Valerie Bertinelli: Becoming ‘Perfectly Imperfect’

WITH A NEW FREEDOM, THE STAR, 65, FINDS HAPPINESS IN LETTING GO OF BODY SHAME AND CHILDHOOD TRAUMA: ‘IT’S NEVER TOO LATE TO MAKE PEACE WITH YOURSELF’

- LIZ MCNEIL,ANDREW ECCLES

When Valerie Bertinelli talks about getting “emotionally naked,” she strips down right away—from discussing how she let go of body shame (“My poor body, I was so mean to it”) to dishing on love and sex (“I’m not dead inside!”) to disclosing a “boob job” she had back in the ’80s. At 65, the star and celebrity chef has found a new freedom in embracing the “perfectly imperfect.” That’s how she ended up posing without clothes for the cover of her new book Getting Naked. “I thought I might as well expose myself there too,” she says. But she’s also ready to free herself from something much deeper: “I was carrying secrets no one can see.”

For the first time, she reveals that she was sexually abused at 11 years old. It wasn’t something she’d planned to share in her new book, but time and therapy changed her mind. “I don’t feel shame about it anymore,” she says. “I’m pissed off that it happened.”

Today, she says, “I’m a survivor.” After her last relationship, with writer Mike Goodnough, ended in a difficult breakup in 2024, she still leads with her heart. It’s all part of the emotional connection she shares with fans, who’ve followed her for decades—since she first appeared on One Day at a Time at age 15, to Hot in Cleveland, opposite her friend Betty White, and now as a proud part of the “Drew Crew” of lifestyle experts on The Drew Barrymore Show. On a recent rainy day in Los Angeles (that ended in a double rainbow), she relaxes at her cozy home on a hill with 14-year-old rescue dog Luna and two very independent cats, Henry and Batman. “I’m a senior taking care of seniors,” she jokes.

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