Miley Cyrus Was Once a Target of Bullies
Teen shares life story in new autobiography, shares secrets of beauty "process."
April 7, 2009 — -- What hasn't the 16-year-old pop phenom Miley Cyrus done? She's a multiplatinum musician, star of the incredibly popular "Hannah Montana" TV show and movie, and now she has released an autobiography.
But can you imagine Cyrus as a target of bullies?
Tune in to "Good Morning America" Wednesday to see Miley and Billy Ray Cyrus perform live and then head back to www.abcnews.com/gma for another, Web exclusive performance.
In sixth grade while attending school in Nashville, Tenn., Cyrus says a group of three girls she'd befriended turned on her. They began sending her mean notes, stealing her books, making fun of her clothes and hair. They sent her a note threatening her if she showed her face in the school cafeteria. And one day they shoved her into the school bathroom and locked the door.
She became "friendless, lonely and miserable," she writes in her book.
Cyrus says she had always been teased for having a famous father, country music star Billy Ray Cyrus. She was also auditioning for the role in the "Hannah Montana" show during that time period.
"Maybe they thought I was snotty for being proud of my dad or for wanting to be my own person or for wanting to be an actress and a singer. Maybe they just smelled insecurity. Maybe that was why they singled me out," she says in her book, "Miles to Go," written with Hilary Liftin.
It's an insecurity that Cyrus told "Good Morning America" does not go away with fame, but one she's learned to overcome.
"There was times where all I was looking in the mirror and not seeing a role model, or not someone that inspires people if I tell myself that I'm ugly or my body isn't right," she says. "What's that going to tell girls that feel that way as well? It's going to say it's OK to feel that way, but it's not OK to feel that way."
She says people's comparisons to magazine covers of stars like herself are unfair because "if [they] saw the process ... they would feel so much better about themselves."
"It's not real," she says. "I look at it, and I'm just like, 'Gosh, how do they look like that?' and they don't."
"Hannah Montana: The Movie," which opens April 10, touches on some of those themes. Schoolgirl-by-day, pop star-by-night Hannah Montana learns about the price of fame and the importance of going home again.
