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'It's been hard': Rachel Platten opens up about postpartum anxiety struggle

The singer revealed she's had sleepless nights and hours spent crying.
/ Source: TODAY

Just because others might think you look fabulous, doesn’t always mean you feel fabulous — and that’s what songstress Rachel Platten wants her fans to know.

The “Fight Song” singer has been open on social media about the ups and downs of motherhood since welcoming her baby girl, Violet Skye Lazan, in January. But on Sunday, she got even more honest, taking to Instagram to share her struggle with postpartum anxiety.

“I’ve cried a lot in green rooms, cried through feedings, cried huddled on the bus knowing I have months of this to go wondering what on earth I got myself into with an infant?” she wrote next to a selfie that appears sexy and confident, which she explained is not how she actually feels.

Platten went on to say she hasn’t been getting a lot of sleep on tour, even though her daughter sleeps through the night.

“And when I’m feeling the absolute lowest i tend to isolate,” she continued. “It feels too big to share with a friend and i feel like no friends really want to deal with all of my big feelings anyway.”

But this time, she reached out to someone and it made all the difference.

“Friends are our life support when you feel like you are drowning,” she wrote. “If you’re like me, hiding when things get too dark, please don’t, please REACH OUT.”

Platten used her post to encourage others to share and vent in the comments. “I’ll do my best to see all of you and give you my love,” she wrote, adding that the reason she’s talking about the “bad stuff” is so that she can show new mamas know “that this stuff is real and ok and normal and healthy.”

Fans appreciated her message and many took to the comments and shared their own stories.

“I needed this,” one person wrote. “Seriously. You are such a pure and kind person. Thank you for this.”

Platten isn’t the only celebrity to open up about her postpartum disorder. Behati Prinsloo, who has two daughters with Maroon 5’s Adam Levine, recently revealed that she had postpartum depression after her first child.

Chrissy Teigen has also been vocal about her experience with the condition.

While the awareness around postpartum depression has increased in the last few years, often less talked about is postpartum anxiety. Anywhere from 15 percent to 20 percent of women experience these disorders — and some women experience both at the same time, according to Dr. Priya Gopalan, chief of psychiatry at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital in Pittsburgh.

Many moms are thankful to Platten for bringing awareness to this disorder. “It took me years to figure out my anxiety wasn't a normal thing,” one woman commented on Platten’s post. “I thought it was a new aspect of motherhood I needed to navigate on my own.”

But as Platten reminded everyone, it’s not something you have to take on by yourself.

For more information and resources, visit Postpartum Support International or call the 24-hour, national hotline at 1-800-944-4773. If you or someone you know are having thoughts about suicide or harming yourself please callthe National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).