Valerie Bertinelli: My Body Then & Now

Almost 49 and in bikini-ready shape, the actress takes PEOPLE on a photo tour of her looks through the years. By Elizabeth Leonard

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Early 1970s

"I was a cute little girl and I wished that I'd believed it then. Maybe because I didn't think I was beautiful inside," says Valerie Bertinelli of this photo, taken in her early teens before she landed a starring role on TV's One Day at a Time in 1975. She had never dieted before joining the show, but costarring with rail-thin Mackenzie Phillips made her feel insecure about her own body. "Then I was like, 'Oh, I'm a fat pig and I need to lose weight.' "