Cheryl has said she was “struggling in silence” with anxiety.
While visiting Radio One, the “X-Factor U.K.” judge said that for “so long” she has battled with anxiety while raising Bear, 2, who she shares with ex Liam Payne.
“I think I actually walked through the fire, to be honest. I struggled for so long in silence, I wouldn’t even open up to friends and family. I was very closed,” Cheryl, 36, admitted.
“I actually had therapy for a year. I struggled for so many years with anxiety and in my own head, thinking things… I didn’t want that to be happening when I was trying to focus on raising a child,” she added.
“It felt like my responsibilities shifted and my priorities changed and I needed to be settled in my own head to be able to give him the best that I could possibly give him.”
The “Let You” singer said that she believed putting on a brave face was the best way to deal with her anxiety but has since learned there are better ways. “One of the problems I think with social media is that people put on this face and this facade of how they are.”
“I think what happens then is everyone is looking around like, ‘why does everyone seem so good and having a good time in a happy place and I feel rubbish?’ And that’s not helpful.”
She believes that if people are “a bit more open and honest with how they’re feeling” it would benefit everyone.
Another thing that was hard to deal with was the negative comments and trolls in the early days of her career.
“If someone has the time and the mental capacity to want to go on an article and write a sentence about somebody, you’ve got to be quite an angry sad person. They’re not okay. It’s more a reflection than it is a truth – it’s how they feel about themselves or how they perceive things to be.”
Luckily Cheryl has learned not to let those words get to her. “These people don’t know you. They have no idea about you as a person or what’s really going on. They can say they don’t like your shoes or they don’t like your hair – who cares?”
Cheryl also teased new music, but warned it might be some time until anyone hears it adding that she wants to see the reaction from her singles and “if people are enjoying the music” first.
