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Kelly Clarkson is opening up about the difficult times she went through immediately following her divorce from ex-husband Brandon Blackstock, with the American Idol alum revealing she didn't handle the split well.
The "Stronger" singer got vulnerable during an appearance on the Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend podcast, telling the host and live audience some of the heartbreaking feelings she experienced during the major life change when she and her ex called it quits in 2020, per The Sun.
"Divorce, in general, is hard," she said. "Separation, grief, loss, all of that is hard. I think the worst part is when you feel alone."
While Clarkson felt "alone" and "isolated" amid the split, she had a difficult time relating her feelings to her loved ones as they hadn't gone through the same thing, especially in the public eye the way that she had.
"When you're going through something so horrendous and so publicly, there's no way to describe that," she said. "I think when you're that isolated... that's the worst to not feel like you can connect to another being and not heal."
The grief of ending such an important relationship in her life eventually impacted her ability to work, even forcing her to cancel at least one obligation, something she said she never does.
"I would be like truth, completely [bawling] right before we would be shooting and be like, 'how do I fix this?' ... It's hard to keep smiling," she said, adding, "There was one time — I never cancel, I'm not that person — and I was like, I can't actually fix this. I looked like, oh God, put her in a jacket. It was real bad. I was really sad, so we had to cancel one day."
The host of The Kelly Clarkson Show expanded on her isolated feelings in a recent radio interview, saying she "did not handle [the divorce] well" and was "crying so hard" even before the divorce that she "couldn't even speak," per Page Six.
"I don't know how people get through anything like that because I'm not going to say I did it gracefully," she said. "Behind closed doors by myself, it was not."
Clarkson's upcoming album will give fans more of a look into the journey she went through during the course of her relationship, showing both the good and bad times, per Today.
"It's all in there, the ride. The beauty is in there, as well," she said. "Now, there's a lot of pain, but that's what happens, for all of us."
Chemistry drops June 23.