Bella Hadid’s Mental Health Struggles Go Viral

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American fashion icon Bella Hadid’s mental health journey highlighted the mental health issues in the fashion industry.
Her mental health issues included depression, dissociation, and eating disorders.

The “It Girl” of the fashion industry, Bella Hadid opens up about mental health in her Vogue cover interview. She spoke of her personal mental health struggles with conditions like anxiety, depression, body-image issues, eating issues, and intense social anxiety. She also provided insights into the prevailing landscape of mental health in the fashion industry.

Bella Hadid’s Mental Health Struggles

Hadid, since early adolescence, had suffered from several physical and cognitive symptoms. These included Lyme disease, depression, anxiety, body dysphoria, sleep disorders, alcoholism, anorexia, and hypothyroidism.

Symptoms related to these disorders like brain fog, anxiety, exhaustion, poor focus, headaches, adrenal fatigue, bone pain, and crying spells severely impacted her high school years.

She also said that she got misdiagnosed for a few years and was subject to stressful treatment methods like ozone therapy, hyperbaric oxygen therapy, hormone replacement therapy, etc. Moreover, the negativity and trauma that came with her parents’ separation stayed with her and added to her emotional distress.

With the commencement of her modeling career, she was subject to intense media scrutiny, professional pressure, and the hazards of social media. This worsened her mental health and left her in suicidal despair.

How Hadid Addressed Her Mental Health Struggles

Hadid said she turned to medical help for her mental healthcare. She availed treatment at a mental health program in Tennessee and added the two mainstays of Western psychiatry—talk therapy and medication—to her regimen. She also took some time off from work and spent quality time with her family and pet animals.

Elaborating on how she decided to prioritize her mental health, Hadid remarked: “To have to wake up every morning with this brain-it’s not cute. So now everything that I do in my personal life is literally to make sure that my mental state stays above water … Walking outside, being able to remember there are so many people going through things and have similar patterns to me, it makes me feel better.”

Besides advocating sustainable trends in fashion, she uses her vast presence on social media (like Instagram) to raise awareness about mental health and destigmatize it. Recently, she developed her own line of nonalcoholic, adaptogenic drinks to contribute her part in abating alcoholism and similar forms of substance abuse.