When Liam Payne revealed mental health struggles, battle with alcohol
Liam Payne, the former member of the globally acclaimed boy band One Direction, has tragically died at 31. The singer's death was confirmed by Policia Federal Argentina to PEOPLE after he fell from a balcony at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel in Buenos Aires on Wednesday. The circumstances surrounding his death are currently under investigation. Payne had always been vocal about his struggles with mental health and his alcohol dependence. Let's revisit the times he spoke about it.
Payne's public struggle with mental health and addiction
In a 2019 interview with Men's Health Australia, he opened up about using alcohol as a coping mechanism for the overwhelming fame that came with One Direction. He said, "It's difficult when you have the level of fame that we had in the band." "There have been a lot of people in trouble with mental health that aren't really getting the help that they need, and I think that's a bit of a problem in our industry."
'Where's rock bottom for me?'
Payne said, "I was [drunk] quite a lot of the time because there was no other way to get your head around what was going on." On The Diary of a CEO podcast in 2021, he revealed having suicidal thoughts, "I was worried how far my rock bottom was going to be. Where's rock bottom for me? No one would ever have seen it." "It was really, really, really severe. And it was a problem."
Payne's recovery and journey toward sobriety
In July 2023, Payne announced he was celebrating six months of sobriety and had spent nearly 100 days at a rehab facility in Louisiana. "I just feel like I've got more of a grip on life and everything that was getting away from me. I've got more of a handle on it." "I just needed to take a little bit of time out for myself, actually, because I kind of became somebody who I didn't really recognize anymore."
One Direction's journey and eventual hiatus
One Direction, which included Payne, Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan, and Louis Tomlinson, shot to fame after competing on The X-Factor in 2010. Malik departed the band in 2015 and the group subsequently announced an indefinite hiatus. Looking back at their time together, Malik told Call Me Daddy's Alex Cooper in 2023 that there were "underlying issues within our friendships" but he now looks back at those experiences "in a much fonder light."
