Melanie "Mel B" Brown first came onto the scene as "Scary Spice" with the epic and wonderful girl group known as the Spice Girls, and we have all followed her career ever since.
Brown has been a judge on America's Got Talent for several seasons, even continuing to work on the show through all the drama of her divorce.
Not only did she experience a bad divorce, but in 2017 her father passed away. And now, the trauma and abuse she suffered has taken its toll, and the singer has decided to check herself into rehab.
In 2007, Brown married film producer Stephan Belafonte. However, their marriage wasn't the fairy tale she had dreamed of.
When they separated in 2016, Brown revealed that she had been suffering physical, verbal, and psychological abuse at the hands of her husband, but the legal battle left her "financially battered."
The divorce became official in 2017, but in recent months, the singer has been reliving the experience while writing her book, and this seems to have brought on a new set of issues.
The Spice Girls singer released a statement and opened up about how traumatizing it has been, and how it has inspired her to get the help she needs.
"The past six months have been incredibly difficult for me," Brown shared. "I've been working with a writer on my book, Brutally Honest, and it has been unbelievably traumatic reliving an emotionally abusive relationship and confronting so many massive issues in my life from the death of my dad to my relationship with men."
She continued by explaining that not only has writing her book been emotionally trying, but her legal battle with her ex-husband has been hard to deal with as well.
"I've also been through more than a year of court battles which have left me financially battered and at the mercy of the legal system which is completely weighted against emotionally abused women because it's very hard to prove how someone took away all your self-respect and self-worth."
She goes onto say that she has been using alcohol to cope with her pain, and hiding what's really going on with her. "Sometimes it is too hard to cope with all the emotions I feel. But the problem has never been about sex or alcohol "” it is underneath all that."
Brown has been officially diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and has started a new type of therapy called Eye Movement Desensitization (EMDR).
"After trying many different therapies I started a course of therapy called EMDR (eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing) which in a nutshell works on the memory to deal with some of the very painful and traumatic situations I have been through.I don't want to jinx it, but so far it's really helping me."
"I am fully aware I am at a crisis point."
The singer says she is going to be checking into a "proper therapy program" for a few weeks in the UK, "because I am very, very British and I know that will work best for me."
She wants to help raise awareness for others facing this kind of struggle, "I am still struggling. But if I can shine a light on the issue of pain, PTSD and the things men and women do to mask it, I will do. I am speaking about this because this is a huge issue for so many people."
She ends her statement by saying that she wants to get better for her children's sake.
"I'm not perfect, and I have never pretended to be. But I am working on being a better version of myself for my kids, for my family and for all the people who have supported me in my life."
Source - Variety / The Guardian