Jennifer Lopez says she was slated for having curves in her early career.

The "On the Floor" singer has become renowned for her shapely bottom, but she claims she was told to make changes to her body when she first ventured into television as an actress on American 90s sitcom In Living Color. In an interview for the winter issue of Cosmopolitan Latinas magazine, she recalled, "When I first started on television, people, and even my own manager at the time, would tell me I had to make all of these changes. But you have to stand up and say, 'There's nothing wrong with me or my shape or who I am, you're the one with the problem!' And when you can really believe that, all of a sudden other people start believing too."

J.Lo - who has five-year-old twins Max and Emme with her ex-husband, singer Marc Anthony - grew up in The Bronx, New York, with her Puerto Rican parents and she says her upbringing gave her self-confidence and a sense of pride in her looks and heritage: "Early on, my family really made me love who I was and what I looked like. My body was nothing out of the ordinary in my neighborhood. I love the family that I grew up in the; strength and passion and the heart that we bring to things. And also the way I was raised, the intense love we demonstrate."