The interview ends not with redemption, but with a warning. Li reveals she was diagnosed with complex PTSD and anorexia athletica. She has spent two years relearning hunger cues and saying “no.”

When Chen Wei asks if she would do it all again, knowing the cost, Li whispers: “I didn’t know I had a choice. That’s the crime.”

Then, for the first time, she laughs — genuinely. “But now? Now I’d rather be ordinary.”

This is where the interview earned its “hardest” reputation. Li names names — not for revenge, but for warning. She describes:

“The hardest part,” she says, “is that everyone congratulated me. My mother called my thinness ‘elegance.’ My fans said I was ‘disciplined.’ No one said, ‘You’re dying.’”

Worth watching — especially if you respect public figures who drop the persona. It’s uncomfortable at times, but that’s exactly the point.

The fashion industry has long romanticized suffering — the “suffering artist” trope. Li Rongrong’s testimony shattered that. Commenters wrote: “She showed us that strength without boundaries is just self-destruction.”