This post contains mentions of sexual assault and self harm and might be triggering to some readers.
Lady Gaga has shared traumatic details about a sexual assault she experienced at 19 years old.
In the first episode of Oprah Winfrey and Prince Harry's new Apple TV+ docuseries, The Me You Can't See, the singer and actress opened up about being raped by a music producer as a teenager.
The now 35-year-old also shared that she later found out she was pregnant after the assault.
Watch the trailer for The Me You Can't See below. Post continues after video.
"I was 19 years old, and I was working in the business, and a producer said to me, 'Take your clothes off,'" she said.
"I said no. And I left, and they told me they were going to burn all my music. And they didn't stop. They didn't stop asking me, and then I just froze and I just... I don't even remember," she continued.
"The person who raped me dropped me off pregnant on a corner."
Gaga, whose real name is Stefani Germanotta, shared that the chronic pain she still lives with today feels the same as what she experienced after the sexual assault.
"First, I felt full-on pain, then I went numb, and then I was sick for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks after," she said.
"And then I realised it was the same pain that I felt when the person who raped me dropped me off pregnant on a corner at my parents' house because I was vomiting and sick."
Gaga said she would never name the producer who did it, adding: "I do not ever want to face that person again."
Years after the assault, in 2018, the singer hit a breaking point.
"I had a total psychotic break, and for a couple years, I was not the same girl," she said. It was at this point, she cancelled the remainder of her Joanne World Tour.
Gaga first talked about the incident during a chat with radio DJ Howard Stern in 2014.
A year later, she said: "I didn’t tell anyone for I think seven years. I didn’t know how to accept it. I didn’t know how to not blame myself or think it was my fault. It changed who I was completely. It changed my body, it changed thoughts."
She's also spoken in the past about her chronic illness diagnosis, fibromyalgia.
"I get so irritated with people who don’t believe fibromyalgia is real," the singer told Vogue in 2018.
"For me, and I think for many others, it’s really a cyclone of anxiety, depression, PTSD, trauma, and panic disorder, all of which sends the nervous system into overdrive, and then you have nerve pain as a result."
During her latest interview with Oprah Winfrey, Gaga reinforced the pain she now experiences reflects the assault.
"The way that I feel when I feel pain is how I felt after I was raped," she said. "They don't find nothing, but your body remembers."
If this post brings up any issues for you, or if you just feel like you need to speak to someone, please call 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732) – the national sexual assault, domestic and family violence counselling service. It doesn’t matter where you live, they will take your call and, if need be, refer you to a service closer to home.
You can also call safe steps 24/7 Family Violence Response Line on 1800 015 188 or visit www.safesteps.org.au for further information.
The Me You Can't See is available to watch on Apple TV+ now.
Feature Image: Getty.