vulnerably acknowledged the negative toll social media has recently taken on her mental health.
Stafford, 34, made the candid admission while discussing New Year’s resolutions on the Thursday, January 2 episode of her podcast “The Morning After.”
“I want to get off social media so bad. I don’t want to be on it anymore. It’s honestly giving me depressing thoughts,” Kelly said, while audibly fighting back tears. “But in the work that we are in, that’s not really an option.”
Stafford, the wife of Los Angeles Rams quarterback , explained being active on social media is crucial to the success of her podcast, but she said comments about her appearance have forced her to seriously weigh the pros and cons.
“I’m human,” Kelly noted. “I post something about a game or something and either I need to wear more makeup or now I am looking like I had plastic surgery because I actually had time to do my makeup and I did it because I felt like I needed to.”
Kelly joked, “ I’ll be the first one to tell you when I get a facelift and I’ll tell you where the doctor I go to is.”
“I’m old,” she added. “This should not be happening. It is very, very scary to raise four girls in a world where opinions of people you’ve never met matter to you.”
Kelly and Matthew, who got married in 2015, share four daughters: twins and , 7, , 6, and , 4.
“I’m not going to tell people that I’m going to have tougher skin, because I’m not,” Kelly said. “I’m a woman in my 30s and I have feelings. But I am going to try and do a better job of remembering that clearly people who are commenting certain things are unhappy with situations in their own life.”
Kelly admitted bluntly, “If people are setting out to hurt me with comments, congratulations. You have done it.”
Furthermore, Kelly explained how her husband has begun noticing the negative impact social media is having on her well-being.
“This has been a back-and-forth with Matthew, too, because he can see it,” she said. “I put down the phone, he knows immediately. ‘What did someone say?’ That’s a problem because I’m carrying it way past just putting my phone down. It is in my mind, it is in my heart. I am trying to do my best to fix that.”
Kelly issued a plea to any podcast listeners who might be the ones responsible for the vitriolic attacks being spewn online.
“I do want to make it aware that if you’re listening to this and you’re a person … God, I’m sorry,” she said as her voice began to crack. “And you’re one of those people that comments horrible things on anyone’s Instagrams, just stop. It’s hurtful. You never know what something you could say could do to someone. So just stop.”
Ultimately, Kelly said her resolution for the year is “to every day remind myself that the people who matter, those are the opinions that matter to me.”
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org.
