Zac Efron says he struggles badly with agoraphobia

Published 12:54 13 Sept 2022 BST

Charlie Herbert

Zac Efron says he struggles badly with agoraphobia

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'I just don't go out'

Zac Efron has revealed that he struggles with agoraphobia - the fear of going outside. The actor made the revelation in a recent interview with Men's Health. The NHS defines the anxiety disorder as a "fear of being in situations where escape might be difficult or that help wouldn't be available if things go wrong." For example, someone with agoraphobia may be scared of travelling on public transport, visiting a shopping centre or leaving home. The health service adds: "If someone with agoraphobia finds themselves in a stressful situation, they'll usually experience the symptoms of a panic attack."

Speaking of the disorder, Efron said to Men's Health: “I just don’t go out. People in large groups... it triggers my agoraphobia.” He went on to discuss some of the problems he faced while attempting to bulk up for the 2017 Baywatch remake, saying: "There's just too little water in the skin. Like, it's fake; it looks CGI'd. "And that required Lasix, powerful diuretics, to achieve. So I don't need to do that. I much prefer to have an extra, you know, 2 to 3 percent body fat." The 34-year-old explained that his experience of training and dieting had led to him facing struggles with his mental health. [caption id="attachment_358638" align="alignnone" width="1364"]

The actor said his experiences training and dieting resulted in his mental health struggles (Getty)[/caption]

"Something about that experience burned me out. I had a really hard time recentering. Ultimately, they chalked it up to taking way too many diuretics for way too long, and it messed something up," he said. The actor, who shot to fame in 2006 for his role as Troy Bolton in High School Musical, also quashed rumours that he had undergone plastic surgery. In 2013, he managed to shatter his jaw after slipping in his home while running in socks and smashing his jaw into the granite corner of a fountain. In April last year, the internet wondered whether Efron had had plastic surgery on his face, to the extent that his mum asked him if this was true. But Efron explained that in fact what had happened was that his masseter muscles "just got really big," after he took some time off from the physical therapy for his jaw. He tries to avoid social media because "if I valued what other people thought of me to the extent that they may think I do, I definitely wouldn't be able to do this work."

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