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What Is Halsey’s Song ‘The End’ About? Meaning Behind the Lyrics After She Reveals Health Struggles
Halsey revealed she’s been struggling with her health when she shared a carousel of video clips and photos on Instagram on June 4, 2024, the same day she released her new song “The End.” The lyrics of the tune seem to be a nod to the issues she’s been battling.
What Happened to Halsey?
Halsey revealed that she’s been experiencing health issues in her June 4, 2024, Instagram post. In the photos and video clips the first video showed the singer rubbing her legs to ease some pain while saying that she “feels like an old lady.” She had her short hair hidden beneath a dark beanie and two vials of what appeared to be some sort of medicine sat on the table in front of her.
Other clips showed her announcing her first day of treatment, in a recording studio with a shaved head and several shots of her receiving IV treatments.
“long story short, i’m Lucky to be alive. short story long, i wrote an album. it begins with The End. out now,” Halsey wrote for the caption.
While Halsey didn’t reveal a specific diagnosis in her June 2024 Instagram post, she tagged both the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and the Lupus Research Alliance
What Is Halsey’s Song ‘The End’ About?
Halsey’s new song “The End” opens with her singing, “Every couple of years now, a doctor says I’m sick / Pulls out a brand new bag of tricks.” The opening line seems to reference the trouble doctors had deciding on a specific diagnosis.
In 2022, she revealed that she had been diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, Sjögren’s syndrome, mast cell activation syndrome — known as MCAS — and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, known as POTS. However, her June 2024 Instagram post seemed to reveal doctors had either changed their diagnoses or added more to the list.
‘The End’ by Halsey Might Reference Lupus or Leukemia
The “Without Me” artist goes on to sing, “And I told him I’m not bitter ’cause I finally found a lover / Who’s better for my liver, and now I’ll finally recover.”
According to the Lupus Foundation of America, lupus “is a chronic (long-term) disease that can cause inflammation and pain in any part of your body. It’s an autoimmune disease, which means that your immune system — the body system that usually fights infections — attacks healthy tissue instead.”
The disease can also wreak havoc on a person’s liver, causing inflammation, jaundice and more.
Halsey also sings about “poisoned blood,” which could possibly be a reference to leukemia, a cancer that affects the body’s blood cells.
In the last line of the song, Halsey sings that “her treatment starts today,” and in the final clip shared in the Instagram carousel, fans can see her attending several different appointments, where it seems she underwent various treatments.
