MEL'S HEALTH BATTLE ‘I WAS BURNT OUT'

Stressed Mel was at crisis point before overhauling her life

She’s one of the most established food writers in the country and has built a career editing cookbooks, presenting TV shows and writing columns in acclaimed publications, but things haven’t always been easy for MasterChef Australia judge Melissa Leong.

“I worked on a book, which involved a lot of travel and close living with a small crew. As an introvert, who manages depression and anxiety, it was a situation asking for disaster,” Mel, 38, recalls of her life before MasterChef.

“Managing my mental health in such close confines was challenging. Add to that the fact that living on the road can pile on the pounds…” she adds, revealing that when the book was complete she replaced her high-pressure work with “crazy exercise and a diet regimen” instead of taking a break.

“One day I woke up with what I thought was a bad cold, and it was the beginning of the end. Months later, with thousands of dollars spent on wellness retreats, colonics, acupuncturists, Chinese medicine, endocrinologists and gastroenterologists, I was finally diagnosed with pyrrole [disorder, a stress-induced autoimmune condition] that stops your body from absorbing zinc and B vitamins.

HEALTH TRIALS

“This meant chronic insomnia,” adds Mel, who says she was only sleeping one-and-a-half to three hours a night and suffered hair loss, while her nails “would shatter just by looking at them”.