Jackie Evancho Says ‘Being Imperfect Is Perfectly OK’ After Mental Health, Eating Disorder Struggles

Jackie Evancho is getting real about her struggles with perfection.

The singer, 23, who rose to fame on America’s Got Talent, posted a video to Instagram on Monday to reveal the inspiration behind her new song, “Get Out of My Life.”

“It took me a bit to work up the courage to do this,” she said on the video. “I’m talking about something that’s very personal… And it’s something I think we all struggle with because of these societal pressures to attain something that is just not attainable — and that is, perfection.”

The “Both Sides Now” singer went on to say that growing up in the industry has contributed to her “need to be perfect,” and that perfection has “created these deep pressures in me that I put on myself to this very day.”
In fact, she revealed, “I kind of believe it is partly causing my disordered eating, my anxieties and all those other things on the list.”

She captioned the video: “Recently I’ve discovered something that I had all along…my voice,” she wrote. “I want to take my power back, be bold when facing my past demons, and share what I learn through my music. Being imperfect is perfectly ok, and that’s exactly how this song came to be. Enjoy. #JackieEvancho #Music#NewMusic #MentalHealth#SingerSongwriter #NotPerfect#PerfectlyImperfect #Selfcare#Perfection #Imperfection”

The singer then posted her new song, “Get Out of My Life,” which she wrote last year .
“As I’ve gotten older I’ve realized I don’t need everybody’s approval,” she said. “I don’t need everybody to like me or what I sound like.”

In July 2022, Evancho opened up to PEOPLE about her battle with anorexia and how she was working to recover.
She said she had been struggling with disordered eating since she was 15, and finally realized she needed help following a January 2021 car accident that broke her back in two places.
“They were abnormal breaks, breaks that you see in 80-year-olds,” Evancho said at the time. “That’s how I learned that my eating problems created osteoporosis. So now I’m a 22-year-old with osteoporosis.”

“I had to eat [for my bones] to heal, and that really messed me up with my eating problems, because I was gaining weight to heal,” she continued. “Once I finally healed, my disorder said, ‘OK, now you’ve got to be really hard on yourself to get all of that out of you…and then some.'”

Evancho described the time as “dark and painful,” and was “still struggling” and fighting.”

But the illness is not going to stand in the way between Evancho and her music career.

“Since I was a kid I’ve put so much blood, sweat and tears into my career, and to see that sort of fade away because of this demon in my head? No, I’m going to fight this now because you can’t take this one thing from me.”