Kanye West Speaks Out on His Bipolar Diagnosis and Treatment
Kanye West Opens up About His Mental Health
Kanye West has always been a controversial figure from his rise to fame in the 2000s to dividing his audience based on his vocal support of President Donald Trump. He recently spoke candidly about his bipolar diagnosis in 2018, and his experiences during treatment.
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In a recent interview, which is set to air on the Netflix series “My Next Guest Needs No Introduction” with David Letterman, Kanye opened up about his stances and beliefs – as well as about his bipolar diagnosis.
This past summer, Kanye West essentially confirmed his bipolar disorder diagnosis with the release of a song titled “I Hate Being Bipolar. It's Awesome,” per People. After having been hospitalized for what had been termed a “psychiatric emergency” in November 2016, Kanye returned to the mic stronger and more focused than ever.
The double-edged sword of Kanye's bipolar diagnosis also brought questions from Letterman as to what his treatments looked like. The rapper, producer and entrepreneur did not hold back when describing the often-frightful process – deriding many aspects of the treatment as inhumane.
“When you’re in this [bipolar] state, you’re hyper-paranoid about everything...” West told Letterman. “Everyone — this is my experience, other people have different experiences — everyone now is an actor. Everything’s a conspiracy. You feel the government is putting chips in your head. You feel you’re being recorded. You feel all these things.” he continued. “You have this moment [where] you feel everyone wants to kill you. You pretty much don’t trust anyone.”
West elaborates on the restraints and isolation involved in some treatments. “They have this moment where they put you — they handcuff you, they drug you, they put you on the bed, and they separate you from everyone you know,” West said, according to the outlet. “That’s something that I am so happy that I experienced myself so I can start by changing that moment... When you are in that state, you have to have someone you trust. It is cruel and primitive to do that.”
Moving beyond the topic of Kanye's bipolar diagnosis, Letterman took Kanye to task on several differences of opinion between the two of them, and the rapper was not hesitant to push back, according to Rolling Stone. As Kanye spoke to his feeling of the increasing atmosphere of silent fear that surrounds many men in the #MeToo era, Letterman denied this line of thinking, replying that this fear was, “not equal by any equation to the fear women felt being on the other side of that.”
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Ye disagreed, speaking to the importance of due process and the dangers of mob rule. “I’m definitely supportive of the women. What I’m saying is we’re not allowed to have any conversation. When you go to court, both sides can talk. This is a court of public opinion where when someone bombs first, the war is supposedly over.”
It looks like Kanye's support for the president has not wavered, either. Despite David Letterman being an avowed opponent of President Donald Trump – according to Fox News, the rapper pushed back against the interviewer's suggestion that the president was more dangerous than his most rabid detractors.
“Have you ever been beat up in your high school for wearing the wrong hat?” West said to Letterman's criticisms of the Trump administration. “The idea is the bullying. Well, definitely liberals bully people who are Trump supporters. It’s not just calm. You can’t just go and wear the hat. It’s like, ‘F*ck you! F*ck you!’ It’s like bro, I have. In America, we have rights and we have rights to open the conversation.”
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