Demi Lovato Says Her Obsession with Her Weight Started At Age Three

Pop star Demi Lovato says that her struggles with her weight first started during her childhood when she was just three years old.

The "Skyscraper" crooner suffered from both anorexia and bulimia during her teen years and also spent some time under professional monitoring at a rehabilitation clinic in 2010. She has now revealed that her obsession with the shape and size of her body began when she was still a baby.

On Monday's episode of Katie Couric's show "Katie," Lovato opened up about her inner battles and said: "I remember being three years old in a diaper and rubbing my hand over my stomach, like I remember thinking in my head, 'I wonder if one day this will ever be flat?' It just continued. I've always had self-confidence issues… and it also didn't help that I had kids in school at such a young age that were really, really naturally very thin, so I always felt like the bigger one of the group."

But her eating disorders had never turned into full-blown emotional meltdowns until two years ago. She says that the pressure that comes with being a celebrity acted as an aggravating factor in her case.

"I believe that I was born with it, and that it was just gonna be there. It runs in my family and it's just there. And I think that when you go through things that are traumatic… it can bring out the nasty behaviors that rise to the surface when you don't know how to stay in control or feel your emotions," Lovato added.

In the same show, Couric had revealed her own bouts with bulimia. Talking to eating disorders specialist Dr. Cynthia Bulik, the veteran hostess said: "I wrestled with bulimia all through college and for two years after that. And I know this rigidity, this feeling that if you eat one thing that's wrong, you're full of self-loathing and then you punish yourself, whether it's one cookie or a stick of gum that isn't sugarless, that I would sometimes beat myself up for that."