Writing 'Til It Happens To You' forced Lady Gaga to relive her sexual assault but also helped her to come to terms with it.
Lady Gaga
The singer - who was raped at the age of 19 - co-wrote the Oscar nominated track with Diane Warren for the soundtrack to the campus rape documentary 'The Hunting Ground' and while Gaga is happy to raise awareness of the issue, she admitted writing the song brought all the bad memories back.
She said: "Working on this with Diane has helped me relive all of this in a bad way at first. It's healing, but it's like a wound that has to crack and be messed up before it heals. I would never have done this without Diane. I would never be able to face it by myself and sing somebody else's song. It had to be something that I believed in to my core."
However, Gaga is thrilled with the Academy Award nomination for the song as it shows support for victims of sexual abuse.
She explained to Deadline: "Everyone says, 'Oh, an Oscar nomination.' It's not about that for me at all. Of course, it's cool. The Oscars nominated this issue by nominating this song. Now the issue has the media talking about it, hopefully in a way I believe it deserves to be talked about. We can reach more people. When an organization like The Academy that believes in talent says 'We care about you.' That means that message is not just sent to me and Diane, but to people that hear the song and who went through something like this."
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