Jenn Tran opened up about her battle with depression as she explained her decision to perform to Taylor Swift’s track, The Archer, on Tuesday’s episode of Dancing with the Stars.
While explaining what inspired her to choose the emotional song, which details suffering self doubt and fear in relationships, the Bachelorette star, 26, reflected on her mental health and insecurities.
‘The Archer is such a beautiful, beautiful song talking about flaws and insecurities and feeling unlovable. And I feel like that a lot of the time,’ she told People.
The physician assistant continued: ‘I’ve been through a lot of depression [and] anxiety in the past, and times where I didn’t think that I would still be here today.’
The TV personality noted that dancing to the song was about her ‘working through those moments’ and ‘overcoming those battles every now and then.’
Tran also chose to dedicate her performance to Swift, 34.
‘I wanted to really dance my heart out for me, for Taylor, but also for everyone else who had been going through the same things that I’ve been going through, because I want them to know that they’re not alone,’ she said.
The reality star also recalled how the pop star’s music ‘transported’ her into ‘different place when’ she was at her ‘lowest of lows.’
Tran, then, noted that listening to Swift’s discography helped her navigate her parents’ ‘volatile relationship.’
‘I remember walking home from school and seeing, like, cop cars in my driveway and feeling scared and alone,’ she recalled.
During those times, Tran said she turned to the lessons that she had learned from Swift’s music and career, including that there is ‘strength in being vulnerable and allowing other people to see you for who you really are.’
Tran’s performance earned her a score of 32/40 and praise from the DWTS judges.
Last month, Tran detailed her broken engagement to Devin Strader, who she accused of not giving a ‘crap’ about their relationship.
Tran told People, last month, that her now-ex, 28, was ‘non-apologetic’ towards her for his ‘disrespectful’ behavior following their split.
On her season of the Bachelorette, she proposed to Strader, but he broke it off over the phone shortly after the show wrapped and refused to talk to her for months.
While filming After the Final Rose, which aired on September 3, she revealed that their relationship started to deteriorate after they wrapped The Bachelorette.
She told host Jesse Palmer that Strader became a different person.
‘As soon as we left Hawai’i, things were just different,’ she said.
‘It kind of just felt like he was pulling away all the promises that he had made to me — wanting to move somewhere together, and wanting to have this future planned out, and wanting to see each other all the time.’
She recalled how she began feeling like she was being ‘ghosted’ as he stopped contacting her until the night he called her to end their relationship.
‘He called me, and he basically broke off the engagement,’ she said. ‘[He said] he didn’t love me anymore, feel the same way and felt like something had been off since the second thing he proposed. He regretted getting engaged.’
During the After the Final Rose, Strader claimed he did have ‘real’ feelings for her, but they faded.
‘Obviously I failed you,’ he told her. ‘And there’s nothing I can say other than that. But everything I felt for you was real.’