Liam Hemsworth Needed Surgery that Forced Him to ‘Completely Rethink’ His Vegan Diet

The year 2020 is not going the way most people had planned. And in Liam Hemsworth’s case, he’s still recovering from a difficult 2019 that included surgery for a painful kidney stone and a divorce from Miley Cyrus

The experience led him to reexamine several parts of his life, and he started with his vegan diet.

“I was vegan for almost four years, and then February of last year I was feeling lethargic. Then I got a kidney stone. It was one of the most painful weeks of my life. I was doing press for Isn’t It Romantic. But I had to go to the hospital and get surgery,” Hemsworth, 30, told Men’s Health for their May cover.

The actor said that “it’s all good now,” but that he had to lower his vegetable intake.

“Once you get one kidney stone, you have a 50 percent chance of getting another one if you continue eating the way you were eating,” he explained. “Well, my particular kidney stone was a calciumoxalate kidney stone. It forms from having too much oxalate in your diet. Oxalates are really high in a lot of vegetables, specifically spinach, almonds, beetroot, potatoes. Every morning, I was having five handfuls of spinach and then almond milk, almond butter, and also some vegan protein in a smoothie. And that was what I considered super healthy. So I had to completely rethink what I was putting in my body.”

Hemsworth said that he tends to “go from one extreme to the other,” and that was how he initially became vegan. He learned that while certain diets or workouts can be touted as healthy, “You have to figure out what works best for your body.”

“If something works well for a period, great, keep doing it. If something changes and you’re not feeling great, you’ve got to reassess it and then figure it out.”

Hemsworth said, though, that working out kept him going through the difficulty of the last year.

“Honestly, the past six months…I’d say exercise and fitness is a big thing for me to just feel balanced and level headed,” he said.

What those workouts entail changes depending on his current project. Hemsworth spent the end of 2019 filming the movie Most Dangerous Game, and it was “extremely physical.”

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“I spent most of the project running and getting beaten up. It was just brutal. I leaned out a lot,” he said. “Running is so jarring. Your knees, your ankles, your lower back. After that I teamed up with Jason Walsh, who owns Rise Nation in West Hollywood. We do high-intensity stuff, a mix of calisthenics, sled pulls, sled pushes, and lots and lots of free weights.”

He’s also worked on his mental health by learning to let things go. Hemsworth said that after his breakup with Cyrus, the constant paparazzi and tabloid obsession “was very stressful.”

“From my point of view, the majority of the time things that are written about me are completely false. There are times when you want to speak up and there are other times when it’s not worth it, because you’re just going to draw more attention to it, and then it’s better to just not think about it and let it all wash away,” he said.

“These days I don’t want to invest any more time in worrying about that sort of stuff. I remind myself of what to appreciate now and to enjoy every moment as much as possible, whether that be working or with my family or whatever I’m doing. Just trying to find a positive in it all and enjoy life as much as possible.”