EastEnders hunk Danny Walters weighed 16 stone when he was a kid and was tormented by cruel bullies over his size.
The actor, who played stud Keanu Taylor in the soap, has admitted he was big as a child and would smuggle packets of sweets into school under his blazer.
He was targeted by bullies until his teens, and reveals a cruel jibe about his size on holiday as a teenager convinced him to get healthy.
Speaking on Mike Fenton Stevens' My Time Capsule podcast, he explained: "We were talking to these two girls on the sun loungers and I came out and said, 'Hey' and they turned around and said, 'Oh my God, who's this ugly fat guy?'
"I was like, 'Woah' and my brother said, 'Hey, that's really harsh.'
"I started crying and ran off... This is not what I wanted people to see me as the funny fat guy.
"So I was like, I'm done with that. I want girls to like me, I want girls to love me."
He went on to embrace health and fitness and training at the gym is a huge part of his life now.
Danny added: "Training helps me to push myself, to only get better for myself.
"Because I used to weigh 16st, used to be big, there is a massive motivation behind what I do and the way I train because I never went to go backwards."
Danny now works out six times a week to keep in shape.
He quit EastEnders in November as part of a dramatic storyline as Keanu's affair with Sharon was exposed.
