Liam Payne is going through it. On Sunday, he got into his feelings on Instagram stories about relationships and regret. And in one of his cryptic posts, he even tagged his ex-lover.
When I saw these, I felt an interesting mix of confusion and sadness for him. Confused, because this is... a lot. Sad, because I’m a hopeless romantic. Everyone knows that feeling of regret, or thinking you let “the one that got away” trope actually happen to you. For context, Liam split from his now ex-fiancée, Maya Henry, after a ten month romance. And yes, that is her Instagram tagged in one of the Instagram stories, but that post was eventually deleted. It was one of those things where everyone knew this was a conversation that could’ve been kept private but since it’s right there, you can’t seem to look away. Liam isn’t one to do this kind of thing. He’s pretty open in interviews about life experiences, but when it comes to posting on social media, he tends to be a little more reserved. When I saw Liam’s name trending on Twitter, I scrolled through some fans trying to stop people from talking about it, and then people like me who were trying to understand where this was coming from and why it came up like this. Fortunately, most of the conversations I saw made sure not to kick Liam when he was already clearly down. I didn’t see any memes or jokes at his expense. Instead, there were countless messages for Liam to stay strong. Personally, I have a hard time remembering that celebrities go through the same emotional crap the rest of us have to deal with too. If this post wasn’t Liam, it wouldn’t be out of the norm to see something like this happen online; it could even be me after a glass of wine after a busy day. However, it’s naive to think that celebrities with media training like Liam from his years in One Direction would just let this slide as an “oopsie”. If it was a mistake, he wouldn’t have only deleted the post where he tagged his ex. He wanted the world to see this. So what could have possibly made Liam want to have this moment of vulnerability in front of everyone?
Based on Liam’s interview on The Diary of A CEO, his actions led to the breakup. The video is pretty long, but in summary, he talked about how he’s “just not been very good at relationships.” He went on to say, “I just need to work on myself and not on somebody else. And I feel like that’s where I got to in my last relationship.” I think that’s just it. Liam seems to at least be aware of his own behaviours, and he admitted himself that this is something he needs to work on. So when I see some people say that this may be a sign of a rekindling romance, I think we’re missing a few steps first. If anything, it was an attempt. In that interview, he said ending the relationship didn’t feel “good”, which is the textbook definition of not getting proper closure. I’m thinking that Maya has been taking space from him and, in a bout of sadness, reminiscing, and a little bit of hope, this was the only way he knew to get her attention. After all, this is the generation that literally lives on social media, famous or not. Will they get back together over time? This is the season of celebrity romantic reunions.
