Paramore’s Hayley Williams opened up about mental health in a candid Instagram post.
Hayley Williams is taking a break from social media. The lead singer of Paramore announced Saturday that she will be focusing on her side project, Good Dye Young, a line of vegan and cruelty-free hair products, in lieu of posting on Instagram and Twitter.
“Hey friends. It’s holiday season… but I’m working a lot from home,” she said in a lengthy collage-style message on Instagram. “There’s… a lot… going on. It’s exciting and it’s also a lot.”
While she is taking “another extended break” from social media, she will be managing Good Dye Young’s social media accounts, she assured fans.
“I am careful not to sensationalize issues around mental health as it’s such a sensitive and very layered conversation for every individual,” she continued in her Instagram post.
Williams confessed that she “could never fully admit to nor bring myself to go get a true diagnosis for my own issues until recently.”
“I’m working really hard on getting strong for myself. I am so grateful to people who have kept this conversation safe and sacred for me in the last couple of years.”
With the release of the album After Laughter in the spring of 2017, after a dry spell since 2013, Williams revealed that her mental health had suffered for a while as a young artist in the public eye.
“I don’t feel as hopeful as I did as a teenager. For the first time in my life, there wasn’t a pinhole of light at the end of the tunnel. I thought, I just wish everything would stop,” she said in a Fader interview.
But with the release of After Laughter, Williams said she’s moving on from feeling hopeless. “[After Laughter] helps me mark this time as a significant turning point in my life. I’m noticing similar movement in my friends’ lives too,” she said in Paper Magazine earlier this year. “More presence and awareness. More tenderness. I’m alive to both pain and joy now. I have my old laugh back, as my mom says… And only a couple years ago, I had hoped I’d die.”
Williams urged fans to take mental health seriously. “It’s important to do what you can to find a solution that works for you. Be it therapy, medication, fighting the tendency to isolate and asking people you trust to keep you accountable,” she said in her recent Instagram post.
The singer-songwriter said that she’s done feeling “okay” and ventured to want more for herself. “I know it is very popular to say ‘it’s okay to not be okay,’ but please give me the grace to admit that as I am quickly approaching 30 I am just not okay with not being okay anymore,” she said. “I am interested in living out a much more fulfilling life than just ‘okay’ could ever offer. I think that you are worth more than ‘okay’ has to offer too.”
“Please take care of yourselves and try to believe that you are worth more than just ‘okay’ or ‘been better’ or ‘can’t complain.’ I think we are all worth experiencing joy. We are worth feeling hope.”
