In December of 2020 the musician FKA Twigs, Tahliah Barnett, sued her former boyfriend, actor Shia LaBeouf, for sexual battery, assault, and abuse. In a lengthy New York Times report she opened up about the coercive dynamics and violent altercations that led up to her decision to leave, and eventually pursue legal action against LaBeouf.
Barnett has been very open about the impact of the relationship on her mental and emotional health, and recently spoke with Louis Theroux of the BBC for his show Grounded about more specifics of what she dealt with. In her interview with Theroux, Barnett details the confusion and pain of getting the strength to leave the relationship, and the lasting impact it had on her.
She told Theroux that she was struggling with PTSD symptoms after leaving the relationship, another element of abuse that isn’t discussed when it comes to the healing process.”I was left with PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder] from that, which again is just something that I don’t think we really talk about as a society just in terms of the healing when leaving, and how much work that has to be done to recover, to get back to the person that you were before,” she said.
Listen to the full interview here, and watch a clip about her realizing she needed to leave the relationship in the video above.
