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Liam Payne opened up about his health over the years before his untimely death. The late English singer and former One Direction member died at 31 years old in October 2024, and fans are struggling to come to terms with his tragic death. Amid the shocking news, Hollywood Life has compiled everything that Liam revealed about his mental and physical health, below.
Liam Payne Struggled With Alcoholism
During the early days of Liam’s career with One Direction, he struggled with addiction and alcoholism, which he recalled during a 2021 interview on “The Diary of a CEO” podcast. The late “Strip That Down” singer recalled the “pills and booze” in addition to his “moments of suicidal ideation.”
“There is some stuff that I’ve definitely never spoken about,” Liam said. “It was really, really, really severe. It was a problem.”
Liam even admitted that the “day the band ended,” he was thankful and added, “I know a lot of people are going to be mad at me for saying that, but I needed to stop or it would kill me.” He elaborated by recalling moments when he’d turn to alcohol during the height of One Direction’s fame.
“In the band, the best way to secure us, because of how big we’d got, was just to lock us in our rooms,” Liam said, before describing his mindset at the time. “What’s in the room? A mini-bar. So, at a certain point I thought, I’m just going to have a party-for-one, and that seemed to carry on for many years of my life. Then, you look back at how long you’ve been drinking, and you’re like, ‘Jesus Christ, that’s a long time.’”
Liam Also Had a Kidney Infection
In 2023, Liam announced that he was sick with a kidney infection in a video on Instagram. He looked incredibly disappointed as he told fans that he’d need to postpone the tour. “I’ve been a little bit unwell recently, and I’ve been in the hospital with a bad kidney infection. We’ve started rehearsals, and I’ve just been advised that now’s just really not the right time to be out on the road, trying to recover from this,” he said in the clip.
As he explained his illness, he described how painful the infection was in his Instagram caption. “Over the past week I’ve been in hospital with a serious kidney infection, it’s something I wouldn’t wish on anyone, and doctor’s orders are that I now need to rest and recover,” he wrote at the time.
What Is a Kidney Infection?
While Liam didn’t provide many details or specifics about his infection, it can be very serious, especially when in the kidneys. It can lead to permanent damage of the organ or a more serious infection, according to the Mayo Clinic. While Liam didn’t detail his symptoms, some of the symptoms to look out for include fever, chills, nausea, vomiting, and pain in the groin, back, side, or belly. Many of the symptoms also have to do with urinating, such as frequent urination, burning pain when urinating, blood or pus in urine, and cloudy or bad-smelling urine.
What Liam Said About His Mental Health
In July 2023, Liam shared a video to his Instagram Stories opening up about the “conditions” he was diagnosed with, which he did not specify.
“I know in my last video I mentioned I’d been diagnosed with a couple of conditions and, not to go into too much detail, but one of them I have is, there’s a lot of manic things in my life, which you guys saw,” he said, before briefly mentioning his sobriety journey. “But the other side of it is and that kind of feels like when I would lose my sobriety in these moments that were super low, and I felt like that today [sic].”
After pointing out that he had “some amazing people around [him] that kind of look after [him],” the “What Makes You Beautiful” artist acknowledged that he occasionally wasn’t “really here” at times.
“I’ve filmed this same video about 20 times at different points this year and got too scared to put it out by talking myself out of it,” he admitted. “I’m coming to see how fortunate I am to be in the position I’m in, and I wanna give any of you struggling the gift I was given by sharing some of the things I learned form specialists whilst I was away.”
How Did Liam Payne Die?
Liam reportedly died after falling from the third floor of his hotel room in Buenos Aires in October 2024. It’s still unclear what caused him to fall.
If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).