Bella Hadid’s journey to recovery has been anything but easy.

Recently, intimate photos emerged from a clinic in Germany, capturing the supermodel in a vulnerable state—teary-eyed in a hospital bed, connected to oxygen tubes and IV drips.

These images offered a rare look into the 29-year-old’s ongoing battle with what she refers to as chronic neurological Lyme disease, a struggle that has spanned over a decade.

Despite her health challenges, Bella returned to the spotlight, gracing the runway for Saint Laurent at Paris Fashion Week in late September and traveling to London to unveil her new perfume line. Yet, beneath the glitz and glamour, the Dutch-Palestinian model has reportedly found it challenging to resume her usual busy lifestyle after her recent health ordeal.

An insider revealed to the Daily Mail that Bella has been ignoring concerned messages from friends and family, choosing to retreat indoors and isolate herself like a recluse.

‘Bella is as functional as she can be, but there’s always room for improvement,’ the insider said.

‘She just struggles to be around people. When things get bad, she retreats. Her batteries seem to recharge when she’s alone.’

Hadid initially sparked concern when she revealed her stay at St. George Hospital located on the outskirts of Munich. It was there that Hadid was undergoing a month-long treatment for her Lyme disease symptoms at the clinic’s specialized center, where a week-long stay could cost upwards of $100,000.

The alarming images – which were shared by both Hadid and her mother Yolanda, who also suffers from chronic Lyme disease – showed the model hooked up to an IV, breathing through an oxygen tube and covered in wet towels.

In her own caption, Hadid apologized to her 61 million Instagram followers for being ‘MIA’ over the past month. But according to the source, the brief social media hiatus isn’t unusual for the Vogue cover star.

‘She doesn’t respond [to texts] for days or even weeks,’ they told the Daily Mail. ‘But when things are better, she will text back. She doesn’t ghost, she just says, “I can’t talk today, sorry.”

‘Everyone who loves her gets it,’ they said.

The model, who lives in Texas, confirmed as much when she took to her Instagram Story on Monday to share a candid message in honor of World Mental Health Day.

The post, originally shared by activist Alicia Cook, was a screenshot of a Notes App message that began, ‘Hi. Sorry I haven’t texted you back.’

The heartfelt screengrab highlighted the silent struggle that often comes with anxiety and depression, both of which Hadid suffers from.

Apart from the physical symptoms of her chronic Lyme disease – which she’s said includes headaches, brain fog, sensitivity to light and noise, thyroid dysfunction, inflammation, joint pain and numbness – Hadid also experiences severe bouts of depression and anxiety.

Just this week, Hadid explained to her Instagram followers how the ‘weight’ of her anxiety and depression ‘can sometimes feel all-consuming, paralyzing, and invisible to the outside world’.

‘Over the years, I’ve learned that this is not a weakness – it’s a part of me. My sensitivity, my awareness, my empathy. In many ways, it can be a superpower. It’s what makes us human, and these parts of me have helped me understand myself and others more deeply,’ she wrote.

However, the source maintained that the model has ‘a lot of people in her corner’ and a ‘huge support system’ behind her as she continues to navigate her health journey.

‘Everyone was supportive of her coming out and talking about [her mental health] because it’s going to help so many people and get rid of the stigma,’ the insider said.

That support system includes her mother Yolanda, her siblings Gigi and Anwar Hadid, and her boyfriend, Mexican-American rodeo star Adan Banuelos.

The model, known for her high-profile romance with The Weeknd, sparked an unlikely relationship with the 36-year-old professional cowboy in late 2023. 

While her move to the Lone Star State that same year was partly to be closer to the equestrian, Hadid also found her home in Texas to be a respite from the demands of the modeling industry.

‘After 10 years of modeling, I realized I was putting so much energy and love and effort into something that, in the long run, wasn’t necessarily giving it back to me,’ she told Allure in 2024.

‘For the first time now, I’m not putting on a fake face. If I don’t feel good, I won’t go. If I don’t feel good, I take time for myself. And I’ve never had the opportunity to do that or say that before,’ Hadid said. 

‘Now when anybody sees me in pictures and they say, I look happy, I genuinely am. I am feeling better; my bad days now were my old good days.’

Hadid has since made her return to the fashion world, but her recent chronic Lyme disease flare-up has indeed been a setback for the runway star.

Although she has no plans to ‘quit modeling’ altogether, the insider said, the A-list supermodel can now decide for herself exactly ‘when and how much’ energy she puts into her modeling career.

‘Right now she’s doing less because she doesn’t have to do any more,’ they added. ‘When she’s struggling physically, she struggles mentally as well. That’s just her life right now.’

However, Hadid’s battle with chronic Lyme disease hasn’t been without some criticism from health skeptics – the most common one being that chronic Lyme disease is not widely accepted by the medical community as a recognized medical term.

Most patients diagnosed with Lyme disease will recover after two to three weeks of antibiotics, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). 

Lingering symptoms do occur for some, known as post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome (PTLDS), as experts say these symptoms tend to last for weeks or months.

But in most cases, doctors argue that borrelia bacteria – the bacteria transmitted by ticks that causes Lyme disease – cannot stay active in the body for decades, despite what some chronic Lyme patients have claimed.

Research shows that patients who say they have chronic Lyme disease rarely ever test positive for the infection on blood tests.

Still, chronic Lyme disease activists say these traditional tests are unreliable because they look for antibodies for the bacteria, rather than the bacteria itself.

It’s also been suggested that people who claim to have chronic Lyme disease symptoms could actually be suffering from an undiagnosed condition, such as a severe vitamin deficiency or another immune disorder.

Hadid may have suggested as such when she reposted an infographic to her Instagram Story about mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), a chronic disease of the immune system.

MCAS, according to the Cleveland Clinic, is a condition that can cause severe allergic reaction-like symptoms such as swelling, diarrhea, vomiting, flushing and itching. 

It is caused when the mast cells in the immune system release mediators in the body too frequently or abundantly, in response to triggers found in foods, chemicals or the environment that are not typically considered to be harmful.

Hadid’s post, originally shared by Dr. Laura Gouge, a naturopathic doctor, aimed to highlight the ‘anxiety, panic, and OCD-like symptoms’ that patients with MCAS may also experience.

Though, Hadid didn’t explicitly state in her post whether she’d been diagnosed with MCAS during her recent stay at St. George Hospital.

It was during her extensive visit to the German clinic that Hadid underwent a series of invasive treatments to ease her chronic Lyme disease symptoms.

An inside source previously told the Daily Mail that Hadid received a whole-body hyperthermia treatment to kill bacteria responsible for Lyme disease. 

The high-tech treatment slowly raises a patient’s body temperature to 107 degrees Fahrenheit and then maintains it for two to three hours while they’re sedated.

Hadid had two rounds of the whole-body hyperthermia treatment, one week apart, the insider said at the time, as well as two weeks of antibiotics, multiple peptide infusions and Chelation therapy – the process of removing heavy metals from the body.

After more than a decade of unconventional treatments, unanswered questions and lingering mental health effects, it’s unclear whether Hadid will ever see an end to her chronic Lyme disease symptoms.

But one thing is for certain; the supermodel ‘will be OK,’ our insider maintained.

‘She has too many people concerned about her and checking in. She may struggle, but she knows she’s loved very much,’ they added.

The Daily Mail has contacted representatives for Hadid for comment.