Famous singer Ed Sheeran revealed in an emotional Wednesday Instagram message that his wife was diagnosed with a tumor during her pregnancy.
The artist wrote a heartfelt post that described the toll that the stress had on his emotional and mental well-being. The excitement of expecting a child with his wife was marred by the horrifying news that she had a tumor for which she was unable to seek treatment until her baby was born.
“Within the space of a month, my pregnant wife got told she had a tumour, with no route to treatment until after the birth,” Sheeran wrote in the post.
View this post on Instagram
Sheeran went on to discuss the trying times he faced over the course of the past year, and added that the potentially life-altering diagnosis his wife received was devastating on its own, but it wasn’t the only painful issue he was forced to contend with.
“My best friend Jamal, a brother to me, died suddenly, and I found myself standing in court defending my integrity and career as a songwriter,” Sheeran wrote.
“I was spiralling through fear, depression and anxiety. I felt like I was drowning, head below the surface, looking up but not being able to break through for air,” he said.
Sheeran described what it was like to create an album during this tumultuous time in his life.
“I had been working on Subtract for a decade, trying to sculpt the perfect acoustic album, writing and recording hundreds of songs with a clear vision of what I thought it should be,” he said.
“Then at the start of 2022, a series of events changed my life, my mental health, and ultimately the way I viewed music and art,” Sheeran added. “Writing songs is my therapy. It helps me make sense of my feelings. I wrote without thought of what the songs would be, I just wrote whatever tumbled out.”
“And in just over a week I replaced a decade’s worth of work with my deepest darkest thoughts,” Sheeran wrote. (RELATED: Long List Of Artists Reportedly Turn Down Offers To Perform At King Charles’ Coronation)
View this post on Instagram
Sheeran candidly spoke of his thought process during this experience.
“As an artist I didn’t feel like I could credibly put a body of work into the world that didn’t accurately represent where I am and how I need to express myself at this point in my life. This album is purely that,” he said.
“It’s opening the trapdoor into my soul. For the first time, I’m not trying to craft an album people will like, I’m merely putting something out that’s honest and true to where I am in my adult life,” he added.
He concluded his message by saying, “[t]his is last February’s diary entry and my way of making sense of it. This is Subtract.”
The album is set for release on May 5.