Kiwi pop star Lorde has shared a long life update, including some recent struggles, in a letter to fans.
In a newsletter sent out to fans today, the Solar Power singer - also known as Ella Yelich-O'Connor - confirmed her split with 42-year-old music executive Justin Warren, who she has been linked to since 2015.
The 26-year-old appeared introspective as she reflected on the months spent working in London, and missing her loved ones "like a vitamin I’m deficient in" while struggling with heartbreak.
"I ache all the time, I forget why and then remember. I’m not trying to hide from the pain, I understand now that pain isn’t something to hide from, that there’s actually great beauty in moving with it. But sometimes I’m sick of being with myself."
The Green Light hitmaker also wrote of her health struggles, and her reliance on a "little yellow pill" to push through.
"My body is really inflamed, it’s trying to tell me something and I’m trying to support it but nothing seems to help and I get frustrated. My gut isn’t working properly, my skin is worse than ever, I’ve gotten sick half a dozen times. I realised earlier this year that listening to my body is hard for me, it’s something I never really learned how to do.
"I’ve been trying to teach myself that this year, but it’s been hard actually, pretty confronting, has made me fully aware of all the times I ignored it or didn’t give it what it needed, shamed it for a fight or flight response, took a handful of pills and pushed through.
"The little yellow pill I took every morning for thousands of mornings since I was 15, I stopped taking it 5 days ago. Gonna see how it goes."
She also mused over the trappings of social media and the pursuit of perfection, writing, "I look at arched backs and wet flower mouths, the right bag, the right sunglasses".
"I wonder if it feels as good as it looks, it’s been so long since I chose the best picture from a hundred, lined it up like pulling an arrow taut in a bow, and let it go.
"Everyone looks very thin. Just thinking that makes me feel tired and far away. I’m not sure if it’s having an effect on anyone else. I keep spending money, wondering if what’s in the package will make me feel right, but I guess I buy the wrong things."
The Perfect Places singer said she had "grand plans" to attend Paris Fashion Week when she pulled out earlier this week, writing, "At the start of my career I promised myself I’d never be one of the people in the light smiling if it wasn’t real".
In her extensive letter, Yelich-O'Connor also admitted to consuming "two handfuls of mushrooms" earlier this year, which she described as "solid doses that tasted like green dirt".
She said consuming the hallucinogenic drug allowed her to learn "about what my body had been through in our time so far, what it needed, where God was and where God wasn’t; I felt in my bones how destabilising it is to leave home and start a new life the way I did".
"I also saw that my body is completely magnificent, and that hating it is as futile as hating a tree; that I truly, truly love doing my job, and that my life is like a beautiful tapestry, and every inch of it is precious and has meaning."
She continued: "It might seem funny or be easy to forget, but I make records because I need to. The songs are spells; a spell to let go of something, a spell to unlock a door.
"Every time I put something into words just as I see it, set it to the right music, a knot comes loose in me. But it hurts too, confronting the knots. I’ve made enough records to know that this feeling of my skin coming off is part of it. I know I’m gonna look back on this year with fondness and a bit of awe, knowing it was the year that locked everything into place, the year that transitioned me from my childhood working decade to the one that comes next — one that even through all this, I’m so excited for. It’s just hard when you’re in it."
She concluded with a number of book recommendations including Rough Translations by Molly Giles, "brought into my life by sweet angel bookworm Chris Chang".
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