Sharing the Secret 2000

Beth Moss Alison Lohman appears to have it all: she’s attractive, popular, excels in school, and shines on the ballet stage. Yet underneath the surface, she feels adrift, trapped between her parents’ divorce and their clashing compliments about who she should be. This tension pushes Beth toward a desperate need for control, and she quietly turns to a dangerous coping mechanism: bulimia. Her inner struggle is not just a private battle but a social one, as she navigates the expectations of friends, teachers, and family while trying to decide who she can trust with the truth about herself.

From the outset, the film paints a portrait of a girl who looks polished on the outside but is unraveling inside. In a ballet class, a dizzy misstep becomes a red flag she desperately tries to hide. When she pleads with her instructor Arina Gasanova not to tell her mother, the first crack in Beth’s carefully maintained façade appears. A later scene reveals a more public sign of trouble: bleeding gums that Beth conceals from her friends even as she teaches one of them, Melanie Kady Cole, how to purge. The act of teaching another girl this dangerous skill underscores how deeply Beth has internalized the urge to control and the ease with which she can pass that danger along, even to someone she cares about.

Beth’s fear of growing up and not fitting in is repeatedly juxtaposed with moments of social pressure. In a game with Sophia Brighton Hertford, Beth voices a fear that echoes through the whole film: she does not want to become “one of those people”—the people who seem to have their lives together but secretly struggle with the same anxieties and self-discipline gone awry. This fear shapes how she moves through school, friendships, and family life, often leading her to retreat rather than open up.

The film tracks Beth’s attempts to conceal her illness even as the evidence becomes harder to ignore. A fall in school triggers a call to her step-mother, Beth’s Mary Crosby character, as she skirts the truth about her condition. At her father’s urging, a medical evaluation begins, and a physician questions her eating habits. She offers a rehearsed answer about illness rather than disclosing the real problem, all while hiding the visible signs—things like scarred knuckles and the rapid, irregular heartbeat she’s learned to ignore. The school counselor Khadijah Karriem is compassionate and persistent, pressing Beth to speak honestly, which in turn triggers a tense confrontation with her mother as Beth is forced to acknowledge that something is very wrong.

Parallel to Beth’s struggles runs a thread involving her mother’s work as a child psychologist and a patient of her own. Beth’s counselor’s empathy, as well as reflections on the therapist’s own battle with anorexia, begin to illuminate the tough path toward healing. The film also leans into Beth’s broader world by introducing her as a daughter who grapples with a complicated family dynamic—her father Tim Matheson doing what he can to help, while her grandmother Diane Ladd offers warmth and difficult truths in a moment when Beth needs direction most.

As Beth begins formal counseling, she is at first defiant but gradually opens up, helped by the insights of her therapist, Roxana Brusso who plays Beth’s psychiatrist, Kerri Gold. The therapist’s own history with eating disorders provides a real, human perspective that helps Beth see that her patterns aren’t a unique flaw but a set of responses she can learn to rebuild from. This therapeutic arc is mirrored in the life of another child, Rachel [Camryn Grimes], a patient who is also feeling squeezed by her family’s structure and demands, offering a mirror that deepens Beth’s sense of not being alone in her private battle.

A turning point arrives as Beth becomes more engaged in treatment and begins to distinguish between the urge to purge and the need to heal. In a moment of raw honesty, she tells a friend that she doesn’t purge to lose weight, but to cope with a deeper wound: “I do it because I’m screwed up.” This blunt confession marks a shift from denial toward acceptance and a willingness to confront her illness with the support of those around her.

Tensions within the family come to a head when Beth returns home to find her mother in the bathroom, cleansing the medicine cabinet in a desperate attempt to remove anything that could be used to induce vomiting. Beth’s anger boils over as she confronts her mother in the doorway, insisting they face the truth together. She vomits into the toilet with her mother present, a confessional, devastating moment that exposes the full scale of her struggle to her caregiver. In the aftermath, Beth pleads to be admitted to an inpatient facility, accepting that help is necessary to survive and to reclaim her life. The film closes with Beth still in the hospital, but with a glimmer of progress: the routine after-meal supervision she endures is already being reduced, a sign that real, measurable improvement is within reach.

Throughout its emotional journey, the film uses Beth’s experiences to explore the imbalances of family life, the pressure to perform, and the arduous path to healing. The cinematic lens gives equal weight to the warmth of Beth’s connections—her father’s concern, her grandmother’s comforting but imperfect support, the steady presence of mentors like her therapist—and the painful honesty of her illness. It is a story about the moment when a young person chooses to accept help and fight for a future that allows room for both strength and vulnerability.

I do it because I’m screwed up.

Beth’s fight is not glamorous, but it is deeply human: a teenager attempting to navigate a fractured family system while wrestling with a disease that makes control feel like safety. The film remains careful not to glamorize Beth’s disorder, instead presenting her resilience, the gravity of seeking help, and the cautious optimism of recovery. In the end, what shines through is the recognition that healing is possible, even when the road is long and the wounds run deep, and that the people who care about Beth—her Alison Lohman portraying Beth, along with the doctors, counselors, and family who stand by her—play essential roles in guiding her toward a healthier, more hopeful future.