Paris Hilton is getting candid about her diagnosis of rejection sensitivity dysphoria (RSD) – a condition she compared to ‘a demon in your mind.’
The socialite, 44, appears on Monday’s edition of the The Him & Her Show, Lauryn Bosstick and Michael Bosstick’s podcast on Dear Media.
The hotel heiress told the pair that she had been initially diagnosed with ADHD in her late 20s, prior to learning that she had RSD.
RSD is described by The Cleveland Clinic as ‘when you experience severe emotional pain because of a failure or feeling rejected.’
The clinic said that RSD ‘is linked to ADHD and experts suspect it happens due to differences in brain structure.
‘Those differences mean your brain can’t regulate rejection-related emotions and behaviors, making them much more intense.’
Paris Hilton, 44, is getting candid about her diagnosis of rejection sensitivity dysphoria (RSD) – a condition she compared to ‘a demon in your mind.’ Pictured in LA January 20
Hilton provided a more personal account of what it was like to live with RSD, saying, ‘It’s basically, like, any thought of a negative perception, if you think someone is being rude or you feel something.
‘You will feel it like it’s physical pain, and it’s not even real. It’s kind of just this, almost like a demon in your mind that is, like, saying negative self-talk to you.’
Hilton said people living with RSD feel negative feelings ‘on such a deep level, and it just, like, it’d be, like, so painful.
‘Now I know it’s not real – it’s just like the RSD kicking in,’ Hilton said. ‘So there’s so much to learn.
‘I’m obsessed with learning more about it and spreading the message, because I want people to know that it doesn’t have to be something that holds them back in life; it could be something that they can harness as a superpower, to really go for their dreams in life.’
The Stars Are Blind singer said she ‘didn’t even know what [RSD] was before,’ until speaking with the number of other patients who live with ADHD.
Hilton said that communicating with people dealing with the condition has been helpful.
‘I’ve been through so many things in my life,’ Hilton said, ‘and especially in the 2000s, just everything I was going through with the media.
‘And suffering from this RSD with ADHD, it was like so, so extremely painful.’
The hotel heiress was pictured Saturday in NYC in a flashy ensemble
The Simple Life star compared RSD to ‘almost like a demon in your mind that is like saying negative self-talk to you’
The Simple Life star said that she was not diagnosed with ADHD as a child because society and the medical community were not focused on the ailment at the time, particularly for females.
‘No one was talking about it when I was a teenager – especially for girls and women,’ she said. ‘You know, everyone just would say, “Oh, this is, like, something little boys have” … and back then everyone always only said the negative parts about it.’
Hilton said that the undiagnosed ADHD impacted her education: ‘I was always so confused, and in school, it was so difficult for me.’
‘As hard as I would study, I could never remember anything. I was always failing my test. I was just always in detention, getting in trouble. And it was always just very difficult for me.’
Hilton said she feels she has properly refocused her mind to adapt to the conditions and thrive, which is why she ‘really wanted to reframe’ the public discourse on the topic in an effort to help people.
‘I see this my superpower, and I wouldn’t be entrepreneur I am today without it,’ Hilton said. ‘It was me, like, this drive, and always being in the future, and there’s, like, hard parts about it to it – very overwhelming.’
