Little Mix's Jesy Nelson reveals she attempted to take her own life after online abuse

9 September 2019, 12:16

By Jazmin Duribe

"I just remember thinking, 'I just need this to go away, I’m going to end this.'"

Jesy Nelson has opened up about how hurtful comments from trolls led her to attempt to take her own life in new documentary, Jesy Nelson: Odd One Out.

READ MORE: Jesy Nelson: 15 facts about the Little Mix star you probably never knew

The Little Mix star discusses how growing up in the age of social media affects mental health and her own experiences of online abuse. In the documentary, which premieres on 12 September, Jesy revealed that she became obsessed with reading comments about herself and it had a dreadful impact on her mental health.

"I wasn’t known as one of the singers from Little Mix," she said. "I was always known as the fat, ugly one. It literally consumed every part of me."

Sadly, this led to Jesy starving herself before events and photoshoots, and eventually trying to take her own life in November 2013. She added: "I just remember thinking, 'I just need this to go away, I’m going to end this.'

"I remember going to the kitchen and just took as many tablets as I could. Then I laid in bed for ages and kept thinking, 'Let it happen. Hurry up.'"

View this post on Instagram

6 months ago this girl was someone I just wanted to forget. I wanted to erase her from my mind and everyone else’s memory. I didn’t see her as Jesy I saw her as “the fat one from Little Mix”. Up until now I hated her not because she’d ever done anything bad but because I was made to hate her by endless amounts of trolling. Since filming my documentary for @bbcone and @bbcthree I’ve learned so much more than I ever expected to. Thanks to all the inspirational people I’ve met on this emotional journey, I now love the girl in this photo. I’ve made this documentary for 2011 Jesy and for anyone who might be feeling like she did. I refused to speak about how I was feeling for so long. I was embarrassed and scared to. But I was so wrong to feel that way. Please if you are feeling how I did, SPEAK ABOUT IT. Talk to your family, speak to your friends, there’s always help out there. If you’d have told that girl one day you won’t feel sad anymore, I’d never have believed you....and here I am. Now when I look in the mirror, I don’t see Jesy the fat one, I see Jesy the happy one!

A post shared by @ jesynelson on Jul 30, 2019 at 5:18am PDT

Luckily, Jesy was saved by her boyfriend at the time who called an ambulance. And thankfully, Jesy is now a lot healthier and happier after a dancer urged her to delete Twitter.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by @jesynelson on Sep 8, 2019 at 11:11am PDT

She continued: "Now I’m mentally a lot happier, I just think people are always going to have an opinion. But I only care about mine."

For confidential help and support contact the Samaritans on 116 123 (UK) or 1 (800) 273-TALK (US).