Katy Perry recalls being 'ashamed' about taking medication for depression

Singer says she thought: 'I'm Katy Perry. I wrote Firework. I'm on medication. This is f***ed up'

Katy Perry has opened up about her experiences with depression as an artist, and what it felt like being prescribed medication for the first time.

Speaking with Apple Music's Zane Lowe, the singer recalled the relationship she used to have with her pain and her ability to create music, and how that relationship changed as she got older.

“The older you get, the more real life gets and the harder it gets to hold onto the pain that helped you create. No longer is that pain helping you create songs,” Perry said. “It's just tormenting your mind, at that point, especially in your 30s, when just life, things start to ache. Your body starts to not function. Your metabolism goes south.

“All things start to change in your 30s, but there's so much clarity that comes from it as well. I was getting pretty high off my own supply for a long time, and then it just didn't work after Witness.”

According to Perry, following the release of her fifth album, she realised that her pain and experiences were no longer helping her as an artist.

“I realised: 'Oh my God. I have given so much power out for validation and acceptance and love, and now it's not coming back to me.' I used to really be able to fix my depression or my bouts of depression by just going: 'I'm going to write a freaking song,' or, 'I'm going to do this. So blah, blah, blah. I'm going to whatever. I'll leave you in the dust. You break up with me, I'll show you. Here's a number one,’” the Firework singer told Lowe, adding that it eventually “didn't work anymore”.

At the time, Perry said “everything changed" and she felt that the “world didn’t want to hear from me anymore at that moment,” a point in her life she says she became “clinically depressed”.

“I just couldn't get out of bed for weeks and became clinically depressed and had to get on medication for the first time in my life,” she recalled, adding that she was “ashamed” to be on medication for her mental health.

“I was so ashamed of it. I was like: 'I'm Katy Perry. I wrote Firework. I'm on medication. This is f***ed up.'”

However, according to the singer, who is releasing her upcoming album Smile this month and is currently pregnant with her and fiancé Orlando Bloom’s first child together, the last two and a half years have helped her see things differently and learn how to quiet the negative thoughts in her brain.

She is also grateful for the “pain", as it led her towards growth.

“I'm grateful for the pain because it pushed me towards the growth,” she said. “Now I don’t feel like a thirsty, desperate pop star that's just trying to hit a number. I've got more dimension. I have a baby on the way. I have a fiancé. I love my nieces. I love my soon-to-be stepson. I love life.”