Mental health comes first. Mel B “will continue to get treatment” for her battle with post-traumatic stress disorder, a source close to the former Spice Girls member tells Us Weekly exclusively.
“[She] would like to emphasize she isn’t going to rehab,” the insider clarifies. “It’s not rehab or even a clinic. It’s all outpatient.”
The source adds that Mel B’s recent statement to The Sun — in which she was quoted as saying she “made the decision to go into a proper therapy program” — was “misunderstood or misquoted.”
The America’s Got Talent judge, 43, revealed to the U.K. newspaper on Saturday, August 25, that she was recently diagnosed with PTSD after an “incredibly difficult” six months. Her father, Martin Brown, died in March 2017 after battling cancer, and she finalized her bitter divorce from Stephen Belafonte nine months later.
“I’ve been working with a writer on my book, Brutally Honest, and it has been unbelievably traumatic reliving an emotionally abusive relationship and confronting so many massive issues in my life, from the death of my dad to my relationship with men,” she purportedly said in the statement. “I am being very honest in my book about drinking to numb my pain, but that is just a way a lot of people mask what is really going on. Sometimes it is too hard to cope with all the emotions I feel.”
Mel B further clarified her statement during an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on Tuesday, August 28. “It kind of got a bit skewered with,” she said. “I’ve been in therapy since my father got diagnosed with cancer nine years ago.”
She continued, “My therapy a changed a little bit because I was in a very intense relationship. … But no, I’m not an alcoholic. No, I’m not a sex addict. … I did have to ease my pain. I do suffer a lot from PTSD.”
