Gwyneth Paltrow's Sketchiest Moments

Gwyneth Paltrow often makes headlines for the controversial things she promotes in the name of health on her lifestyle website, Goop. One of her first newsworthy topics was vagina steaming. In a 2015 post, she claimed (via Women's Health), "You sit on what is essentially a mini-throne, and a combination of infrared and mugwort steam cleanses your uterus, et al. It is an energetic release...that balances female hormone levels."

While that does sound intriguing, several gynecologists spoke out against it, with Mary Jane Minkin, an OB/GYN and professor, declaring, "It's complete bull." She went on to point out that the vagina doesn't actually produce hormones and there are major risks involved like burning your vagina or giving yourself an infection. Fellow OB/GYN Jen Gunter wrote a whole blog post about why it's a bad idea. She explained, "I'm not sure what our gal GP thinks balancing hormones actually is...but I am confident when I say that steaming your vagina with wormwood or mugwort will not do anything to hormones because these plants are not hormones."

Despite the negative feedback from medical experts, Paltrow stood by her claim, telling The Cut that she too had been skeptical at first but once she tried it she was all in. She added, "It's been in Korean medicine for thousands of years and there are real healing properties. If I find benefit to it and it's getting a lot of page views, it's a win-win."

At this point it's pretty clear that Gwyneth Paltrow has backed some unconventional wellness practices, but perhaps her most intense one was bee venom therapy. The "Shallow Hal" actor has promoted getting stung by bees on purpose for skin care. She revealed to The New York Times, "I've been stung by bees. It's a thousands of years old treatment called apitherapy. People use it to get rid of inflammation and scarring." Paltrow praised it, but did admit, "Man, it's painful."

Paltrow left that last part out when she wrote about it for Goop, dishing, "I was recently given 'bee venom therapy' for an old injury and it disappeared." While that all may be true, doctors still advised against it, and not just because it hurts. Dermatologist Gary Goldenberg explained to Health (via Refinery29), "I do not recommend bee stings as anti-inflammatory agents. Many patients are severely allergic to bee stings and may not know it."

Unfortunately, a woman in Spain did have a severe allergic reaction to bee venom therapy and died because of it, according to the BBC. While she of course had the worst outcome, other people have suffered from it as well, including "300" star Gerard Butler. The actor talked about his experience, which was much different from Paltrow's, on "Late Night with Seth Meyers." He said his heart rate increased drastically, adding, "I ended up in the hospital."

After Gwyneth Paltrow came down with COVID-19, she opened up about the holistic treatments she chose to use. In a 2021 Goop post, she wrote, "It left me with some long-tail fatigue and brain fog. ... I had some tests done that showed really high levels of inflammation in my body." Paltrow then turned to things like intuitive fasting, using an infrared sauna, and taking supplements specifically to treat that inflammation that she linked to the coronavirus. Because she shared that and then plugged the products she used, Paltrow came under fire for recommending unverified COVID-19 treatments, despite the article having a disclaimer.

The National Medical Director of National Health Services (NHS) England, Stephen Powis, spoke out against her advice. Per the BBC, he said, "Some of the solutions she's recommending are really not the solutions we'd recommend in the NHS." He continued, "We need to take long Covid seriously and apply serious science. All influencers who use social media have a duty of responsibility and a duty of care around that."

Paltrow didn't feel that she nor Goop did anything wrong and defended herself to The Hollywood Reporter. Of Goop's critics, she said, "I always find it's for their own amplification." The actor added, "We're very much in integrity and we're careful about what we say. We always feel like we understand why a lot of that becomes clickbait for people."

In 2014, Gwyneth Paltrow got a lot of flack for something unrelated to Goop, which was how she and her then-husband Chris Martin announced their divorce. Since celebrity divorces are never that shocking, it was the fact that they called it a "conscious uncoupling" instead of a divorce that rubbed people the wrong way. Evidently, some critics felt the statement came across as out of touch and pretentious, and so the ribbing began.

A year later, Paltrow looked back at the backlash during The Goop Q&A, recalling, per Us Weekly, "We like broke the f**king internet." She went on to explain that it was actually a good thing because it started a discussion of what that means for a family. She added, "Because it was such an emotional time and we didn't give it as much context and didn't explain [that it] wasn't something that I was inventing — it was already an established theory."

However, in 2019, Paltrow shared on "The Armchair Expert" podcast that she had really used that term to help herself process the pain of divorce and keep her family intact. She admitted that backfired though because of all the negative attention. She shared,  "There was this whole other layer of the world turning on us about saying, essentially, 'We just want to be nice to each other and try to stay a family.' ... It was brutal, because I already felt like I had no skin on."

On more than one occasion Gwyneth Paltrow's approach to dieting has made waves. Take for example when she appeared on "Oprah" with celeb trainer Tracy Anderson in 2008. At one point during their workout demonstration, the actor casually stated, "When you're 35, you either starve yourself, or you eat and you do serious cardio." Understandably, this remark rubbed some the wrong way. Goop has also offered weight loss tips that've been received poorly, with one (now-deleted) article about how to "lose weight fast" getting a lot of backlash, in particular. A nutritionist told The Independent, "I am in complete shock that this article has been published as this has the potential to harm a lot of relationships with food." Following the backlash, a spokesperson for Goop told E! News, "We would never advocate for an unhealthy diet or extreme routine." Goop later published an article about why people should work toward achieving their "leanest livable weight." Per The Independent, Dr. Giles Yeo of the University of Cambridge pointed out why this "tip" could pose a problem. "This is a dangerous suggestion, as many people will take it to mean they should be as thin as possible," he said.

A former employee also alleged that while working for Paltrow's company, she developed harmful eating habits and a distorted body image. She said on Instagram, "I felt like I was not in a healthy relationship with my body, where I was always trying to punish it, bring it under control."

If you need help with an eating disorder, or know someone who is, help is available. Visit the National Eating Disorders Association website or contact NEDA's Live Helpline at 1-800-931-2237. You can also receive 24/7 Crisis Support via text (send NEDA to 741-741).

Gwyneth Paltrow sparked outrage in the early 2000s when she seemingly made anti-American comments. The Los Angeles native had spent many years living in London part-time when she was married to Coldplay frontman Chris Martin. Paltrow had apparently been quite taken with the country since she often boasted about it. Yet what people found sketchy was that she had reportedly thrown her own country under the bus when doing so. For example, in 2006 she told The Guardian, "I love the English way, which is not as capitalistic as it is in America. People don't talk about work and money; they talk about interesting things at dinner parties."

It seemed like Paltrow took her insults toward the U.S. a step further when speaking with a Portuguese newspaper (via Hollywood). She reportedly told the outlet, "I don't fit into the bad side of American psychology. The British are much more intelligent and civilized than the Americans." After the story began to make waves, Paltrow attempted to set the record straight, insisting to People that she didn't actually say those things about her home country. "First of all I feel so lucky to be American," she said. "I felt so upset to be completely misconstrued and I never, ever would have said that." She went on to reveal that she sees herself as a "New York girl" and that she only lived part time in England because of her then-husband. "It's not like I've left America," she said.

Being a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is a big deal. But for at least one MCU actor, the movies really start to blend together. On an episode of "The Chef Show" (via ET), Gwyneth Paltrow admitted she couldn't remember being in "Spider-Man: Homecoming," telling her co-star Jon Favreau,  "We weren't in 'Spider-Man' ... No, I was in 'Avengers.'" Paltrow later defended her forgetfulness on "Jimmy Kimmel Live." "I just got confused," she said. "There are so many of these wonderful Marvel, interconnecting movies."

She really seems to have trouble keeping track of her MCU co-stars. "Gwyneth Paltrow [was] asking why Sam Jackson was there, and the other actors [were] jumping in saying... 'He's Nick Fury! You've been in movies with him," Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige revealed in a 2019 Q&A, per Empire. She was also heard asking her publicist who her co-star Sebastian Stan was. Stan poked fun at that on his Instagram, writing, "glad I got to reintroduce myself to @gwynethpaltrow for the third time. We are in the same film."

Paltrow may have described the Marvel movies as "wonderful," but it sounds like they aren't exactly at the top of her priority list. As she told Elle in 2019, "[T]o be honest, I haven't seen very many of them. It's really stupid and I'm sorry, but I'm a 47-year-old mother." So maybe don't ask Paltrow to join your Marvel trivia night team.