Selena Gomez says vaping changed her voice as she talks about quitting nicotine

Selena Gomez said in Instagram Stories on October 18 that vaping nicotine had changed her voice and that she had recently stopped using it. Her account has drawn attention to her efforts to quit and, following criticism from some social-media users, to the kidney transplant she received in 2017.

“It’s so stupid. It changed my voice,” Gomez said, according to The Express Tribune. She said nicotine was hard to quit and urged people considering vaping to avoid it: “It’s just not worth it.”

What Selena Gomez said about quitting nicotine

Gomez said she had recently weaned herself off nicotine, according to the BBC. ARY News reported that she hoped to maintain that progress. “I just hope I can keep it up,” she said, adding that others going through something difficult could get through it too.

Why her voice and kidney transplant came up

Questions about Gomez’s voice predate this post. In an Instagram exchange last December, she said her throat sometimes swelled, according to the BBC. The singer and actress has lupus; the BBC noted that flare-ups can cause inflammation around the voice box. Gomez has attributed the change to vaping, but a medical cause for her particular voice change has not been established.

Gomez received a kidney transplant from her friend Francia Raisa in 2017, the BBC reported. The Express Tribune said some social-media users brought up that donation while criticizing Gomez’s nicotine use after her latest comments. Their criticism does not establish that vaping affected her transplanted kidney.

The reaction has not been uniformly critical: the BBC also reported that many fans supported Gomez for speaking openly about addiction. Gomez herself described quitting as hard and said she hoped she could keep going.