Bela Padilla revealed that she recently faced a health challenge when she was diagnosed with hypothyroidism.
The actress shared that she first noticed the symptoms while she was in London. "I found out that I had a few things while I was in London because I was gaining so much weight without changing my lifestyle, [even] I was working out four times a week," she recalled in an interview with Karen Davila in her latest YouTube vlog.
At first, Bela thought the changes in her body were connected to grief over her father’s passing.
"Parang I didn't change anything in my lifestyle but my dad just passed away, so I thought maybe this is just my body reacting to the sadness, and to the stress. But I was like, am I emotionally eating? I'm not naman. Since my dad died, I only had one donut, you know like that's the only bad thing I had. I was like, what's happening to my body?" she recounted.
It was only when she returned to the Philippines that she finally received an answer.
"I started getting checkups when I came back to the Philippines and then they just saw that my levels were super off. When I came here, I found out that I had my hypothyroidism," she shared.
According to Cleveland Clinic, hypothyroidism is "when your thyroid gland doesn't make and release enough hormone into your bloodstream. The condition slows down your metabolism, which may make you gain weight unexpectedly or feel tired all the time."
Following her diagnosis, Bela began treatment, which improved her overall well-being.
When asked how the treatment helped her health, she relayed: "First of all, I started getting more energetic. I felt like the brain fog was slowly slipping away because I got super forgetful. When I first found out that I had hypothyroidism, talagang the brain fog was so intense. I always hear about this, you walk into the room, into any room and you forget why you went there, that's very common. Pero ito 'yung I am thinking about it while walking to the room para I won't forget about it and then I get to the room and I still forget about it," she recounted.
"[I was] super forgetful. It was one of the symptoms also, it's one of your body's ways of telling you na something is wrong na. You're overloading na."
After treatment, the brain fog went away and at the same time, Bela lost weight.
"I lost 13 kilos in total, but it took a while, it took six months because I think people only see 'yung the part when you lost weight," she said.