The first ever winner of The Voice Australia, Karise Eden seemed to have it all but then she suddenly disappeared from the limelight and cancelled her national tour after only four shows. Now, in a new interview, she reveals what happened.
Speaking on ABC’s Australian Story Karise, 22, reveals how she had a physical and mental breakdown after the show finished, as the pressures of the limelight took its toll. Since the show ended, the young star has shunned the media, so the revealing interview was the first insight into exactly what happened in the three years since the show finished.
Related: Karise melts down: I quit!
“It’s been a huge secret. This will probably be the first time I’ve spoken out. Only my close family and friends are aware of truly what happened, ” Karise said.
“If I could put one word on my journey over the last couple of years it would definitely be ‘turbulent’”
Karise was just 19 when over 3 million viewers voted her as the winner of The Voice in 2012. She won over many fans with the story of her humble background that saw her shifting between foster carers and refuges as a teenager and battling emotional difficulties that led her to self-harm.
Related: The Voice’s Karise Eden: From street kids to sing sensation!
The week after the series ended, Karise had four songs in the top five ARIA singles chart – the first act to do so since The Beatles in 1964. The sudden fame put her under a scrutiny that she wasn’t prepared for:
“It was stressful, it was hard, it took its toll on our health. In comes the social media. People started saying that I was ugly and I was fat and I sound like crap – just outright rude and vile and it hurt a lot.”
When the show ended and Karise went on a national tour of Australia’s Westfield shopping centres where she met with fans, she found herself being approached by other young girls in a similar position who were suffering abuse or self-harming:
“I didn’t know what to say to them. I didn’t know what I could say that would comfort them,” Karise said.
“I didn’t know, I was a kid just like them.
“My heart was there for them, but I didn’t know how to help them because I still needed help.”
Related: The Voice’s Karise Eden: ‘I’m finding my inner strength’
Donna Harrison, the manager of one of the refuges where Karise lived when she was a ward of the state, said that it would have placed the young musician under an enormous amount of pressure:
“That situation would have been extremely confronting for Karise, to the point where it definitely could have catapulted her back to the past when she was in a dark space,” Donna said.
“It does take its toll and I was getting very drained,” Karise said.
“I’d see these young girls and it was just a mirror – all I see is me.”
Related: Karise triumphs: ‘I’ve been to hell and back’
The pressure got too much and forced Karise to walk away: “I just lost myself and I didn’t know who I was expected to be,” she said.
“So basically I hit rock bottom and I had a breakdown.”
So Karise took the time she needed to grow as a person, settling down and getting herself together. On Australian Story she proudly showed off her new home in Queensland, after years of being shuffled between foster homes and refuges: “It’s amazing to have my own home,” she said. “Just knowing that this is mine and it’s not going to be taken away from me.”
“About six months after I moved in here I met the man that now became my fiancee and the beginning of my family.”
Karise is now pregnant with a son who is due in December and is releasing her first album since The Voice ended, with plans to tour later next year.
Related: Karise Eden announces she has a new baby AND a new album on the way
Is she ready to come back into the limelight again after her tumultuous early flirtation with fame? Her tour manager Jimmy Foster said:
“She got a sneak preview of what her life was going to be like and wasn’t prepared for it. And then took time out to get ready and put everything in place so she could meet this head-on because that’s what she wanted to do, and come back when she was ready in her time.”
Listen to Karise’s new song Dynamite below. It is the first single off her new album Things I’ve Done, out October 17.
Related: Karise’s cancer scare: ‘I’m going to be ok’
