- Willow Smith revealed on "The YUNGBLUD podcast" that she had an anxiety attack "on set" at the age of 10.
- She said that an appearance on "The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon" gave her a flashback to the attack.
- She said that everyone around her at the time of the attack thought she was having a "tantrum."
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Willow Smith said that her recent performance on "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" triggered flashbacks to an anxiety attack she had as a kid.
"I was doing the Jimmy Fallon performance and I had a flashback of being, like, 10 or 9 and, like, having an anxiety attack on set, and basically feeling like everyone around me was just, 'You're just a brat… Why aren't you grateful? You're having an anxiety attack,' but they didn't see it as an anxiety attack," she said during an appearance on "The YUNGBLUD podcast."
"They saw it like a tantrum. And now, I look back and I know it was an anxiety attack, and so when I'm in these situations now and I have those flashbacks, I need to take time," she continued.
Smith did not specify which show she was performing on when she experienced the attack.
Smith was asked by YUNGBLUD about her mental health and whether sharing new music has been "a cure" or "a curse and a cure."
"For so long, I had a lot of fear that was just like in my heart, and just sitting there," the 20-year-old singer said. "I felt extremely unsafe in my music career in the past, and that feeling of insecurity or unsafety - I just didn't feel protected, which went really deep."
"I kind of had to come back from the music industry," she said. "And now I'm kind of going back in, and it's so interesting because all of those memories and emotions have just been resurfacing."
Smith started performing at the age of 10 after releasing her first single "Whip My Hair" in October 2010.
However, she has opened up about how the success of the song negatively impacted her mental health, revealing to her mother, Jada Pinkett Smith, on "Red Table Talk" that she used to cut herself after the song blew up.
Smith told YUNGBLUD that as she is growing, she is learning how to deal with her mental health.
"I need to go into a little meditation," she said. "I need to separate myself from the situation a little bit and kind of tell myself, 'You're not 9. You're a grown a-- woman.'"
"I have to retrain my mind," she added. "My mental health is in a very fragile state, but I think it's a state where it's about to grow in a really awesome way."
During a set to celebrate her new album, "Lately I Feel Everything," Smith shaved her head for the third time in her life, during a performance of her first single, "Whip My Hair."