Megan Thee Stallion Reflects on Tory Lanez Shooting: “People Didn’t Treat Me Like I Was Human”

Zoe G Phillips
·2 min read
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Megan Thee Stallion says she navigated “dark times” after being shot by Tory Lanez in 2020, offering new insight this week into her recovery from the assault.

“As a Black woman, as a darker Black woman, I also feel like people expect me to take the punches, take the beating, take the lashings, and handle it with grace,” Stallion told Women’s Health. “But I’m human.”

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In December 2022, Lanez was convicted of three felonies for shooting Megan, including assault with a semiautomatic firearm that left the hip-hop star with bullet fragments in her feet. During the trial, Megan faced backlash from fans and fellow artists who questioned the validity of her version of the story.

“A lot of people didn’t treat me like I was human for a long time,” Stallion recalled of the vitriol. “I feel like everybody was always used to me being the fun and happy party girl. I watched people build me up, tear me down, and be confused about their expectations of me.”

The backlash resulted in severe depression for the singer, and she struggled to return to music.

“Before I went onstage, I would be crying half the time because I didn’t want to [perform], but I also didn’t want to upset my fans,” Megan said. “I didn’t want to get [out] from under the covers. I stayed in my room. I would not turn the lights on. I had blackout curtains. I didn’t want to see the sun. I knew I wasn’t myself. It took me a while to acknowledge that I was depressed. But once I started talking to a therapist, I was able to be truthful with myself.”

Megan will now soon release her (still unnamed) third album and embark on her Hot Girl Summer tour later this year. In January, she told Good Morning America that “I feel like I’ve never been able to be outside doing my own thing during the summer, since like 2019, so this is gonna be the first time I drop an album on time for the summer. I do want to give the hotties the Megan Thee Stallion experience.”

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