Lily Allen is opening up about the pains of dating following her recent divorce from actor David Harbour.
The singer, 40, said looking for love is “much harder” than it was when she was younger, especially following the end of her marriage last year.
“It’s bitterly disappointing,” Allen admitted in a new interview with Perfect magazine.
“There’s an element of humiliation and shame around it,” she said. “The world doesn’t portray women of my age as being desirable. And it just feels like climbing up a mountain.”
Allen told the magazine she’s slowly reentering the dating world after her “really sad” split from the Stranger Things actor, 50, whom she married in 2020. Their divorce was announced in February.
“It’s hard for me to not have my person, you know? And I am quite a codependent person,” she told Perfect.
“And I find it difficult to lean on the people who are available to me when I’m missing the comfort and stability of what is not available to me.”
The pop star went on to say that it feels like “work” to try to make herself happy, instead of relying on a romantic relationship to motivate her.
“I’m exhausted by it. And I thought it was done. I thought it was happily ever after, you know?” she said.
Having previously been open about her struggles with substance abuse and her mental health, the singer revealed on her podcast Miss Me? in February that she spent several weeks at a treatment center after she almost relapsed following six years of sobriety.
The singer said she wanted to be her “strongest self” for her daughters, Marnie, 12, and Ethel, 13, whom she shares with her ex-husband Sam Cooper.
“I felt like it was getting harder and harder for me to be able to show up for them in the way that they need me to,” she said on the podcast.
“It was a really big decision to have to leave them for a few weeks to go and focus on myself, but ultimately it was for them. Yes, it’s for me, but it’s for them so that I can get us through this bit. I needed some help to be able to do that.”
Allen will open up more about her breakup on her fifth record, West End Girl, out this Friday. The singer said the album was recorded over “an intense 10-day period” in Los Angeles after their separation last December.
