was…so there this big drama online, and Ajay Rochester was getting attacked for saying that this particular model should not be labelled plus-sized, and she was a size 14 Australian model. She looked just like the average woman, if not slimmer than the average Australian woman. This model had attacked her back and there was this big thing going on, and I decided to come out in support of Ajay Rochester because she was being bullied, and I said that it is quite a detrimental term because it doesn’t really make sense, and the average size does change in other countries. In the modelling industry, any model above an Australian size 8 is plus-sized. It just doesn’t make sense. What that’s implying is that what is normal is everything under a size 8 and that everything over a size 8 is this “other”, it’s this other category—it’s not the norm. It is a message that we are giving to young girls that if you’re above a size 8, you’re not quite normal—you’re too big to be really accepted. I basically made that point and said that I don’t think that it’s an empowering term to use, I don’t think we need it, we should just call a model a model whether she’s a size 8 or a size 18 #DropThePlus. And I just created the hashtag and stuck it there, and then about a month later, it just went absolutely viral. I wasn’t even thinking that would happen but obviously the public was like, yeah, they’ve got it. So the public’s the one that made it viral—it obviously resonated with them. 

I think it’s that bridging-the-gap between the general public and the modelling industry, especially with these impressionable young girls. I mean, we’ve all had our time of wanting to be somebody else or striving towards these goals set by “famous” or well-known women.

It’s hard, you know, because I’ve always been a bigger girl. When I was younger, I had quite a bit of shame—I was scared of what was going to be said about me, I didn’t want to wear a bathing suit, I was told to cover up more. Then a few years ago, I was just like fuck it. I’m going to do me. Because it is that empowerment, and we should be celebrating all bodies. And when people do put on that “plus size” label, it’s detaching it from this almost unattainable “norm”…

Well, it’s segregating women as well! It’s pitching us against each other. Because these counterparts are these skinny size 8 models—and then we’re there, it’s like we’re in some sort of battle or war with each other. It’s like no, we’re all one. We’re all models, we’re all women. It doesn’t matter what size we are. Don’t segregate us based on our size. It just seems crazy! Plus size is so broad that it’s not even a necessary label. It’s not specific, it doesn’t actually describe anything in particular because it could mean anything from a size 8 to a size 30! It’s not specific, it’s not necessary. It’s not descriptive in any way—it’s so bland and open. The only thing it really means is bigger than the “norm”. Which is what? What is norm?

But you, having been a bigger girl for most of your life like you said, you would’ve been aware of the plus sized label and had it put on you as well. How do you feel about it?

I think, especially when I was younger, I was very ashamed. I was a lot bigger than a lot of my friends, I’d wear a lot of clothes, but it was just something I kind of accepted. To me, it was what it was. And it’s only in the past few years that I was just like you know what, fuck what everyone says or thinks. I’m the most confident and comfortable in my own skin than I’ve ever been, I walk around with my head held high—even on the days when I don’t feel like it, because ultimately how you feel about yourself is what resonates with other people. I think when I started giving less of a shit about what people thought—especially in regards to my size—that’s when I became my true self. Honestly, I could give less of a shit what anyone else thinks. 

I think it’s an internal conversation that we all need to have with ourselves. If we’re not happy with ourselves, only we can fix that. Even my friends and I, we’re all smart people, and we would follow these people on Instagram who always look the part and are living these insane lifestyles—are you familiar with Shani Grimmond?

Is she a blogger? She does writing?

She does YouTube videos. She’s 21 and she’s had all this work done, and she puts on this façade, you know, “Oh, I’m just a regular girl just like you, but here I am in this amazing part of the world where I was flown over in Business Class…and here I am eating all this amazing food and going to these amazing events, but I’m just like you.” Girls see that—and even my friends and I, who are all mid-to-late twenties—we see that and we know in our heart of hearts that what we’re seeing in these photos isn’t real, but sometimes we catch ourselves comparing our lives to theirs and getting really depressed about it. Or even thinking oh, maybe I should get lypo? 

Maybe I should get a little Gucci bag?

Yeah! Maybe I should try to get sponsored by this clothing brand and go to the Maldives! Then I think, wait—if this is what we’re thinking, there are girls a lot younger than us seeing the exact same posts, what the hell are they thinking? I mean, we all wanted to be somebody else when we were younger…

I wanted to be that really, really skinny, tanned blonde girl on the front of Dolly. That’s what I wanted to do!

See, we all wanted to be someone else at least once! But yeah, going back to the plus size label, I could personally give or take it either way, I guess. But you’re right, it does segregate women.

That being said, as well, I think if a woman does want to personally call herself plus size, then I have absolutely no objection to that. It’s more when the label gets involuntarily put onto someone, that’s when I have an issue. We come into the modelling industry and we don’t have a choice—we’re automatically put into this category. We don’t say I want to be a plus size model, they say you’re a plus size model. 

Cosmo actually did this big article, and it was titled Five Plus Sized Models, and there I was with these other curvy girls, and I just thought why would they just automatically label us that way? I had to contact one of the other girls [featured] to get in contact with [Cosmo] to change the headline—which they did, which was great. But the thing is, people don’t think. When people write articles, they just don’t think…I don’t care, the other models didn’t care, but it’s young girls that read Cosmo that are going to go I’m a similar body shape to her, therefore I must be plus size too. And it’s like, why not just These Five Models. That would be even more empowering because it’s breaking down the stereotypes of what a model is and what a model looks like. There’s this idea of the “model body” and the model being tall and skinny…so when you start calling these women of varying sizes just “models”, it’s breaking down that stereotype of what beauty is.

Have you ever had an experience where you’ve gone in for a casting, and they’ve said that you have to lose “x” amount of weight? Or you need to change or alter something about yourself?

So, my first experience of that was actually when I was very skinny, when I started modelling when I was 16. I was on the verge of being underweight—if I had even lost one or two kilos more, I would’ve been underweight, according to the BMI—which is not great, but it’s the best we have.  So I was on the verge and I was very thin—that is actually when I got told that I should lose more weight if I wanted to model. Which is crazy.

I was very thin, and I had strange eating habits as well. I’d eat very small amounts. I didn’t have a fantastic relationship with food at the time either, so there were things going on there. That’s when I was told to maybe lose another five kilos, a French photographer told me. He was this well-regarded French photographer that I’d reached out to saying what do you think, do you think I have potential? He said yeah, you definitely do but just aim to lose another five kilos. And I just went fuck. You know, I’d already lost several kilos and I just can’t get any thinner. 

And you’re 16 while this is all happening?

I was 16…But now, definitely not. I don’t feel that pressure. 

It’s just crazy that someone can turn around and tell a 16-year-old girl, “Lose a little bit more weight and then you’ll be good!”

How did you take that feedback on board when it happened?

Obviously I remember it so well, because it was quite upsetting and it did affect me and I just thought that I can’t [lose any more weight], I don’t think I can.

For some girls, that would be the tipping point for them to anorexia, or even into a full-blown eating disorder or into a life of bad relationships with food. It’s a very dangerous thing to tell a young girl.

What was the turning point for you to say I’m not doing that?

Well the turning point was, I didn’t really have a choice. My body was like, yo I’m going to put on weight. [At that age] you’re still growing, and I hadn’t reached my full height. I didn’t have hips or boobs yet, or thighs, and my body just started putting on weight and I just did not have a choice and I just went oh fuck, what do I do now? Am I a model? I don’t think so. Ah well, I’ll just keep doing the shoots I do. So I kept organising my own shoots despite the fact that I was getting curvier and I actually put on about 20 kilos slowly, just because my body was still growing and I just accepted it. It was hard, though, because I did get quite depressed and I do think it affected my mental health. I was trying not to eat but I didn’t have a choice. People just think that you can just lose weight so easily or control your weight, but you really can’t just lose weight…

Especially when you’re going through that growing stage as well…

Yeah, and that’s probably the most dangerous time to start binging or purging or becoming anorexic, because your body is still developing. 

I definitely did struggle, but I did come to accept it. I think loving your body and accepting it is a journey that we’re on for our whole lives, because even if you are in a really good place, you’ll still have those days where you feel a bit down about your body or you feel a bit uncomfortable. It is a journey we’re always on but I think the idea is to make that journey as smooth and bearable as possible, and enjoyable. But you’re going to have to accept that there are going to be those days.

One of the points that I thought of earlier is, so you know how we were talking about negative comments and people leaving negative comments? I’ve actually personally struggled with mental illness, and I’ve had episodes of psychosis. I’ve had two. During the second time especially, I was hospitalised, it got really bad. I was in hospital and they let me have my phone on me. And I did what we were talking about—leaving mean comments, posting rude things. I can’t remember a lot of it, a lot of people have told me [about my behaviour]. I had a lot of important people in my life unfollow me, I lost thousands of followers a day, and I posted some pretty terrible things and said some pretty terrible things that I am ashamed of. At the same time, I have to remind myself that I wasn’t in a good mental state. I was out of touch with reality and I didn’t really have control.

I think we’ve got to remember that, when people do leave mean comments, we don’t know what they’re going through. You can take it personally, you can let it get to you and think that they’re terrible, evil people. But the thing is, you really don’t know what their story is. They could be in a much worse place than you. So I think remember that if you do receive any hatred.

Do you mind me asking how long ago this was?

This was in 2016. My two psychoses were the very start of 2016, and the second one was towards the end of 2016. The second one was much worse—I was hospitalised twice actually in that time. I have so much…like, why did I have my phone on me? Why did the hospital let me have my phone on me? But, at the same time, I feel like I learnt a lot of life experiences because of that and I think I’m definitely a lot less judgemental now of other people.

I think a lot of things do come from a place of mental instability…so people leaving these comments, there’s obviously—there’s something wrong. They’re not happy in order to want to leave something like that. You just don’t know what they’re going through.

So you try and look it at from their perspective as well?

Yeah, I think that’s the thing. I think you just gotta—once again, disassociate yourself. Remember that they’ve got a different perspective, and you just don’t know what’s going on in their life. And I think that when we tell ourselves that, it definitely helps. 

In regards to your previous troubles with mental illness, and as a public figure, do you ever get scared that you may fall back into that?

My psychoses were—it was stress mixed with drug abuse. I was smoking a lot of marijuana, I was smoking morning to night. I don’t have an issue with—I mean, I think the idea of the legalisation of marijuana is great. It should be regulated. Because, the thing is, in Australia it’s not regulated and it should be regulated. I don’t know where it was I was getting it from, I don’t know what hands I was getting it through, I didn’t know what it was laced with.

Now I feel like I’m definitely in a lot more control. I’ve got out all drugs from my life. I don’t really enjoy alcohol, so I’m not really doing anything that can change my chemistry too much in my mind so I’m not in too much of a fear. But I think, with mental illness—they thought I was bipolar to begin with, in which case I would live in this constant state of being a little bit worried that I could end up in a mania or end up in a psychosis again. That would be really hard…to think that could happen. 

I’m almost glad that it was induced by drugs, because now as long as I stay clean and manage to stay off that road, then it won’t be an issue. But then there is always that fear that I could fall back into that state where I get a bit sad or I get a bit anxious…but it’s not something that occupies my mind, my fear of falling back into that state.

How did you realise that you were falling into that state? Did somebody point it out or did you realise internally?

So it started off in a mania, which is basically a heightened state of emotion. You feel really elevated, you feel really happy, you feel high on life, colours are brighter, lights are brighter, and so I felt like I was having a spiritual awakening—at the time, that’s what I thought was happening. And then the mania turned into a psychosis, and a psychosis is when you completely lose touch with reality, so I didn’t know what was real and what wasn’t. I was having hallucinations. But to me, that was normal. I wasn’t entirely aware. I actually had people telling me…My partner took me to hospital and I didn’t really know why. You can have people tell you that you’ve gone insane, but I just was not entirely aware, so it wasn’t until I’d fully come out of psychosis that I realised what happened and I can look back and see that. 

Even the second time it happened, I wasn’t aware. To me, that was normal, and it was the world that was changing. It was the universe around me that was changing and I was just totally normal. 

And when your partner told you that you were going to be taken to hospital, were you forthcoming with the idea or apprehensive?

The first time my partner took me to hospital, I was like yeah, take me to hospital! I’m the next Jesus! That’s how I felt. Yes, I’ll go and tell all the doctors and nurses that I can save the world. The first time was almost a positive, fun experience I would say. But coming down out of it was very depressing. And the second time was much more of a tormented sort of psychosis. 

The second time, I was really distrusting of people. I didn’t want to be stopped from doing anything. And if I felt forced into doing something that I didn’t want to do, I’d react terribly—the second time. The first time I was much more open to things.

I guess considering we’re talking about mental illness, I should say that when I was younger, life was great. I was happy, and I was really stable and “normal”. You’d hear of things like depression or mental illness and schizophrenia and things like that, and I was just like what is that crap? That doesn’t exist. How can you be depressed? That’s a load of bollocks. And it’s almost like the world was like okay…well get a dose of this! Here’s some depression. Here’s some body image issues. Here’s some psychosis.

Now I can understand that those things are very, very real and I don’t think that mental illness should be taken lightly. And it’s so funny, when I talk to friends about it and I ask them if they know anyone that has struggled with it…they’ve all got stories. Everyone knows someone that has battled mental illness. Everyone knows someone that has gone through suicidal periods or has committed suicide or has had anorexia. It’s just so vast, but it’s still not looked at the same way or treated the same way as someone that’s got a physical, visible illness. 

I think that [if mental illness] was more accepted and it was more well known, that these people struggling with it would be able to heal more easily and would have a place where they feel more comfortable. 

Dare I say this, but do you think that mental illness still has this stigma attached to it and is almost a taboo subject to openly discuss? I mean, there are shows out at the moment like 13 Reasons Why that are discussing it in their own very unique way…

Oh, yeah. And people are ashamed of it! If I had a terrible car accident and broken both my legs and couldn’t model for a year, I would have no trouble getting on national TV and saying that, for example. But, it’s a lot harder to get on national TV and say, yo I was in psychosis twice for drug abuse and I lost touch with reality and did crazy things and got carried off to the fucking hospital in the back of a police car—no one could just get on national TV and just say that calmly. And then judgements would pour in as well, people being like well, why did you smoke dope? Why did you do this? You’re a terrible person.

It’s funny because it is, in a lot of ways, like having a car accident. I was out of work for a long time. I was really sick. I did have to deal with the aftermath of it. So it’s a shame—it’s a shame that we still don’t feel comfortable speaking about it so openly. And, like you said, there are shows like 13 Reasons Why that are talking about it and are bringing it to the forefront, but this is mental illness. In the past you might just think that they’re just a bad person, they’ve got issues. But now you can actually say, they’re actually living with bipolar. And so we can understand these things more instead of saying that they’ve got the devil inside them.

While we’re on the topic, I want to talk about Kanye West...

Mmm, Kanye West! Now I know Kim has come out and said he’s normal, he’s an artist and everything, but reading his tweets…The sort of stuff he’s written in his tweets and the sort of stuff he’s said, to me, is so similar and resonates so much with the things I said and did when I was going through psychosis that I can automatically look at him and go “that is psychotic behaviour.” He is going through something. He is not in a clear mental state. 

There were people around me [during the time of my psychoses] that were like “you’re just an artist, you’re just going through something”, but they didn’t know me and they hadn’t gone through something like this. I have, and I can see so much of that in what Kanye is going through. People are overanalysing the things that Kanye is saying and then taking them as a personal attack. But it’s like no, he’s in an altered state of reality, he’s looking at things from a different perspective. I can look at Kanye’s tweets and see what he’s trying to say. And where it looks like he’s supporting Trump, from my perspective—what I think he’s doing—is he’s befriending what is regarded as the enemy in this day and age. To him, that’s how you fix things. He’s talked about peace and he’s talked about wanting to do these things. So what he’s doing, in my opinion, is he’s befriending someone that a lot of us think to be an enemy and, by doing that, he can start bridging the issues and start having these conversations. Donald Trump actually responded in a positive way and, to me, I think that’s a great thing.

From what I can see, he’s coming from a place of love and positivity. And even if it might seem angry and it might seem backwards, but you just have to look at it from his perspective and I think that’s so hard for a lot of people because they’ve never been at that stage so they can’t empathise. I think he needs to stop being attacked so much, that is not how you treat someone in that state.

There is so much to learn from people who aren’t “normal”, and you should listen to what they’re saying. He’s in a heightened state, he’s Jesus!

Hence, Yeezus…

Yeah!

So you and Kanye have that in common. You both have thought you were Jesus!