Lady Gaga and Oprah Both Break Down in Tears After Singer Reveals She Developed PTSD After Being ‘Raped Repeatedly’

Lady Gaga opened up about her history of sexual abuse in a new interview with Oprah, and the powerful conversation drove them both to tears. The singer said that she suffered many sexual assaults, and as a result she suffers Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Lady Gaga is now an advocate for mental health care.

Lady Gaga was the first guest on Oprah Winfrey‘s 2020 Vision: Your Life in Focus Tour on Saturday. They spoke in front of a live crowd of about 15,000 people in Florida, according to a report by The Daily Mail, and Gaga had the whole room teary-eyed with her heartbreaking story.

“I was raped repeatedly when I was 19 years old, and I also developed PTSD as a result of being raped and also not processing that trauma,” she said.

Lady Gaga now suffers from fibromyalgia, leaving her in excruciating pain at times, and she revealed that it may be related to her PTSD.

“I all of a sudden became a star and was traveling the world going from hotel room to garage to limo to stage, and I never dealt with it, and then all of a sudden I started to experience this incredible intense pain throughout my entire body that mimicked the illness I felt after I was raped,” she said.

Gaga said that she hopes to see mental health treatment pushed a solution to fibromyalgia more often.

“What’s interesting about it is that I’ve found through neuropsych research and my relationship with my doctors that fibromyalgia can be treated through mental health therapy,” she said. “And mental health is a medical condition, it should be treated as a medical condition. It should not be ignored,” she said.

After the tearful on-stage encounter, Winfrey found Lady Gaga backstage, where she praised her honesty.

“You were so amazing. You were so good. You were so vulnerable, you were so real, I couldn’t even believe you were doing that. I was like, ‘Am I hearing correctly?’ Oh my you were so real,” Winfrey said.

“You were so good, so strong, so you, it was so good. Thank you for doing that for me.”

“Of course, that’s what happens when you’re in the presence of an angel,” Gaga responded.

“To be the truth that way, nobody does that, and you know that, nobody does that. Nobody does that. And you just did it in front of all those people,” Winfrey said.

Winfrey’s talk show tour continues with long-form interview around the country. The next stop is on Saturday in Saint Paul, Minnesota.