Frankie Jonas has a second TikTok account — @frankiejonastherapist — which is devoted to his sobriety journey (he’s since made those videos private). In one, as reported by People, he explained, “This is by no means the eloquent explanation I hope to give on a much more serious mode than this. However from a very young age I struggled with drinking and drugging as an escape because I hated life, and I didn’t want to be here,” he shared, referring to himself as a “sober drug addict” who, at the time, was attending college.
“I eventually, after many years of trying to kill myself accidentally, came to a point where I was going to do it for real,” he continued. “I went to treatment, and it saved me.”
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As he told Bustle, the drugs and alcohol represented his own attempts to self-medicate while coping with problems he didn’t understand, at least not then. “I’ve always dealt with a lot more than just anxiety,” he explained. “At the time, I didn’t know that I got panic attacks. I didn’t know that I had obsessive thoughts. I didn’t know that I would go on to be diagnosed with PTSD.” Ultimately, however, Jonas understands that the difficulties he faced all contributed to bringing him to where he is now. “It’s important for me to be like, ‘Yeah, these things were rough,'” he added, “‘but at the same time, without them, where would I be?'”