Yemi Alade, the Nigerian singer, says she once battled depression after realising she had been denying her real age for years.
Speaking on the WithChude podcast, Alade recalled how, for three years, she kept telling people she was 22, “only to later discover she was actually 25”.
The 36-year-old singer said she had been so consumed by her career that she lost track of time and disconnected from her personal life.
“There was a time someone asked me my age and I realized for like three years, I kept saying I was 22,” she said.
“When I realized that I was 25, I took out my phone to and did the mathematics from whatever year that was from 1989. I was depressed for a few days.
“My mind was rejecting the reality. My mind was also not taking into account that years will pass by. I was so invested and in my own world, I had secluded myself and focused only on the music.
“Every now and then, I would travel to see my mum, maybe twice a year or something but it was mental that for three years I didn’t know my right age because I was lost in the sauce.”
Alade also recalled how discovering her first grey hair triggered a similar emotional response.
“When that dawned on me — what of when I saw my first grey hair? It was the same feeling that time had passed,” she said.
Since rising to fame with ‘Johnny’ in 2014, Alade has become one of Africa’s leading female artistes, known for her multilingual performances in English, Yoruba, and French.
In 2025, she earned her first Grammy nomination in the ‘Best African Music Performance’ category for her song ‘Tomorrow’.
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