Taylor Swift Shared A Heartbreaking Admission About Her Mother

Taylor Swift said her latest album, Midnights, is "a journey through terrors and sweet dreams, the floors we pace and the demons we face." And while Taylor has been very open about her demons in the past, there's one real challenge that she's mostly battled in private. Taylor once described her mom, Andrea, as her "escape in a lot of ways," but there was one problem that the two of them have not been able to outrun.

Making sacrifices for her daughter

Since the start of her career, Taylor's family has supported her dream of becoming a star. So when she had her big break at 14 years old, the family moved to Nashville so Taylor could focus on her music. Her parents — Scott and Andrea — truly went above and beyond to help launch her career, too.

Trying for record deals

Before the family moved, while Taylor was just out of elementary school, the future star recorded herself singing several popular songs. "My mom waited in the car with my little brother while I knocked on doors up and down Music Row," she told Entertainment Weekly in 2008. "I would say, 'Hi, I'm Taylor. I'm 11; I want a record deal. Call me.'" But her mom did give Taylor one bad piece of advice... sort of.

Teardrops on her guitar

"She came back from that trip to Nashville and realized she needed to be different, and part of that would be to learn the guitar," Andrea said to EW. "Now, at 12, she saw a 12-string guitar and thought it was the coolest thing. And of course, we immediately said, 'Oh no, absolutely not, your fingers are too small — not till you're much older will you be able to play the 12-string guitar.'" Yet Taylor didn't like that idea.

All it took

"Well, that was all it took," Andrea recalled. "Don't ever say never or can't do to Taylor. She started playing it four hours a day — six on the weekends. She would get calluses on her fingers and they would crack and bleed, and we would tape them up and she'd just keep on playing." The hard work paid off, of course.