The father of Lil Nas X has broken his silence following the rapper’s widely publicized arrest last week, describing his son’s recent struggles as a painful consequence of both fame and personal burden. Speaking to The Times over the weekend, Robert Stafford said he believes the weight of expectation both as a global superstar and as a son trying to hold his family together, contributed to the incident that left fans shocked and worried.

Lil Nas X, born Montero Lamar Hill, was taken into custody in Studio City, Los Angeles, on August 21. Police say the 26-year-old Grammy-winning artist was roaming the streets wearing only underwear and cowboy boots when he allegedly charged at officers. He was arrested on four felony counts, pleaded not guilty in court, and was released on a $75,000 bond with the condition that he enter a drug treatment program.

For Stafford, the incident was not simply an isolated act of instability, but rather the visible eruption of years of pressure building behind the scenes. “I understand how the music business is,” he told the newspaper. “It’s like a high. When you get to that level, you want that drug again, you want to hit that high again.”

The father pointed to the intense demands of being both a global entertainer and the financial backbone of a family marked by hardship. Hill’s mother has long struggled with addiction, an issue that has occasionally surfaced in public view. In 2021, she was seen in a viral video pleading for food on an Atlanta street corner. According to Stafford, the inability to resolve her struggles despite his son’s success has weighed heavily on Lil Nas X. “For a 26-year-old to have to deal with what he’s dealing with, to be a breadwinner for a lot of people, the inability to change his mother’s situation and the pressure he puts on himself… that can weigh heavily on your heart,” Stafford explained. He said Hill had tried multiple times to help his mother, but she declined the assistance.

Stafford described the emotional moment he reunited with his son in jail after flying to Los Angeles in the aftermath of the arrest. “As soon as I walked through that door, I couldn’t do anything but cry,” he said. “To see my baby boy on the other side of that glass. We shed tears with each other for a minute. And I had to tell him that ‘What you’re going through is normal.’ We all have breakdowns every now and then, but the difference is, yours get played out in the public eye.”

Even during the visit, Stafford said, his son’s instinct was to apologize. “When I went to visit, he asked me to say, ‘Tell everybody I’m sorry they saw me like that.’ Even in that moment, he was apologizing to people for something he was going through.”

The rapper himself later reassured fans in an Instagram Story that he was recovering. “Your girl is gonna be OK, y’all,” he said in a candid update. “OK? She’s gonna be all right. That was terrifying. That was a terrifying last four days. But your girl is gonna be all right.”

In the days leading up to his arrest, Hill had posted a string of unusual content on Instagram, from unreleased tracks and self-portraits to random piles of household objects, that some followers interpreted as either artistic experimentation or a deliberate attempt to stir controversy ahead of new music. Others worried the posts signaled deeper turmoil. The arrest, and subsequent court filings, put to rest speculation that the bizarre behavior was part of a marketing stunt.

Stafford said he hopes the ordeal will serve as a moment of reckoning for his son. “Hopefully, this is a turning point in his mental stability,” he said. “Sometimes God will take you through your worst moment to give you your best moment.”