Bowen Yang is taking time off from his podcast due to ‘bad bouts of depersonalization’

Bowen Yang has announced he will be taking a short hiatus from co-hosting the podcast Las Culturistas, due mental health issues.

The 32-year-old actor, who is also on hiatus from Saturday Night Live wrote in an Instagram story, ‘Bad bouts of depersonalization are f**king me up bad, but I am doing my best to get better!’

‘Please take care, be soon,’ he told his fans. 

Bowen and co-host Matt Rogers have been producing the podcasts, which includes interviews with celebrity guests, since 2016. 

The Cleveland Clinic describes depersonalization disorder as being ‘detached from your thoughts, feelings and body… and ‘disconnected from your environment.’ 

The average age for developing depersonalization disorder is 16 and can be triggered by ‘intense stress or trauma,’ according to the hospital’s website.

Bowen revealed to the New York Times in 2020 he went through gay conversion therapy as a teen to appease his parents after they caught him chatting with another male on AOL messenger.

‘They just sat me down and yelled at me and said, ‘We don’t understand this. Where we come from, this doesn’t happen.’ 

The child of Asian immigrants, Bowen said the first few sessions with the ‘specialist’ ‘were talk therapy, which I liked, and then it veers off into this place of, “Let’s go through a sensory description of how you were feeling when you’ve been attracted to men.”‘

He felt that ultimately the practice which has since been banned in Colorado, where he was living at the time, was ‘completely crackers.’

Conversion therapy has been banned in more than a dozen US states. 

In a June interview with Rolling Stone, the funnyman, who is openly gay admitted, ‘I still have to pull that part of myself, turn it at a different angle, and understand it a different way.’

Bowen and co-host Matt Rogers have been producing the award winning podcast Las Culturistas since 2016, often interviewing A-list celebrities

Bowen suffers from depersonalization disorder, described by the Cleveland Clinic being ‘detached from your thoughts, feelings and body… and ‘disconnected from your environment’ (Pictured in New York in June)

‘I think ultimately that made me value and, in a literal sense, appreciate what I’m able to withstand and survive. You get this sense that you can overcome.’

Bowen has been cast in the role of Pfannee in the movie version of the musical Wicked, starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. 

‘I can’t believe I get to be a witness to it. They’re so open, good, and generous with everybody.’

But, he copped to needing to focus on his own projects.

‘I’m excited to pull back and work on my own thing. I’ve had a really good time supporting other work that is not necessarily my own that I can put my own imprimatur on, and that’s the exciting next adventure for me.’