Mental illness can totally suck and make you feel completely alone. That feeling can be made worse by the lack of public discussion around the topic. Because there’s still such a stigma around talking about mental illnesses, like anxiety and depression, many people keep their suffering a secret. In fact, the National Institute of Mental Illness shows 20% of young people ages 13 to 18 suffer from severe mental illness. According to Mental Health America, depression in teens is increasing at an "alarming" rate. Luckily, these celebs have opened up about their battles with mental illness to show that it can affect anyone. Check out these open and honest stories about how celebs have dealt and are dealing with mental illness.
Selena Gomez
Selena has been very open about her need to step away from the limelight to care for her mental health. In 2016, she canceled the remainder of a tour to seek treatment for anxiety and depression. When she returned from treatment, Selena addressed her mental health at the American Music Awards, when she reminded people that treatment is available. "If you are broken, you don't have to stay broken," she said. Since then, Selena has continued to be honest about her mental health, including her more recent announcement to fans that she'd be stepping away from social media for a much needed break.
"As much as I am grateful for the voice that social media gives each of us, I am equally grateful to be able to step back and live my life present to the moment I have been given. Kindness and encouragement only for a bit! Just remember— negative comments can hurt anybody’s feelings. Obvi," she wrote about her break.
Selena often shows us that self-care is important, and that it's OK to take the steps you need to take to treat your mental health.
Ariana Grande
After a bombing at one of Ariana's concerts in Manchester, England, killed 22 people, the singer has talked about how she was left with PTSD and other mental health issues after the attack. She's talked on social media and in interviews about how she copes with anxiety and PTSD, and opened up more recently, after her ex-boyfriend Mac Miller died. Like Selena has in the past, Ariana recently announced she'd be taking a break from the public eye to cope with the loss of Mac and other events.
"Given the events of the past couple of years, Ariana is going to take some much needed time to heal and mend. She will be staying close to home and using this period to spend time with her loved ones and work on new music without deadline. She thanks her fans for their understanding," a representative for Ariana said in September.
Justin Bieber
Last week, Justin Bieber spoke up about depression and feeling weighed down by expectations when he canceled all future meet-and-greets with fans on his Purpose World Tour, because they were too much to handle. In an Instagram post on Wednesday, Justin said the fan meetings leave him feeling “drained and unhappy."
“I always leave feeling mentally and emotionally exhausted to the point of depression,” he wrote. “The pressure of meeting people’s expectations of what I’m supposed to be is so much for me to handle and a lot on my shoulders.”
It makes total sense that Justin needs a break. Depression isn’t just a mental disorder, but can cause physical symptoms like pain, fatigue, and appetite changes.
This isn’t the first time Justin has opened up about mental illness. In 2015, Justin told NME that he gets depressed “all the time,” because he feels isolated.
Justin also told NME that he tries to put things in perspective when he’s overwhelmed by depression.
“If I wanna do this, there’s gonna be darkness thrown at me,” he said.
Rowan Blanchard
In 2015, Rowan Blanchard made an Instagram confession: In a reflection on the year, Rowan wrote that she was experiencing more depression than ever.
Rowan said she had experienced so many emotions over the course of 2015, and sometimes had multiple emotions at the same time. The ups and downs, Rowan concluded, can be put in perspective, even if they seem like too much.
“As I found myself, this year in particular, going through ups and downs with depression, I realized that instead of rejecting and ostracizing these teenage feelings (human feelings), I can learn to love the intensity of them and know that everything is momentary,” Rowan wrote. “I learned this year that happiness and sadness are not mutually exclusive. They can exist within me at the same time in the same moment.”
These realizations, Rowan said, led her to understand how accepting and processing her feelings is more helpful than just blocking them out.
Halsey
Halsey spoke out about having bipolar disorder last year, but in an interview with Billboard, the singer revealed that her struggle with mental illness led her to consider suicide when she was 17.
Though the National Alliance on Mental Illness estimates approximately 1 in 5 adults experience mental illness in a given year, and 1 in 5 young people ages 13 to 18 experience a severe mental illness in a year, Halsey told Elle that being a bipolar, bisexual, biracial woman makes her sometimes feel “inconvenient.”
“This plight, like you said, of being the 'inconvenient woman,' just comes from people expecting me to...I'm not always going to be agreeable, you know? I'm not always going to be calm,” she said. “I'm entitled to my emotions and, unfortunately, because of the circumstance that I deal with, it's a little more than other people.”
Halsey has found a community on the Internet, though, where she’s able to channel her emotions and connect with people who relate to her.
Cara Delevingne
Being successful and beautiful doesn’t make you immune from depression. Model and actress Cara Delevingne opened up at the 2015 Women in the World Summit about dealing with depression for years, which at times made her feel suicidal.
“I think I pushed myself so far [at school] that I got to the point where I had a mental breakdown…I was completely suicidal. I didn’t want to live anymore,” Cara told actor Rupert Everett at the summit.
Feeling like she was the only one suffering from mental illness, Cara said, made it worse.
“I thought that I was completely alone. I also realized how lucky I was, and what a wonderful family and wonderful friends I had, but that didn’t matter. I wanted the world to swallow me up, and nothing seemed better to me than death.”
Cara said her depression didn’t let up when she became a successful model, but instead lived inside her while she put on a brave face. Cara is doing better now, she told Rupert, and she got there by opening up to a few close friends.
“It’s about finding people around you who have your best interests at heart. I had a lot of people around me who were just after what I gave them…not looking after me,” she said. “So it’s about finding people who care about you, and support you. And I’ve now been able to become a support for other people as well.”
Lena Dunham
The Girls creator and actress is often looked to as a voice of her generation, so it makes sense that she would have something to say when it comes to making mental health a non-taboo topic. Lena took to Instagram (is there a trend here?) to talk about how exercise has helped her cope with anxiety.
According to Harvard Medical School, a regular exercise program can improve the mood of people who have mild to moderate depression. This is likely due to a boost in endorphins, mood- enhancing chemicals in your body, and because exercise increases the flow of a different happy-inducing neurotransmitter.
Lena, who said she went 16 medicated years before using exercise to cope with mental illness, also said she makes sure to carve out gym time even when she’s super busy, to keep her anxiety in check.
“Promised myself I would not let exercise be the first thing to go by the wayside when I got busy with Girls season five, and here is why: It has helped with my anxiety in ways I never dreamed possible,” she wrote. “To those struggling with anxiety, OCD, depression: I know it's mad annoying when people tell you to exercise, and it took me about 16 medicated years to listen. I'm glad I did.”
Demi Lovato
Singer Demi Lovato is so passionate about tearing down the stigma around mental illness that she started a campaign to boost awareness. Be Vocal: Speak Up For Mental Health urges people to talk about their mental illness to normalize it. She’s so passionate because she suffered from mental illness for years, without having the words to describe it.
"When you don’t know what’s happening, why you’re feeling certain ways, and you don’t have the answers yet, people tend to self-medicate, which is exactly what I did," Demi told Women’s Health Magazine. Demi was also diagnosed with addiction, bulimia, and cutting. After those diagnoses, though scary at first, she was able to focus on gaining control and coping.
"Now I know that when I focus on my treatment plan with my team and my support system, I’m able to not only maintain a healthy mind, but I’m able to maintain my sobriety,” she said.
To help others get to that point, Demi partnered with Be Vocal to get the word out.
“In the end, I was so relieved to get the diagnosis I did,” she told Refinery 29.
Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga has been candid about many personal issues, including her lifelong battle with anxiety and depression. In 2015, Gaga told Billboard that she’s coped with mental illness all her life, and still deals with it daily.
Through her music, though, Gaga has been able to relate to fans and hopes to show young people that it’s OK to struggle.
“I’ve suffered through depression and anxiety my entire life. I still suffer with it every single day. I just want these kids to know that that depth they feel as human beings is normal,” she told Billboard. “We were born that way. This modern thing, where everyone is feeling shallow and less connected? That's not human.”
Gaga has also channeled her energy into acting, something she said has helped her mental health a lot. She has tried to stop her medication, but said she stuck with it at the recommendation of her doctor.
“I have tried a lot of things, but there is something about acting that has really helped,” she said. “I am a Stefani-Gaga hybrid and I want you to know the real me.”
For 2018's World Mental Health Day, Gaga penned an op-ed asking for change in how we view mental illness.
Jared Padalecki
In Gilmore Girls, Jared Padalecki played the often mope-y Dean, who wasn't always great at expressing his feelings. In real life, though, Jared has taken a stand for making discussions around mental illness more common.
After he was diagnosed with depression, Jared launched a T-shirt campaign with represent.com that benefits the mental illness support organization To Write Love On Her Arms. The shirts urge people living with mental illness to “Always Keep Fighting.”
“It kind of hit me like a sack of bricks. I mean, I was 25 years old. I had my own TV show. I had dogs that I loved and tons of friends, and I was getting adoration from fans and happy with my work, but I couldn’t figure out what it was; it doesn’t always make sense is my point,” Jared told Variety. “It’s not just people who can’t find a job, or can’t fit in in society that struggle with depression sometimes.”
To make people more aware that depression can and does happen to anyone, Jared launched the T-shirt line. Looking at support groups for other diseases or illnesses, Jared said he thought it might be helpful for people suffering from anxiety and depression to see they are normal and not alone.
“I say constantly that there’s no shame in dealing with these things. There’s no shame in having to fight every day, but fighting every day, and presumably, if you’re still alive to hear these words or read this interview, then you are winning your war,” Jared said to Variety. “You’re here. You might not win every battle. There are going to be some really tough days. There might be several tough times in any given single day, but hopefully, this will help somebody to think, ‘This isn’t easy; it is a fight, but I’m going to keep fighting,’ and that’s why we did this shirt.”
Troian Bellisario
On television, Troian plays Pretty Little Liars' sharply intelligent Spencer Hastings, who over the years dealt with a prescription-pill problem and was admitted to Radley Sanitarium. Like her onscreen life, Troian's real life is not without hardship. In 2014, Troian told Seventeen that she had an eating disorder and self-harmed when she was a teen.
Troian said she used to intentionally hurt herself if she didn’t do well in school.
“I started self-harming when I was a junior," Troian said. "I would withhold food or withhold going out with my friends based on how well I did that day in school...I didn’t know what was right and what was wrong, so I think I created this bizarre system of checks and balances to create order in my world. But it really backfired.”
Even though she’s past her teen years now, Troian said she still struggles. On the PLL set, Troian said she sometimes felt like she didn’t measure up.
“Sometimes I’ve felt like a fraud. Like, I’m not like these other girls — I don’t dress like that and don’t know how to do my hair,” she said.
To fight that feeling, Troian tries to be as true to herself as possible off set. "The minute I’m off that stage, I try to get as 'me' as possible. I do that by piling on my black eyeliner, and I put on my ripped tights" to feel more Troian than Spencer, she said.
Angel Haze
Rapper Angel Haze has not only opened up about their own depression and mental health issues, but called teenage depression rates an epidemic.
In a 2014 column for Noisey, Angel wrote that they lived with an eating disorder as a teen. They also said that year they battled unnamed mental health struggles. Through therapy, though, Angel said they were able to feel much better.
Because they've been open about their mental illness, Angel said they've heard from many young fans saying they, too, are depressed or self- harm. Angel's heard from so many, they wrote, that they think depression is an epidemic.
“Teenage depression is becoming an epidemic. So many fans have written to me about self-harming and anorexia,” they said. “Read the Twitters, read the Tumblrs, see the messed up thoughts that go on in this generation.”
In their column, Angel urged readers to not be afraid to ask for help.
“I haven’t starved myself for years now, and although I have ups and downs, it’s not as bad as it was,” Angel wrote. “I didn’t get better because I’m famous, I got better because I got help and started to learn how to be happy. I just want others to do the same.”
If you’re depressed or struggling with any mental illness, it’s important to remember you’re not alone. Like these stars who have been there, it is possible to manage your mental health and feel better. If you or someone you know is considering suicide, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is available 24/7 at 1-800-273-8255. There are even some mental health apps that can help you through a crisis. But like these stars said, there’s no shame in asking for help. If you’re going through mental illness, let someone you trust know. Most likely, they won’t judge you or think less of you — they’ll want to help.
Related: Why Chris Brown’s Tweet About Kehlani’s Suicide Attempt Is So Dangerous
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