May is mental health awareness month and celebrities are getting candid about their experiences with mental health struggles – including Kendall Jenner and Lizzo.
Kendall recently appeared on Vogue’s Open Minded series to talk her struggles with one of the most common mental health concerns in the U.S. – anxiety. Chatting with Dr. Ramani Durvasula, she opened up about her “really intense and scary” struggles.
The model revealed that she started feeling anxiety as far back as when she was just eight.
“I remember being really young – I’d say 8, 9, 10 – and having shortness of breath and going to my mom and telling her that,” she recalled.
However, she says that it’s gotten “out of control” since her career kicked off in a big way.
“I think being overworked and being in the situation that I’m in now is kind of what set it out of control in a way,” Kendall said.
She shared that she’s come to the point that she even experiences physical symptoms.
“I’ve had times where I feel like I need to be rushed to the hospital because I think my heart’s failing and I can’t breathe and I need someone to help me,” she said. “Sometimes I think I’m dying. Sometimes parts of my body will go numb, and it can be really, yeah, intense and scary.”
But, right off the bat, she knows she’ll have critics and doubters. “There is going to be those people that say, ‘Oh, okay, what does she have to worry about? What does she have to be anxious about?’ and I’ll never sit here and say that I’m not fortunate,” she says right in the beginning of the video. “I know I live a very privileged, amazing lifestyle. I’m a very blessed girl.”
And Kendall points out that “I still have one of these,” pointing to her head, “and that thing up there sometimes doesn’t always—I don’t know—it’s not always happy and it’s not always connecting.”
“I’m still a human being at the end of the day,” she continued. “No matter what someone has or doesn’t have, it doesn’t mean that they don’t have real-life feelings and emotions.”
Dr. Durvasula shared some tips with Kendall for easing and preventing her panic attacks, including a plan for how she can use her body to put herself and others at ease.
Also getting real about her mental health struggles with fans is Lizzo, who posted a tearful video on TikTok over the weekend.
Opening up about her mental state, she shared, “You know that part of sadness where you feel like a burden on everyone and annoying and nobody cares about you? Can we get rid of that part? It’s like, yo, I’m already sad. Could it add insult to injury that I have no one to talk to about it?”
“I don’t want to feel this way anymore,” she continued. “I want to feel like I do have someone to talk to, people do care about me. I have love. I’m not alone. That’s what I want to feel, but I don’t feel like that.”
Lizzo later shared an update on the platform, telling fans she’s “feeling better.”
“I had a really rough night and a very emotional morning just thinking about my relationships and life. You know how it is. It gets dark,” she explained. “I’m definitely glad I reached out in any way I could and TikTok was one of those ways. To feel received and seen and heard really, really helped me. I’m not crying anymore.”
She went on to share some of the things she did to get herself out of her funk. “Took a bath, talked to my therapist, talked to my medium, breathed, focused on gratitude, tricked my dopamine levels by getting excited about something that’s happening in the future, ate a cinnamon roll, hot chocolate, and now I’m in bed,” she shared. “I do feel better.”
And she assured fans who are “going through things” to “just know you’re not alone.”
If you or anyone you know is going through mental health struggles, please contact a licensed therapist who can better help you with your individual needs or visit www.nami.org or www.nimh.nih.gov which can offer various resources and treatment options.
