Celebrities Who Have Been Living With Hidden Health Conditions

We often think of athletes as being in perfect condition. However, many athletes deal with chronic health conditions just like any other profession. Soccer star David Beckham, for example, has asthma.

He hasn’t spoken on it much but his agent did share that he has had asthma since childhood and that the soccer star hopes to inspire young athletes. Aside from this acknowledgment, Beckham hasn’t touched on the subject but continues to share his workout routines even since he left the field.

George Clooney is one of the most well-known actors in Hollywood. Unfortunately, he sustained a major injury to his spine while filming Syriana, leading to lasting pain. Clooney described the instance as “the most unbearable pain I’ve ever been through.”

He later described his work with a pain consultant to GQ, “Basically, the idea is, you try to reset your pain threshold. Because a lot of times what happens with pain is you’re constantly mourning for how it used to feel,” describing the moment it worked as a “euphoria.”

Alyson Stoner has been honest with fans about some of her personal experiences dealing with anxiety, depression, and an eating disorder.

Discussing her mental health journey, Stoner told POPSUGAR, “The fundamental change that took place was disengaging from the idea that my body is a project to complete or an object to fix.” Stoner has also started a platform called Movement Genius, looking to address both physical and mental health issues.

Venus Williams is a master on the tennis court. The athlete shared in 2011 that she has Sjogren’s syndrome, which caused a break, resulting in Williams having to miss the 2011 U.S. Open.

Williams has opened up about her struggle for a diagnosis, going seven years with worsening symptoms before she was diagnosed. She told Prevention.com, “Unfortunately, that’s typical of people with autoimmune disease. They’re misdiagnosed or too sick to function. I literally had professional tennis taken away from me before I got the right diagnosis.”

Claire Foy is another star who has opened up about their experience living with anxiety, something she says she has struggled with since childhood.

She told The Guardian Weekend, “When you have anxiety, you have anxiety about — I don’t know — crossing the road. The thing is, it’s not related to anything that would seem logical. It’s purely about that feeling in the pit of your stomach.” She continued, “It’s my mind working at a thousand beats a second, and running away with a thought.”

Tom Hanks is one of the most well-known and beloved actors in Hollywood. His name draws in huge crowds to pretty much every movie he’s in.

The actor has shared that in 2013, he was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. Hanks disclosed that he dealt with high blood glucose levels for nearly two decades before he received his diagnosis. He first discussed the condition publicly on with David Letterman on the Late Show With David Letterman.

Lady Gaga is well-known for her energetic performances and has also opened up about her experience living with fibromyalgia.

Gaga once told Vogue, “I get so irritated with people who don’t believe fibromyalgia is real. For me, and I think for many others, it’s really a cyclone of anxiety, depression, PTSD, trauma, and panic disorder, all of which send the nervous system into overdrive, and then you have nerve pain as a result. People need to be more compassionate. Chronic pain is no joke. And it’s waking up not knowing how you’re going to feel.”

If you don’t recognize Hugo Weaving by name, you’ll definitely recognize his work from The Matrix and The Lord of the Rings. Weaving has also opened up about living with epilepsy.

He told The Guardian, “I was diagnosed as epileptic when I was 13 and had seizures once a year until my 40s. Then, they just stopped. With every fit, my last thought was always: ‘I’m dying.'” Weaving was diagnosed back in 1973.

Singer Seal has spoken about his experience with a type of lupus known as discoid lupus erythematosus or DLE for short.

Seal told Yahoo!, “My lupus first arrived when I was 21. It’s not as serious as systemic [lupus], which affects the organs.” While Seal’s DLE is in remission last he shared, he has discussed his former self-consciousness about the scars it left on his face but said, “But then I quickly realized this body is not who we are. I got off lightly.”

Multiple sclerosis (MS) affects the brain and central nervous system heavily, leading to a myriad of symptoms. In 2018, Selma Blair shared she’d been diagnosed with MS.

She said in an Instagram post, “I am disabled. I fall sometimes. I drop things. My memory is foggy. And my left side is asking for directions from a broken GPS. But, we are doing it. And I laugh and I don’t know exactly what I will do precisely but I will do my best.”

Endometriosis is a chronic condition in which the tissue inside the uterus grows outside of it. Lena Dunham has been vocal about her experience with this condition.

She told Cosmopolitan UK, “Having endometriosis has had a really interesting effect on my relationship with my body. Pain does not inherently make you feel sexy; pain doesn’t make you feel beautiful, but in another way, it’s forced me to really take ownership of my body and express my needs.”

Jack Osbourne first graced TV screens as part of the Osbourne family’s reality show, which heavily focused on his father — musician Ozzy Osbourne.

Jack Osbourne shared that he was diagnosed with MS in 2012. Osbourne has shared with Everyday Health, “I felt a weird obligation” to talk about MS, explaining, “I’m in the public eye and I thought it would really benefit people.” He also added, “A lot of people who are younger are nervous to let people know about it because of the stigma that comes along with it.”

Jada Pinkett Smith was diagnosed with alopecia in 2018. Like many facets of her personal life, she’s talked about her experience on Red Table Talk.

She described noticing her hair falling out as, “It was one of those times in my life where I was literally shaking with fear.” However, she reframed it, saying, “The higher power takes so much from people…and by golly, if the higher power wants to take your hair…That’s it?” She continued, “When I looked at it from that perspective, it really did settle me.”

Much like Venus Williams, Carrie Ann Inaba has spoken about her diagnosis with Sjorgen’s syndrome. This came six years after she discussed her spinal stenosis diagnosis.

The star has spoken about dealing with the chronic pain from these conditions, saying, “When you’re in chronic pain, you become exhausted because your body is fighting this pain all the time. Pain is a life stealer. And it’s hidden, so people can’t see it or understand it.”

Psoriasis is a skin condition that Cara Delevingne has been open about in recent years. The model gained attention for not covering her psoriasis at the 2022 Met Gala.

She told Glamour, “I’ve always talked about my psoriasis, so it wasn’t new. But, I’ve never been more naked in the public.” She also added, “And then I remembered, though, that it’s not good for my skin and a lot of people live with psoriasis. It’s not a beautiful thing to have — but you also have to be proud of it.”

Delving isn’t the only model to have psoriasis. In fact, fashion icon and reality star Kim Kardashian has opened up about her experience with the condition.

In earlier episodes of her family’s show, Kardashian seems upset by the condition but has shared she has since come to terms with it. She wrote on the topic on her website, saying, “I’m always hoping for a cure, of course, but in the meantime, I’m learning to just accept it as part of who I am.”

Anthony Anderson is well-known for his roles on shows like Black-ish. Anderson has also been diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes.

Anderson told Everyday Health, “I didn’t deal with it as seriously as I should have in the beginning. I listened, but I didn’t really implement that into my life until much later.” He also said, “Eventually you have that moment in your life, that epiphany, where you think, ‘What do I need to do to change this?'”

Anxiety disorders and panic attacks can cause a lot of distress in someone’s life. This is something Gisele Bündchen has spoken on.

She told People how she felt as though her position in life made her feel as if she couldn’t feel these things. “I felt like I wasn’t allowed to feel bad. But I felt powerless. Your world becomes smaller and smaller, and you can’t breathe, which is the worst feeling I’ve ever had.”

Celebrity Nick Cannon has been rather open about his experience with Lupus. Cannon was diagnosed with the condition in 2012. Speaking to WebMD, Cannon said, “I don’t necessarily look sick, but there are times when I wake up and I can’t move. It’s a tough disease.”

He later added, “I’m just as vibrant and as fly and as exciting as I’ve ever been, if not more now that I have the disease. I see it as a blessing, not a curse. I have lupus, lupus does not have me.”

Dan Reynolds is best known for his work as the lead singer and frontman for the band Imagine Dragons. Reynolds was diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis, which he revealed in 2015.

Reynolds was initially hesitant to speak on his AS but shared with Healio News, “Before my diagnosis, it was so bad that I sometimes I could not move on stage,” he also added, “But now I can live a healthy, strong life and do the types of things that I want to do” since learning about the diagnosis.

Kristen Bell spoke on her anxiety and depression in a video for the #MyYoungerSelf campaign for the Child Mind Institute.

She advised, “Don’t be fooled by this game of perfection that humans play. They strive for a certain aesthetic, and everything looks so beautiful and people don’t seem like they have any problems. Everyone’s human. Everyone has problems. Everyone feels yucky inside sometimes. You deserve to feel just as beautiful on the days you wear no makeup, and the days you don’t shower, and the days you feel like you’re depressed.”

A lot of celebrities, especially ones who do a lot of live performances, often have to deal with their health issues in the public eye.

In 2013, fans were concerned when Lil Wayne had a series of three seizures in rapid succession. The rapper was quick to jump in and tell fans, “This isn’t my first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh seizure. I’ve had a bunch of seizures. Y’all just never hear about it.”

Yolanda Hadid is one of the stars of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills — as well as mother to model Bella Hadid and Gigi Hadid.

Yolanda has Lyme disease, something she’s been rather open about. She explained the condition to People, “There are rough days when you sleep 12 hours, you wake up at 11 and you can’t get out of bed, with severe joint pain, brain fog, and anxiety. There are a lot of symptoms that you can’t see from the outside but bring you to your knees on the inside.”

Like her mother, Bella Hadid has Lyme disease as well. The model has said her Lyme disease is “in all my joints and it goes up to my brain.”

Bella Hadid once spoke to People about her experience with Lyme disease, saying, “Life isn’t always what it looks like on the outside, and the hardest part of this journey is to be judged by the way you look instead of the way you feel.”

Although Country Hall of Famer, Alan Jackson has been battling a hereditary illness for over a decade, he only made that knowledge public in 2021. He has been dealing with a neuropathy and neurological disorder called Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease.

While the illness doesn’t affect his life expectancy, it does lead to extreme difficulty in movement. “It’s called CMT, ironically enough, because CMT was a big part of my career,” he shared with his fans.

Montel Williams is a well-known talk show host but the run of his show wasn’t always easy, partly thanks to some health problems.

Williams shared that he’d try to push through pain on air and take time away on commercial break. He told Oprah, “[I would] let it go, refocus, come back out and sit down, and do another interview with a person. I was doing that every day.” In the 1990s, Williams was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

Gina Rodriguez was 26 when she was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease, a condition that heavily affects the thyroid.

Rodriguez spoke to SELF Magazine about her diagnosis, saying, “To the core of my being, I know what it’s like to feel like there is no way I can win this, so where do I even begin?” She said, though, “When you say, just today, I’m going to choose this because I know it’s going to make me feel better, that’s not such a crazy Mount Everest.”

Recently, people have begun to notice that Prince Charles’ fingers seem to be swollen – which is likely due to arthritis. According to Dr. Nye, a senior lecturer at the University of Chester, arthritis is a “common condition in the over 60s.”

“It often affects three main areas in the hand – the thumb joint or either joints in the fingers. Fingers usually become stiff, painful, and swollen and although medication can help with the pain, the swelling can remain.”

Harry Potter fans might recognize Evanna Lynch best for her role as Luna Lovegood. She’s also opened up about her experience with an eating disorder.

The actress told Entertainment Tonight, “You are constantly having to choose between the negative voice that’s in your head telling you that you’re terrible at everything, that you suck and the then voice saying, ‘No, I can be something.’ That’s what the work is every day.” She added, “Just making the choice to say, ‘I’m going to choose love.'”

U2 lead singer Bono is pretty well-known for rocking a pair of shades when he makes public appearances. This isn’t just his sense of style either.

Bono has revealed that he wears sunglasses due to a three-decade-long battle with glaucoma. The musician told the audience of The Graham Norton Show that the sunglasses help protect his eyes after the condition started causing light sensitivity, which isn’t terribly uncommon with glaucoma.

Allan Houston was an NBA star who has since become the general manager of the Westchester Nicks after retiring due to chronic arthritis. The athlete has since put a lot of effort into helping raise awareness.

He even participated in the Endo Pharmaceuticals 2011 “Apply Yourself!” campaign. About accepting his retirement, he’s said, “I did everything that I possibly could to get back and finish my career the way I would have liked to. But, the injury wouldn’t allow me to do that. This is the right time for me to move on.”

R&B musician Toni Braxton revealed in 2008 that she’d been diagnosed with lupus. She’s continued to update fans on her health over the years.

She told Prevention magazine, “I was petrified, depressed, and scared, but I realized I had to change my life. I may have lupus, but I decided I was not going to be a victim. Now, I listen to my body.” The star has also spoken about the effect lupus has had on her career, making performing more difficult at times.

Bret Michaels is known to many as the frontman for Poison. Michaels shared later in his career that he’d been diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at six years old.

The decision to share this came after the singer collapsed on stage in 1987, leading to a slew of rumors about his health. Michaels has done a lot of charity work regarding diabetes and told Yahoo! News, “I’ve been beat up, but I’ve never felt defeated.”

Alyssa Milano has talked about her postpartum depression and generalized anxiety disorder before, even writing an essay for TIME.

She said, “Here’s the thing about mental illness: you don’t always look sick, and the answers are not always clear or black-and-white but we should not confront these challenges by placing more hurdles in front of Americans who desperately need the care. I was lucky enough to have the means and the insurance to get the help and support I needed. What happens to those mothers who don’t have the kind of support I received?”

Sam Faiers is known for her work on Mummy Diaries and made an appearance on Celebrity Big Brother. During the filming of the latter, she became ill.

Shortly after, she shared news of her Crohn’s disease diagnosis and told BT, “Effectively, my body went into shut down and I only just managed to make it to the end [of Big Brother]. I’d be crying with the pain, violently ill after eating anything, with boils on my face, no energy, and such terrible joint pain in my ankles I could barely walk.”

Mariah Carey first received her diagnosis of bipolar II disorder in 2001. Yet, she wouldn’t discuss it publicly until 2018.

The singer told People, “Until recently I lived in denial and isolation in constant fear someone would expose me. It was too heavy a burden to carry and I simply couldn’t do that anymore. I sought and received treatment, I put positive people around me and I got back to doing what I love — writing songs and making music.”

From his work on SNL to blockbuster movies, it’s safe to say Alec Baldwin is one of the most well-known members of his famous family.

Diagnosed with chronic Lyme disease, Baldwin has spoken about how difficult the disease is, saying, “The first time was the worst of all and I really thought this is it, I’m not going to live.” He continued to say that he now checks his children for tick bites carefully to avoid them contracting the same condition.

Will.I.Am. is a talented musician who has made a name for himself both on his own and as part of the Black Eyed Peas. The musician has ADHD.

Will.I.Am. even went on to say that his work in music helped him to manage his ADHD symptoms better. He told Mirror in 2013, “One thing I learned about ADHD is that it’s hard to keep your attention and you can’t sit still, and you’re always moving and thinking about a whole bunch of things but those traits work well for me in studios.”

Like many people with a uterus, Tia Mowry is familiar with the struggle of endometriosis. She even wrote an op-ed about it for Women’s Health.

She shared, “I thought I was alone because no one I knew personally had dealt with this and then I realized: I’d never really seen someone African-American in the public eye talking about endometriosis or their struggles with infertility. And when you don’t know or see anyone else who looks like you talking about what you’re going through, you feel alone and suffer in silence.”

Kristin Chenoweth made her start on Broadway before becoming a household name in Hollywood. At 24, she said she started to deal with migraines and vertigo.

It would take six more years before she was diagnosed with Ménière’s disease — an inner ear disorder. She told Women’s Health, “I don’t want to appear weak but the older I get, the more I go, ‘I have this, and today might not be the best day,’ and that’s very freeing.”

Sarah Hyland has shared some of her story living with kidney dysplasia. The condition has led the actress to undergo multiple kidney transplants.

The star once shared with Seventeen, “I was born with so many health issues that doctors told my mother I would never have a normal life.” Hyland continued to describe her mother’s support before saying, “If I can’t have an ordinary life, I might as well have an extraordinary one. If you set your mind to something, you’ll achieve it.”

As a former Disney star, Selena Gomez has spent a lot of her life in the public eye. In 2015, Gomez revealed her lupus diagnosis.

Gomez once spoke with the Lupus Research Alliance to say, “From the condition itself to the medications used to treat the disease, lupus can cause loneliness due to fear of infection, not being able to predict how you’ll feel each day, and frustration from chronic pain and fatigue. It is important for people with lupus to look for help when needed and know you are not alone.

The Jonas Brothers reached impressive popularity when they were young. The band was even on tour in 2005 when Nick Jonas was hospitalized and diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes.

He told Healthline, “That was alarming and the start to my life with this disease. It’s pretty wild to think back that had it gone untreated just a few more days, it could have been really, really bad, but I got the care I needed when I needed it.” Jonas has been public about the condition and even started the charity Change for the Children.

Like many women, Gabrielle Union has struggled with fertility, something she’s been rather open about. At a conference, she said, “The reality is, I have adenomyosis.”

Continuing, Union shared, “There is nothing you can do about adenomyosis.” The actress has spoken on multiple occasions about living with adenomyosis, especially the fertility effects it has. She urges others, “Just know if you are out there having fertility issues, you are not alone […] Fertility is not an older women’s issue. It’s an issue, period.”

Daisy Ridley is another actress who has spoken about her life with endometriosis as well as polycystic ovary syndrome or PCOS.

She shared her own diagnostic journey on Instagram, ending by saying, “My point is, to any of you who are suffering with anything, go to a doctor; pay for a specialist; get your hormones tested; get your allergy testing; keep on top of how your body is feeling and don’t worry about sounding like a hypochondriac. From your head to the tips of your toes, we only have one body.”

Halsey is another star who has opened up about their endometriosis. They shared that their diagnosis was a moment that came with some mixed emotions.

The singer once shared on Twitter about her diagnosis saying, “Finding out that I had [endometriosis] was the most bittersweet moment because it meant I wasn’t crazy! I wasn’t a ‘baby!’ I had every right to be feeling like the world was caving in. But, it was terrifying to find out.” She also urged fans, “Please know you’re not alone.”

Christina Applegate announced in 2022 that she’s been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis aka MS. Despite her illness, Christina insisted on finishing up with filming the final season of her hit show Dead to Me in order to give fans closure.

The actress states that filming while ill was the hardest thing she’s ever had to do. At the moment, Christina has to use a cane to walk and she claims that she’s put on 40 pounds. These days, she’s taking a break from work and focusing on her health.

In 2022, Bruce Willis retired from acting due to his diagnosis of aphasia. Aphasia causes language problems, so it makes perfect sense that it’d impact Willis’s career. Unfortunately, things worsened in 2023 when Bruce’s condition escalated to dementia.

Sadly, there’s no current cure for the 67-year-old’s condition. Although we may not see any more movies from Bruce Willis, his impact on Hollywood will remain. The actor’s final film, Assassin hits theaters on March 31st, 2023.