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After spending most of her life in the limelight, Keke Palmer knows a thing or two about the pitfalls of fame. The actress and singer opened up about her battle with depression and anxiety in the third part of her exclusive interview with TheGrio and shed some light on why she believes mental health issues continue to be overlooked in the black community.
“When I was around 16 or 17 I really found myself struggling with anxiety and depression,” she reveals. “A lot of times people think it’s a black and white thing but really it’s a resource and a class system thing. There are a lot of black people who can afford a therapist or have the education to know what they should be doing for themselves, but we don’t get to see those people,” she says. “What’s happening with the money? Where’s the money going? Is it really helping the people it needs to help? Is everybody able to get what they need to get?”
According to Keke, plenty of mental health issues stem from poverty plaguing the black community.
“Really the issue is money. People don’t have the money to be able to find their way out of ignorance to say, ‘Wait a minute. My mind is just as important as my body…Let me talk things through about how I feel. Let me communicate positively to my children so they can feel confident when they grow up.'”
Keke Palmer believes the problem of poverty extends from mental health to education.
“The issue is people not being able to have the proper finances to get the type of help ad the education they need. The fact that education; to understand what you need to understand in life is based off if you can pay enough for school; so that means if you don’t have enough money to get knowledge then you’re supposed to be dumb all your life? That’s crazy.”
Check out the full interview above.