Kamal Ghorui
In a candid revelation, Willa Ford has shared her private struggle with psychogenic non-epileptic seizures, a condition that nearly silenced her music career forever. The early 2000s pop sensation, now 45 and known for hits like ‘I Wanna Be Bad,’ initially kept her battle under wraps out of fear and stigma. Her decision to speak out stems from a transformative realization that vulnerability could inspire others facing similar invisible illnesses.
Onset of deadly seizures
Willa Ford first experienced psychogenic non-epileptic seizures, or PNES, in December 2023. Defined by the National Institutes of Health as seizures potentially triggered by psychological factors, PNES disrupted her life dramatically. She could neither work nor drive during the worst episodes, which left her feeling isolated. “I wasn’t going to tell people because I think it scares [them],” Willa Ford told People magazine. “Like, ‘Oh, she’s going to have one on stage.”
Nature of PNES
Willa Ford describes her seizures as a brain disconnect that spares physical injury. “My brain disconnects, so it actually doesn’t injure my brain,” she explained. “It’s the better of the seizures to have, if I’m being honest. My body just flails, or I get frozen, but I’m coherent. I can talk to you [and] do math, unless my mouth is doing weird things.” She stresses that PNES varies by individual and stems from trauma, in her case linked to a past music industry event. “What I will say is it had nothing to do with my label [Atlantic Records], my labelmates, or a producer or anything. It wasn’t anybody I worked with. It is an out-of-this-world story that doesn’t even sound real.”
The wake-up call and diagnosis
The seizures became a wake-up call. “The seizures are what made me decide I wasn’t done living,” Willa Ford told People. Learning their trauma root prompted her return to songwriting, her sole creative outlet then. “When Ford learned her seizures were caused by a past trauma connected to music, she focused on songwriting. ‘That’s all I could do,’ she says,” said the report. This process fueled her new album, channeling pain into art.Today, seizures strike about once a month, managed through therapy, anti-anxiety medication, and a rescue med for crises. Willa Ford initially viewed her case as rare but now sees its broader relevance. Her interior design business sustained her, even leading to a Flip It Like Disick collaboration with Scott Disick. By addressing suppressed trauma tied to music, as explored with neuroscientists, she reclaimed her voice both literally and artistically.
