Anxiety can affect anyone — even people awash in fame and money — as these celebrities who have talked candidly about their mental health issues prove.
Reviewed: October 28, 2022
Anxiety disorders
affect an estimated 301 million people around the world, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), and celebrities are far from immune. In fact, anxiety is fairly commonplace in Hollywood and among others in the spotlight given the demanding nature of their professions. Creatives and athletes are often under extreme pressure to
reproduce the same or better caliber work that catapulted them to fame in the first place, all while under an increasingly critical public eye. Contractual agreements and strict deadlines with record labels, producers, coaches, and others can lead artists and sports stars to repeatedly emphasize performance over their health and well-being. Add to that their erratic schedules — long hours on set, late-night concerts, demanding itineraries, and grueling practices — and it’s no
wonder that anxiety is common among the glitterati. The good news: By coming to understand their conditions (often with the help of mental health professionals), the following celebrities — who live with various types of anxiety, including generalized anxiety
disorder and panic disorder — have been able to manage their anxiety and continue to thrive in their careers.Prince Harry, Amanda Seyfried, and Megan Thee Stallion have all opened up about living with anxiety.
31Megan Thee Stallion, Rapper
In her 2022 song “Anxiety,” Megan Thee Stallion opened up about being a “bad b*tch” with “bad anxiety”: “All I really wanna hear is 'It'll be okay.' Bounce back 'cause a bad b*tch can have bad days.”
Losing both parents — her father when she was in ninth grade and her mother in 2019 — helped the Grammy Award–winning artist realize she needed to seek mental health support.
“Now in this space, I've lost both of my parents. So now I'm like, ‘Oh, my gosh, who do I talk to? What do I do?’ And I just started learning that it’s okay to ask for help. And it’s okay to want to go get therapy,” the “Her” rapper said during the season premiere of actor Taraji P. Henson's Facebook Watch series, Peace of Mind With Taraji.
It also led her to launch a mental health resources website, Bad B*tches Have Bad Days Too in August 2022. The website offers links to therapy platforms, hotlines, and resources for people in specific communities, including LGBTQ+ communities and Black communities.
32Jonah Hill, Actor and Filmmaker
A series of anxiety attacks caused Jonah Hill to announce in August 2022 that he was stepping back from promoting his films, including a mental health documentary about himself and his therapist, called Stutz.
“I am so grateful that the film will make its world premiere at a prestigious film festival this fall, and I can’t wait to share it with audiences around the world in the hope that it will help those struggling. However, you won’t see me out there promoting this film, or any of my upcoming films, while I take this important step to protect myself,” said Hill in a statement issued to Deadline. “If I made myself sicker by going out there and promoting it, I wouldn’t be acting true to myself or to the film.”
33Kendall Jenner, Reality TV Star
In a four-part interview with Vogue, Kendall Jenner spoke openly about what it’s like to live with anxiety. “I remember being really young and having shortness of breath and going to my mom and telling her,” said Jenner. “In hindsight now I know that that was obviously anxiety.”
Now when Jenner finds herself struggling with anxiety — including social anxiety (a fear of being watched and judged by others) — she turns to strategies proven to help her face the day with “a calmer, more positive mindset,” she explained in an April 2022 Instagram post. Some of those go-to strategies, Jenner wrote, are deep breathing, journaling, practicing gratitude, and being outside in the sun.
34Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex
Shortly after the death of his mother, Princess Diana of Wales, in 1997, Prince Harry experienced severe anxiety and panic attacks. "Before I even left the house [for royal engagements], I was pouring with sweat and my heart was racing. I was in the fight-or-flight mode," Harry disclosed in the docuseries The Me You Can't See on Apple TV+.
That led the young royal to turn to substances to try and cope with his overwhelming emotions. “I was willing to drink, I was willing to take drugs, I was willing to try and do the things that made me feel less like I was feeling," he explained. "I would probably drink a week's worth in one day on a Friday or a Saturday night."
Spending 10 years in the British Army brought the prince solace because it allowed him to escape constant media coverage of his life, he said in an interview with Vanity Fair published in April 2022.
After marrying at age 33, Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle, stepped back from representing the Queen at official engagements in January 2020, and later moved to California. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey that aired in March 2021, the couple explained those decisions stemmed from the negative mental health impact of serving as working royals, as well as hurtful media coverage of their family.
35Selena Gomez, Singer and Actress
When pop star Selena Gomez took a career break in 2016, it was because of panic attacks, depression, and anxiety connected to having been diagnosed with lupus, according to People. Then, in October 2018, People reported that she had sought treatment for her mental health after suffering a panic attack while in the hospital for a low white blood cell count — a complication often associated with kidney transplants and people with lupus. (Gomez had received a kidney transplant in the summer of 2017 from her best friend, Francia Raisa.)
Earlier, in 2018, she spoke to Harper's Bazaar about why she was taking her time creating new music. "I’ve had a lot of issues with depression and anxiety, and I’ve been very vocal about it, but it’s not something I feel I’ll ever overcome," she said. "I want to make sure I’m healthy. If that’s good, everything else will fall into place."
More recently, in a 2022 Apple TV+ documentary titled Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me, she went into detail about her years of treatment for both physical and mental health issues. “I’m a little nervous but excited to share this with you all,” Gomez wrote on Instagram just days before the release of the trailer for the film in October.
In addition, the "Only Murders in the Building" star has been seeking to normalize conversations about mental health through her platform, WonderMind, which she cofounded in 2021.
36Marcus Morris, Professional Basketball Player
Los Angeles Clippers small forward Marcus Morris grew up in a North Philadelphia neighborhood filled with gang violence, an environment that contributed to his anxiety and depression, he says.
"I've seen guys get shot just for sitting on the wrong front step,” Morris divulged in a 2018 interview with ESPN. “You wake up every day thinking, 'How am I going to protect myself?'"
Throughout high school, Morris and his identical twin brother, Markieff, excelled at basketball. But after joining the NBA in 2011, and then jumping from team to team, he began feeling increasingly anxious about his play. Soon, he found himself trying to self-medicate anxiety away with sleeping pills and marijuana — to no avail.
After seeing a mental health therapist, Morris begin to feel calmer, happier, and more productive. He also relies on daily meditation to help him feel centered — focused on the present moment and in control of his emotions, even in stressful situations.
37Lady
Gaga, Singer, Songwriter, and Actress
The "Shallow" singer was frank about her mental health issues in a 2015 interview with Billboard. “I’ve suffered through depression and anxiety my entire life; I still suffer with it every single day,” Gaga said.
“I openly admit to having battled [both] and I think a lot of people do,” Gaga told the British newspaper The Mirror in 2016. “I think it’s better when we all say: ‘Cheers!’ And ‘fess up to it.”
In 2012, the Grammy Award–winning artist, born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, created the Born This Way Foundation to build empowered communities and improve mental health resources for young adults. The foundation’s mission is “to build a kinder and braver world,” said Gaga in a video on the foundation’s website.
38Ariana Grande, Singer
Following a bombing during her Manchester Arena concert in May 2017, as reported by History.com, Ariana Grande experienced symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), according to a British Vogue cover story in which she also revealed “I’ve always had anxiety.”
But that anxiety — along with depression — reached “an all-time high” in 2019, when a bout of panic attacks led her to cancel a meet-and-greet before a performance in Belgium. “I have been giving you all I’ve got and trying to push through as hard as I can and mask it,” she said in a statement.
In 2021, the “Breathin’” singer announced a collaboration with Betterhelp, a virtual therapy platform, to give away $1 million worth of therapy. “I so hope that this will be a helpful starting point and that you’ll be able to build space for this in your lives and continue!” Grande wrote in a post on Instagram. “Healing is not linear or easy, but you are worth the effort and time, I promise!”
39Gina Rodriguez,
Actress
In 2017, the Jane the Virgin star took a silent, makeup-free video of herself for her photographer friend Anton Soggiu's “Ten Second Portraits” project on Instagram, which has been reposted on ETonline.
"I suffer from anxiety. And watching this clip, I could see how anxious I was. But I empathize with myself," Rodriguez wrote on Instagram. "I wanted to protect her and tell her it’s okay to be anxious, there is nothing different or strange about having anxiety and I will prevail. I like watching this video. It makes me uncomfortable, but there is a freedom I feel, maybe even an acceptance. This is me. Puro Gina."
40Kim Kardashian, Reality TV Star
In a 2016 episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians, fashion mogul and reality TV icon Kim Kardashian opened up about her anxiety, particularly around car crashes, and said she had started seeing a therapist.
Her younger sister Kendall Jenner also struggles with anxiety and sleep paralysis, and in the same episode, they attend a meditation class together, as reported by Us, as a way of easing their symptoms.
Just a month prior to that episode, Kardashian had been bound and held at gunpoint in a Paris hotel room. “I definitely get a lot more anxiety today, simply with people knowing your every move,” Kardashian told T: The New York Times Style Magazine Singapore in a September 2017 interview.
Kardashian felt the robbery in Paris, as well as quarantining during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, led her to develop agoraphobia — an anxiety disorder involving extreme fear of entering open or crowded places, leaving one’s home, or being in a place that’s difficult to escape — according to the Independent newspaper.
41Emma Stone, Actress
During an interview at the Child Mind Institute in October 2018, the actress divulged that she had had her first panic attack as a 7-year-old.
"I was at a friend's house, and all of a sudden I was absolutely convinced the house was on fire and it was burning down,” Stone recalled. “I was just sitting in her bedroom and obviously the house wasn't on fire, but there was nothing in me that didn't think we were going to die."
Soon after that first panic attack, Stone started seeing a therapist who diagnosed her with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). To this day, she says she still has panic attacks but seeing a therapist, meditating, and reaching out to people instead of staying isolated helps her cope.
"You don't have to be an actor to get over anxiety, you don't have to be a writer to overcome it. You just have to find what that thing is within you that you are drawn to," Stone said.
42Whoopi Goldberg, Actress, Comedian, and TV Host
The comedian and cohost of The View is so fearful of flying that for decades she traveled by private bus from New York to Los Angeles rather than step foot on a plane, according to BET.
Goldberg’s condition (aerophobia) began as a child, then intensified after she saw two planes collide mid-air while standing on a balcony in San Diego more than 30 years ago, she explained in a 2011 CNN interview.
Aerophobia is a form of anxiety known as a specific phobia, an uncontrollable, irrational fear of a particular object or situation. Treatment for phobias usually includes cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and exposure therapy, a specific type of CBT that helps people learn to face their fears, per experts at Johns Hopkins Medicine. Medication may be an option in some cases, but it’s not usually recommended to treat phobias because talk therapy is usually effective enough, according to the U.K. National Health Service.
To overcome her fear, Goldberg went for the second option: She took a Virgin Atlantic course designed to help people work through their issues with flying, CNN reported. And in May 2022, she announced she’d flown for the first time in years to Scotland and back, according to Yahoo Finance.
"Some people are meant to fly. And I don't know if I was meant to fly, but I do it now," she said.
43Mardy Fish, Former Professional Tennis Player Turned Golfer
During the 2012 U.S. Open, tennis player Mardy Fish withdrew from the tournament for “health reasons,” according to USA Today. Later it was revealed that he’d been living with a severe anxiety disorder that included panic attacks, sleepless nights, and days spent in isolation.
Fortunately, after Fish’s psychiatrist prescribed him medication, he began to feel relief. Fish has since retired from tennis and says that anxiety is no longer an enemy.
“I was in bad shape, and I got out of it and thrived,” Fish explained to Golf Digest in an article posted online March 16, 2022. “It’s not something that will go away for good, but I have really good days almost every day.”
44Kesha, Singer and Songwriter
"I've battled a lot of things, including anxiety and depression," the Grammy nominee revealed to Billboard magazine in 2016. “Finding the strength to come forward about those things is not easy. But maybe, by telling my story, I can help someone else going through tough times.”
The following year, in November, Kesha penned an article for Time magazine describing how hard holidays can be when you have a mental illness like anxiety. “The holiday season is supposed to be the most festive and fun time of the year but sometimes it can quickly become a stressful and emotional time,” she wrote. “This is especially true for those of us who struggle with mental illness — be it depression, anxiety, addiction or any other challenges.”
Her anxiety has not gone away, but Kesha reported in an interview on Refinery 29 that she has learned ways to cope with it: “I go through waves of intense anxiety and then there are moments where I just take a bubble bath and do a face mask and try to relax and accept. None of us really know how to cope with this, so it’s helped me to realize that we're all experiencing a roller coaster of emotions — and that's okay.”
45Amanda Seyfried, Actress
“Yeah. I’m on Lexapro, and I’ll never get off of it,” the actress told Allure magazine in 2016, referring to the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) commonly prescribed to treat generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and depression.
“I’ve been on it since I was 19, so 11 years. I’m on the lowest dose. I don’t see the point of getting off of it,” said Seyfried, who Time magazine named one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2022. “Whether it’s placebo or not, I don’t want to risk it. And what are you fighting against? Just the stigma of using a tool? A mental illness is a thing that people cast in a different category [from other illnesses], but I don’t think it is. It should be taken as seriously as anything else.”
The Mamma Mia! and Les Miserables star has also been open about her obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which shares characteristics with anxiety disorders.
"You don’t see the mental illness: It’s not a mass; it’s not a cyst. But it’s there,” she continued in the interview with Allure. “Why do you need to prove it? If you can treat it, you treat it. I had pretty bad health anxiety that came from the OCD and thought I had a tumor in my brain. I had an MRI, and the neurologist referred me to a psychiatrist. As I get older, the compulsive thoughts and fears have diminished a lot. Knowing that a lot of my fears are not reality-based really helps.”
46Lena Dunham, Writer, Actress, and Producer
The Girls executive producer, director, and writer has had her fair share of firsthand experiences with GAD and OCD. In fact, she has written about it extensively in her show, as well as in her memoir Not That Kind of Girl and in a detailed account of her childhood therapy sessions for The New Yorker.
“I don’t remember a time not being anxious,” she declared to a panel at NewYork-Presbyterian's Youth Anxiety Center in February 2017, reported Vogue.
“I would tell my younger self to squeeze my dog tightly and to read a book and to meditate and breathe,” Dunham told People, also in 2017. “And to understand that I’m not alone; that there are so many other kids like me who are suffering this way and the greatest thing I can do for them and myself is to be honest.”
In 2020, People reported that Dunham had told her three million followers that she’d found relief from her anxiety symptoms through exercise. “To those struggling with anxiety, OCD, depression: I know it’s mad annoying when people tell you to exercise, and it took me about 16 medicated years to listen,” she wrote. “I’m glad I did. It ain’t about the a**, it’s about the brain.”
Additional reporting by Christina Vogt.