Selena Gomez Opens Up About Learning to Cope With Bipolar Diagnosis: ‘I Needed to Take It Day by Day’
Selena Gomez is sharing how she grappled with her mental health challenges. The singer shared a preview of her upcoming My Mind & Me documentary with Vanity Fair, in which she opens up about how she learned to cope with her bipolar diagnosis.
Gomez revealed her bipolar diagnosis in 2020 after checking into a mental health facility. Bipolar disorder is a mental disorder that “causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, concentration, and the ability to carry out day-to-day tasks,” according to the National Institute of Mental Health. The singer has also been candid about her other health struggles over the years, including a lupus diagnosis, a kidney transplant, chemotherapy, and public heartbreak.
“When I first got out, I didn’t know how I’d cope with my diagnosis,” Gomez says in the clip, posted to TikTok. “What if it happened again? What if the next time, I couldn’t come back? I needed to keep learning about it. I needed to take it day by day.”
“When I was a kid I was terrified of thunderstorms. I grew up in Texas and I was so scared that lightning and thunder would mean a tornado was coming,” she added as clips of her childhood flashed. “But my mom gave me these books for kids that explained storms and lightning and thunder and basically said, ‘The more you learn about it, the less you’re going to be afraid of it.’ And it really helped.”
The documentary — directed by Alek Keshishian — is set to follow Gomez’s life and career over the last six years. “Every breath. A breakthrough,” reads text on the screen during the trailer, in which Gomez is seen teary-eyed or crying in several clips. But as the trailer goes on, her tears eventually turn into smiles and laughter.
“My Mind and Me. We don’t get along sometimes, and it gets hard to breathe,” she captioned the trailer. “But I wouldn’t change my life.”
Gomez first publicly discussed her bipolar diagnosis in 2020 during an Instagram Live with fellow Disney star Miley Cyrus.
“Recently, I went to one of the best mental hospitals in America, McLean Hospital, and I discussed that after years of going through a lot of different things, I realized that I was bipolar,” Gomez told Cyrus. “And so when I got to know more information, it actually helps me. It doesn’t scare me once I know it.”
“I’ve been writing a lot. I think that that’s been helping me process what’s been going on,” said Gomez during the live. “A lot of it is connecting with people that maybe you haven’t been the greatest to that you may not have thought about. I feel like there’s been a lot of people I’ve gotten to do that with not necessarily saying it was bad, but just saying, ‘Hey, I hope you’re safe. I hope you’re doing okay,’ and that you know you’re on my side. I’m only sending you love from this end.”
She later spoke to Elle in 2021 about her mental health, adding that she “felt a huge weight lifted off me” when she was diagnosed. “I could take a deep breath and go, ‘Okay, that explains so much.’”
Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me premieres Nov. 4 on Apple TV+.
