Singer and songwriter Anne-Marie says she didn’t ask for help as a new mom because she didn’t want to seem like she couldn’t cope.
During an appearance on Tuesday’s episode of “Mad, Sad, and Bad with Paloma Faith,” Anne-Marie reflected on her back-to-back pregnancies and her difficult postpartum experiences.
The singer, known for songs like “2002” and “Rockabye,” shares two kids with her husband, British rapper Slowthai. She welcomed her daughter in February 2024 and her son in May 2025.
“I think with my first, I didn’t know what I was doing,” Anne-Marie told podcast host Paloma Faith. “I just was like, I don’t know how to be a mom, and I thought it would just come, because everyone tells you that. But I was like, no, it hasn’t come to me. So what do I do?”
Anne-Marie said she was afraid that asking for help would reflect poorly on her.
“I didn’t want to ask anyone for help or tell anyone that, because I didn’t want them to think that I couldn’t do it, and I was a bad mom or I didn’t have the natural instinct or the motherly thing,” she said. “So I just grin and beared it for a year and didn’t get any help. Had no help during the day.”
Instead, she relied on a night nanny, but breastfeeding meant she was waking up more often to pump than her baby was to feed.
“I definitely have struggled and then obviously, got pregnant as I was breastfeeding, so didn’t have a chance to stop,” Anne-Marie said, adding that her body “started changing again” quickly.
Her second pregnancy came with a wave of health complications, including gestational diabetes and anemia, but the postpartum experience after her son was born felt different.
“Weirdly, because I’d done it before, he’s like healing me along his life, because he’s making me feel like I can do it,” Anne-Marie said. “And also, plus, I’ve asked for help this time.”
Anne-Marie is among several celebrities who have been candid about postpartum struggles.
In a March interview with Us Weekly, Ashley Tisdale said she felt “robbed” of her first experience as a mother due to postpartum depression.
“With the second, you just feel so much more confident,” Tisdale said.
Hailey Bieber told Vogue in May that she struggled with postpartum body dysmorphia after giving birth.
“You’re not the same person that you were before. You change head to toe. And I think there was a minute where I kept really hyper-fixating on getting back to what I was. And then I had to go through that acceptance of, I’m not going back. So it’s really about how do I want to move forward? Who do I want to be?” Bieber said.
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