Adele Has Been Working on Her Relationship With Men in Therapy
Like many of us, Adele has spent the last 18 months reflecting. But even before the COVID-19 pandemic began, the singer underwent a year of anxiety. Since then, she’s spent a lot of time in therapy working on and growing to understand herself. One of the topics she dove into was her relationship with men, starting from her connection with her father, to her divorce from Simon Konecki, to how she relates to her son, Angelo. Here’s some of what she’s learned.
Adele’s divorce from Simon Konecki
In her recent interview with Vogue, Adele said her divorce has gone as smoothly as a divorce can. Konecki even lives across the street (in a house she bought) and the two share custody of their son. The family still has consistent movie nights.
Adele opened up to the publication about her reasons for divorcing Konecki.
“I was just going through the motions and I wasn’t happy,” she said. “Neither of us did anything wrong. Neither of us hurt each other or anything like that. It was just: I want my son to see me really love, and be loved. It’s really important to me. I’ve been on my journey to find my true happiness ever since.”
Facing her issues with her father
Adele’s happiness journey involved going to therapy.
“My therapist told me that I had to sit with my little seven-year-old self,” she shared. “Because she was left on her own. And I needed to go sit with her and really address how I felt when I was growing up. And issues with my dad. Which I’d been avoiding.”
Adele’s father, Mark Evans, and her mother, Penny Adkins, split up just after Adele was born. So Adkins had to raise her daughter on her own. When Adele got famous, Evans sold a story about her to the Sun. He died of cancer in May this year.
“I know he loved me, and we actually got our peace before he died,” she said of her father. “When he passed, I had this sort of physical reaction. That fear left my body.”
In therapy, the singer faced her feelings about her relationship with her dad.
“Not being sure if someone who is supposed to love you loves you, and doesn’t prioritize you in any capacity when you’re little,” she said of what she and her therapist spoke about. “You assume it and get used to it. So my relationship with men in general, my entire life, has always been: You’re going to hurt me, so I’ll hurt you first. It’s just toxic and prevents me from actually finding any happiness.”
Adele has even felt her toxic relationship with men in her relationship with her son
The singer’s issues with men ran deep. She even felt them bubble up when her son spoke to her a certain way.
“Sometimes, with my own son, he could talk to me in a certain way, and I shut down,” she said. “With my own f*cking child. I’ll take it so to heart, what he’s saying, when actually what he’s saying is, No, I don’t want to go to bed.”
Thankfully, now, Adele is on the mend — in many areas of her life, not just her relationship with men. How’d she do it? “It was a lot of sound baths. It was a lot of meditation. It was a lot of therapy. And a lot of time spent on my own.”
