Bella Hadid Says Victoria's Secret Never Made Her Feel ‘Powerful’
It’s not all that rare to see Bella Hadid, one of the highest paid models of her generation, in lingerie. But at the Vogue Fashion Festival in Paris on Friday, she admitted that she never felt comfortable until walking in Rihanna’s epic Savage x Fenty show this September. “That was the first time on a runway that I felt really sexy. Because when I first did Fenty, I was doing other lingerie shows and I never felt powerful on a runway, like, in my underwear,” she said per WWD.
Hadid, who has walked the runway for Victoria’s Secret three times, shared that she’s struggled with mental health issues for years. “For a while I just didn’t want to talk about it, and I’ve gone through a lot in the past few years with my health,” she said. “I feel guilty for being able to live this incredible life, have the opportunities that I do, but somehow still be depressed. It doesn’t make sense.”
Her point is powerful and important: Mental health issues like depression and anxiety don’t discriminate. Success doesn’t make you immune.
“I would cry every single morning, I would cry during my lunch breaks, I would cry before I slept. I was very emotionally unstable for a while when I was working 14-hour days for four months straight as an 18-year-old,” she said. “I think I just wanted to breathe a little bit. And so it kind of put me in a spiral.”
Last month, in honor of World Mental Health Day, Hadid alluded to struggling with her mental health to her followers on Instagram. “Being kind and protective to yourself and your energy is something I’ve learned to be helpful. When the world feels like it is collapsing around you, you are allowed to ask for help,” she wrote. “You do not have to deal w/ your mental state alone.”
At the panel on Friday, the 23-year-old model shared that she’s in a better place—and that she wants to help destigmatize mental health issues. “I feel like I would be doing a disservice to myself if I didn’t speak about something such as mental health, because that’s pretty much what I’ve been going through for the past five years very intensely,” she said. “Now we’re here and we’re good, but it took a while.”