‘I need help’: Perez Hilton speaks first words after livestream self-harm incident: report

An insider who has known the family for nearly 20 years told the Daily Mail that Hilton’s first three words he spoke to his mother in the hospital following the incident were: “I need help.”

Authorities responded to Hilton’s house after receiving numerous 911 calls about a suicide attempt. First responders were at the scene for around four hours, and Hilton was taken to a local hospital where he was placed on a psych hold under the Baker Act. Hilton’s family said his 3 children, sister, and niece were home in the moments leading up to the incident but fled as he began cutting himself.

The insider told the Daily Mail of Hilton, “He's really suffering. He's a man in a lot of pain. I think right now he's focused on the physical, but it's all tied together. No one deserves the torment he's going through.” The source said that Hilton is stable and alert.

“He was able to articulate himself [to his mother in hospital] but I don't think he's quite self-aware enough yet [to understand exactly what happened],” the source continued. “He's still in a dark place as I understand it. Just very very sad.”

The family friend said that in the hours leading up to the incident on Tuesday, nothing seemed amiss. “He was acting normal. That's the thing. He was getting excited about future projects. It had been a good day up to then.”

The source later added, “There was nothing specific that happened that anyone knows of. He hasn't been particularly depressed.” They added, “Nothing bad has happened—he was actually looking forward to new opportunities and new projects. The numbers on his website had been low, but they had been going up, not down. So there wasn't like a big event. We think it's the stress from the move. He can get very overwhelmed sometimes. Everyone knows that. But never to this extent.”

Hilton had recently moved from Las Vegas to Miami with his family earlier in the summer. In March, Hilton had spent 21 days in the hospital with sepsis, undergoing two surgeries. In the wake of the health scare, Hilton dove into religion, even launching a line of religious-themed clothing.

A second source said they thought the pivot to religion “was a little strange,” but “I just thought, ‘OK, this is a man who almost lost his life.'” The source, who became close to Hilton in Las Vegas, said that Hilton was missing Las Vegas and was feeling “overwhelmed.”

“He did tell me that he was stressed out but, at the time, I thought it was because of the move. I didn't know that it was because of anything else,” the source said. “Whether it's...the stress of having three children and looming bills and the inability to work while you're navigating medical issues and just normal-life stressors - plus, I don't know what his doctors were telling him about his condition - I think all of that contributed to this.”