Lena Dunham Taking ‘Rest’ from Press Tour

Girls star Lena Dunham announced on her Facebook page that she’s taking a “rest” from the upcoming press tour for the final season of her HBO series due to her endometriosis, a painful disorder of the reproductive system affecting women in their 30s or 40s.

“As many of you know I have endometriosis, a chronic condition that affects approximately 1 in 10 women’s reproductive health,” Dunham, 29, wrote on her Facebook page.

“I am currently going through a rough patch with the illness and my body (along with my amazing doctors) let me know, in no uncertain terms, that it’s time to rest,” she added, explaining why she “won’t be out and about doing press for the new season.”

Dunham’s show Girls is set to return for its final season on February 21st.

The actress and feminist activist has been in the news lately as a stalwart supporter and campaigner for Hillary Clinton. She stumped for Clinton in New Hampshire and Iowa last month.

Dunham’s backing of Hillary has been a notable exception to the rule this campaign season, where Clinton’s challenger, Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, has enjoyed broad support from young progressives of Dunham’s generation. A coalition of 121 celebrities calling themselves Artists for Bernie include some of the best known names in Hollywood progressive circles, including Sarah Silverman, Mark Ruffalo, Will Ferrell, Susan Sarandon, and the band Red Hot Chili Peppers, which performed a benefit concert for the Vermont socialist earlier this month in Los Angeles.

Though Dunham has never publicly wavered from her support of Clinton’s presidential bid and has criticized the media coverage of the Democratic candidate as “rabidly sexist,” the New York Times reported last month that she privately expressed reservations about the way the Clintons handled women who accused Bill Clinton of sexual misconduct.

The Times reported:

This month, Lena Dunham, wearing a red, white and blue sweater dress with the word “Hillary” emblazoned across the chest, told voters how Hillary Clinton had overcome sexism in her political career.

“The way she has been treated is just more evidence of the fact that our country has so much hatred toward successful women,” Ms. Dunham, the creator and star of the HBO series “Girls,” said at a Clinton campaign event in Manchester, N.H.

But at an Upper East Side dinner party a few months back, Ms. Dunham expressed more conflicted feelings. She told the guests, at the Park Avenue apartment of Richard Plepler, the chief executive of HBO, that she was disturbed by how, in the 1990s, the Clintons and their allies discredited women who said they had had sexual encounters with or been sexually assaulted by former President Bill Clinton.

The Times story notes that Dunham “declined a request for comment,” but her spokesperson called the article’s description of her comments at that New York dinner party a “total mischaracterization.”

Read Dunham’s Facebook post below: