Fashion

Model Adwoa Aboah Stripped Down For StyleLikeU

“I just didn’t want to be Adwoa”

Adwoa Aboah recently landed a cover on Vogue Italia, but her path to the spotlight hasn't been the smoothest. The 23-year-old model stars in the most recent episode of StyleLikeU's What's Underneath Project, which aims to redefine our culture’s notion of beauty and reverse the fashion and beauty industry’s debilitating status quo.

In the segment, Aboah opens up about how her struggles with anxiety, self-hatred, and addiction almost led her to take her own life. "I just didn't want to be Adwoa," she says. "That self-hatred is something I work on on a daily basis." 

The Londoner further explains how she used drugs as a mechanism to hide her emotions and make her feel like less of an outcast in society. Starting a full-time career as a model only made the severity of these insecurities increase tenfold. Since leaving rehab, Aboah has started a charity called Gurls Talk to provide young women with a safe place to open up about the problems that they are dealing with. Aboah says that she is still recovering, but is in a much better state in all aspects of her life. 

Watch the emotional footage, below.