Elle Macpherson on the health scare that made her reassess her life

Oct 4, 2015

It's fair to say that Elle Macpherson isn't just a pretty face.

Since setting up her own company at the tender age of 25 to channel her various business interests, the Australian-born model is also a lingerie designer, TV host, skincare line creator and health food entrepreneur.

What the world doesn’t know, however, is that her move into nutrition was prompted by a health scare of her own when she discovered a lump in her breast on her 49th birthday.

"I was away shooting Britain and Ireland’s Next Top Model, so I couldn’t see my doctor and I was really panicking."

"It was four weeks before I got the biopsy results, so it was a long-drawn-out and stressful period of not knowing," she told The Daily Mail.

"I was lucky – it was a fibroadenoma (a benign growth of fibrous tissue), but it was a really big warning. I did some soul searching and realised that maybe I was taking the wrong vitamins and minerals, not eating properly and was too stressed."

At the time, Elle was travelling all over the world and only functioning on three or four hours of sleep a night.

"I experienced imbalanced digestion, fatigue, listlessness and my joints ached."

Elle’s symptoms seemed to chime with the perimenopause.

"I was approaching 50 and it seemed normal that my body would be adapting to the next phase of maturity."

"I decided that if I was to maintain my body, it had to come from the inside. It wasn’t going to come from only putting creams on my face, and I’m not one who can mess about with plastic surgery at this point."

Ms Macpherson went to see a nutritionist, Dr Simone Laubscher, who advised her to stop taking synthetic supplements and start an alkaline diet and devised a diet full of super greens.

"I started sleeping more, woke up with more water, ate less red meat, added more fruit and vegetables and within weeks I felt like a completely different person," said the model.