Singer/dancer FKA Twigs revealed that she has been absent from her music career because she has been suffering from a “fruit bowl of pain” due to fibroid tumors. She opened up about undergoing surgery to have the six tumors removed from her uterus.

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Twigs, born Tahliah Debrett Barnett, shared the details of her health issue in a lengthy post on Instagram. The singer, who is usually private, decided to share the details with her 1.2 million followers to bring awareness of how debilitating fibroids can be.

“I am a very private person as u all know and I have gone back and forth in my mind whether to share that this year I have been recovering from laparoscopic surgery to remove 6 fibroid tumours from my uterus,” Barnett stated. She said that she was in excruciating pain from the tumors that were the size of “two cooking apples, three kiwis and a couple of [strawberries].”

The combined weight and size of her tumors equated to that of a woman in her sixth month of pregnancy. As a result of being in pain, and feeling betrayed by her body, the 30-year-old artist said her “confidence as a woman was knocked.” She had surgery to remove the tumors last December and shared words of wisdom to the women who battle fibroids.

” I know that a lot of women suffer from fibroid tumors and I just wanted to say after my experience that you are amazing warriors and that you are not alone. you can get through this,” she wrote.

You can read her full statement in the Instagram post above.