Dubai: Paige Spiranac broke down in tears on Monday and revealed that she had received death threats ahead of her second appearance at the Omega Dubai Ladies Masters at Emirates Golf Club this week.

The 23-year-old American social media sensation, who has an impressive 860,000 followers on Instagram, got an invite to make her professional event debut at this tournament last year.

However, she missed the cut by six strokes prompting online bullies to suggest she got the invite due to her social media following, and not her golfing ability.

“It was really bad. Right after, I took about three weeks off, just not looking at anything,” she said.

“When you look at the comments, they are extremely cruel. They attack not only me but my parents, family and friends. They say I am a disgrace to golf. I still get those comments and I still deal with it every day.

“I struggled a lot with depression after it, because as a [then] 22-year-old, you feel like you are not worth anything. You feel worthless, and no matter what you do, it’s never good enough.

“So to have all these people say that I’m not a golfer, I’m not a good person, I’m promiscuous, or to make judgements about me that aren’t true, just because I like to wear spandex on the golf course, it’s really hard.

“You think about it and it seems so foolish, but you never know what that person is going through in their life.

“Teenage suicide rates are up right now and they think it’s because of cyberbullying. So, if I can share my story … I’m OK with being emotional about it, and I’m OK with expressing what happened, because people don’t realise how hard it was.

“The comments I get, people threatening my life, saying the world is better off without me, people don’t see that side of it. And I think it’s really important to share that.”

Of her return to Dubai this week, she said: “It doesn’t matter how I play this week, it really doesn’t. But the fact I’m here, sharing my story, hopefully can save someone’s life, I think that’s so much more important than whether I make the cut or not.”

Asked if she had reported the death threats to authorities, she replied: “It’s more like: ‘the world would be better off without you’. I report it but nothing really happens with it. They are not saying: ‘I’m going to your house on this day and I’m going to kill you,’ so they can’t really do anything about it.

“Cyberbullying is a huge problem and no one ever discusses it. They never talk about it but it needs to be talked about and brought to light.

“I think the most important thing for anyone who is being bullied is to make sure they have someone they can talk to. I think people are ashamed of the fact that they are being bullied and they don’t feel like they are cool enough. And I think it’s important for people who are being bullied to express that to other people and have an outlet.”