Lady Gaga reveals she would ‘get depressed’ from waking up and remembering she was Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga reflected on her mental health in an interview with Billboard. (Billboard/Djeneba Aduayom)
Lady Gaga spoke candidly about her mental health in the throes of fame, saying that she would often “get depressed” from waking up remembering who she is.
Well, there are worse people to wake up as than Lady Gaga, we guess.
The Chromatica hitmaker told Billboard how she grappled with depression following her Joanne world tour in 2018, and sought therapy as a result after smoking and drinking became routine.
“I used to wake up every day and remember I was Lady Gaga, and then I would get depressed,” she said.
Singer struggled to leave the house and took-up drinking and chain-smoking to cope.
For a stretch of time, the 34-year-old said she was afraid of leaving her house. Consumed by catatonia, the thought of having even the dullest details of her life captured in social media posts and press paparazzi filled her with “dread”, she said.
“I was peeling all the layers of the onion in therapy,” she said, “so as you dig deeper, you get closer to the core, and the core of the onion stinks.”
Gaga said that after Joanne, she spent hours drinking, chain-smoking and crying – numbing habits that she said, in part, inspired “Rain On Me“.
“My existence in and of itself was a threat to me,” she said. “I thought about really dark s**t every single day.”
To stop the toll of the day-to-day from going from a ripple into a tsunami, she said she often played the “Lady Gaga card”.
“I’m Lady Gaga,” she would say, “you don’t understand what it feels like, I want to dress how I want and be who I am without people noticing, why does everybody have to notice, I’m so sad, I don’t even know why anymore, why are you making me talk about it?”
Although, she noted that she no longer resorts to this anymore: “I gave that up in therapy.”
Lady Gaga scolds the ‘Lindseys’ who post photos of themselves saying: ‘Look at me protesting!’
As the coronavirus began to gnaw on all parts of normal life, Gaga found her seven-years in the making album launch dissolve before her eyes and her mental health slipping into jeopardy. She has often stressed that Chromatica was born from her painful past.
And when the Black Lives Matter protesters drummed along the streets of the US, from major cities to far-flung suburbs, she knew her album launch not only had to be delayed, but changed to reflect this new era of upheaval.
“When you’re born in this country, we all drink the poison that is white supremacy,” she reflected.
“I am in the process of learning and unlearning things I’ve been taught my whole life.
“Social justice is not just a literacy, it’s a lifestyle. What do I think about [posting] a black square? I think everybody has a different feeling about a black square.
“Do I think there’s such a thing as performative activism? Yes.
“Do I think there’s been true activism that’s been very important and needed? Yes. Do I believe Black lives matter? Yes.
“Do I believe this is going to get louder? Yes. Do I believe it should? Yes.”
She also snidely commented on who she calls “Lindseys”, “the girls that protest and are taking pictures of themselves like, ‘Look at me protesting!'” she said, noting that she has been at pains to ensure her own activism is authentic.
Readers affected by the issues raised in this story are encouraged to contact Samaritans free on 116 123 (www.samaritans.org) or Mind on 0300 123 3393 (www.mind.org.uk).
Readers in the US are encouraged to contact the National Suicide Prevention Line on 1-800-273-8255.
