Pop superstar, Lady Gaga, real name Stefanie Germanotta, revealed during an interview with Oprah that she developed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) after being repeatedly raped when she was 19-years-old.
The star made the revelation in an interview with Oprah Winfrey as she kicked off her '2020 Vision: Your Life In Focus Tour'.
The 33-year-old said that she had attempted to put the assaults behind her and got caught up in her life as a musician, but that she developed severe persistent PTSD symptoms which she described as being like 'an illness'.
Lady Gaga said:
"I was raped repeatedly when I was 19 years old, and I also developed PTSD as a result of being raped and also not processing that trauma. I all of a sudden became a star and was traveling the world going from hotel room to garage to limo to stage, and I never dealt with it, and then all of a sudden I started to experience this incredible intense pain throughout my entire body that mimicked the illness I felt after I was raped."
Oprah shed tears as she was told the story, saying later to Gaga:
"You were so amazing. You were so good. You were so vulnerable, you were so real, I couldn't even believe you were doing that. I was like, 'Am I hearing correctly?' Oh my you were so real."
Adding:
"I was just so moved. By your presence, by they way you held yourself, the way you spoke to the people, it was just."
Lady Gaga went on to encourage anyone who has been through the same thing or anything similar to contact trained physicians and counsellors. She explained that mental health is just like physical health and sometimes needs the assistance of professionals. She also vowed to do everything she could to assist in the fight against the wider mental health crisis. She said:
"Mental health is a medical condition. It should be treated as a medical condition, it should not be ignored. I take an oath as a commitment today, with you, it's 2020 and for the next decade and maybe longer, I'm going to get the smartest scientists, doctors, psychiatrists, mathematicians, brain surgeons and professors in the same room together and we're going to go through each problem one by one and we're going to solve this mental health crisis."
[h/t: Daily Mail]
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