https://www.facebook.com/100006731236998/videos/1977220665845622/
Singer Sinead O’Connor, who has been vocal about mental illness in the past, posted a desperate video to Facebook on Thursday about her situation. She’s living in a motel in New Jersey and staying alive for the sake of others, she said. The video was hashtagged #OneOfMillions.
“I’m now living in a Travelodge hotel in the arse end of New Jersey. I’m all by myself and there’s absolutely nobody in my life except my doctor, my psychiatrist — the sweetest man on Earth who says I’m his hero. That’s about the only thing keeping me alive at the moment. The fact that I’m his bloody hero. And that’s kind of pathetic.”
She added: “I’m fighting, fighting, fighting, fighting like all the millions and millions that I know I’m one of to stay alive every day.”
South Hackensack Police Capt. Robert Kaiser said Tuesday that officers conducted a welfare check, but O’Connor wasn’t in her room at the time. He said she is no longer staying there and police don’t know where she is currently living. An email sent to her agent wasn’t immediately returned.
A Facebook post on Monday from an unknown person said the singer was safe and not suicidal.
In O’Connor’s video, she spoke about the devastating effect mental illness and its stigma has had on her:
“Mental illness is a bit like drugs. It doesn’t give a sh*t who you are. Equally you know what’s worse is the stigma who doesn’t give a sh*t who you are. All the people who are supposed to be loving you and taking care of you are treating you like sh*t…I’m fighting like all the millions I know to stay alive everyday which I’m doing because I love the people that are doing this to me. I’m not staying alive for me. If it was me I’d be gone straight away back to my mom because I walked this Earth alone for two years as punishment for being mentally f**king ill and being angry that nobody would f**king take care of me, specifically for being suicidal.”
O’Connor made national headlines in May 2016 after going missing on a bike ride, and in November 2015 was given medical assistance after posting on Facebook that she had taken an overdose.
