There is no question that Hilary Duff and her sister Haylie aren’t talking anymore. And it turns out that she’s not talking to her parents either. The 38-year-old singer has been the talk of the town since she dropped her album Luck… or Something, her first in nearly a decade, and she didn’t hold back when it came to her lyricism.
Whether it was admitting shes worried her husband will leave her, or her rift with her sister, she poured her heart out on the record. Now, she’s opening up about her family drama even more.
Hilary was a guest on On Purpose with Jay Shetty, where she revealed that “The Optimist” is about the rift with her parents.
“I think being very vulnerable and open about what it’s like to be in a family that your parents aren’t together, and you don’t have relationships with both of your parents,” she said.
“It’s devastating. It doesn’t matter what age you are; you want your parents to feel like they care about you. And a big portion of my existence hasn’t felt like that.” She admitted, “I don’t know if that’s the truth,” adding, “but that’s how it feels.”
© GettyHilary then confirmed when it comes to Hailey, “My sister and I don’t speak.” Haylie is two years older, and they were at one point collaborating on music.
Now, they’re no contact. “I think in my adulthood I’ve come across more and more people who are having this experience,” Hilary said, normalizing estrangement in adulthood.
© Peter KramerHilary’s album is raw and vulnerable. “As painful as it feels to share, when I decided to make this record, I could only talk about the things that I’ve gone through,” she explained. “Like there would be no purpose to make a record after 10 years than to face, you know, what it’s been like.”
“We Don’t Talk” is all about her sister. “That’s my truth,” she declared. “And I really worked hard to lyrically make sure that. I’m just speaking about my experience, you know?”
She described the song as “a very vulnerable song” and called the estrangement “a very raw part of my existence.” “I hope it’s not forever, but it’s for right now.”
Was it jealousy?
© Rich PolkHilary debuted the track during her first “Small Rooms, Big Nerves” show at London’s O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire. “We come from the same home, the same blood,” she sings. “Let’s have it out / I’ll hear you out, you’ll hear me out on the couch… So sick of being so sad about / How we don’t talk and you won’t talk about it.”
She even hints at not fully understanding what went wrong: “Not even sure what it was about.” She then hints at jealousy. While Haylie found success in her own ways, Hilary’s career skyrocketed. She is undoubtedly one of the most successful child stars of her generation.
“If it’s ’cause you’re jealous / God knows I would sell it all, then break you off the bigger half,” she sings. Even now, their fame is incomparable. Hilary has 28.1M followers on Instagram, while Hailey has less than a million.
The mom group drama
© Grosby GroupThe rumored rift resurfaced when Ashley Tisdale published an essay with The Cut about leaving a “mean girl” and “toxic” mommy group.
Internet detectives immediately speculated that Hilary was part of that group. Then, fans noticed Haylie had “liked” Tisdale’s promo post, and people saw it as her choosing a side. Then, Hailey shared an Instagram photo of her youngest daughter, Lulu, 7, playing under a table with Tisdale’s daughter Jupiter, 4.
As for when the rift started, they haven’t been photographed together since 2019. There’s also blind item chatter about tension involving Hilary’s husband, Matthew Koma, and Haylie’s fiancé, Matthew Rosenberg.
Will they ever make up?
© Grosby GroupWhen asked on CBS Mornings whether she hopes Haylie hears “We Don’t Talk,” Hilary’s answer was measured. “I don’t think that that would help,” she said. “I think I have to just exist as a person on my own and do what I want to do.”
“I hope that for everyone that is where I’m sitting, you have to do what you want to do and you have to do what feels good for you,” she continued. “It’s taken me a lot of time to get there and to live that way and to not care what the noise is going to be around it and just be me.”
She knows the song is personal. She knows it won’t stay private. “I don’t know how she’ll react to it,” Hilary admitted. “But it is a really personal part of my life that doesn’t get to stay personal, so I might as well say how it is for me as an experience.”
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