'I've always tried to practise acceptance'

Activist Katie Piper on prioritising wellness, working for women's safety and her new campaign to help sensitive skin

- ZARA ZUBEIDI

When Katie Piper welcomed her daughter Belle back in 2014, she poignantly described motherhood as a new chapter, adding that she was finally able to leave the past behind. But becoming a mother also marked the start of something else – a fresh outlook on the way she treats both mind and body.

Over the past decade or so, Katie has focused on being in the best place she can be, physically and mentally – and her efforts have paid off. In December, she appeared on Katherine Ryan’s podcast, What’s My Age Again?, and her biological age was revealed to be just 22.

Katie, 42, tells OK!, “I was shocked. I had a fun past in my teens and early twenties, and then I had a complex medical past in my twenties and thirties. But since becoming a mum I have really taken lifestyle and wellness seriously.

“I’m not a wellness bore – I’ll still have a glass of rosé at the weekend. But I’ve always been a massive advocate for accountability. It’s treating your mental and physical health a bit like a job. I think if you don’t sort of manage life in that way, life starts to manage you. And that’s when things unravel a bit.”

Katie has been in the spotlight for more than a decade after surviving a life-changing acid attack in 2008. The former model met her now-husband Richard Sutton through mutual friends in 2013, before tying the knot two years later. The couple – who are parents to Belle, 11, and eight-year-old Penelope – celebrated their 10th wedding anniversary last year.

“I was really careful what I posted about it online, because I remember being single and always struggling with Valentine’s Day and seeing other people’s posts about love and relationships and thinking, ‘Oh my God, why can’t I have that or get it right?’