Florence Pugh has responded to people criticising her relationship with Zach Braff.

On Monday, the actress posted a photo of Braff to mark his birthday. And taking to Instagram on Wednesday night, she said that within a couple minutes of sharing the photo, most of the comments were "hurling abuse and being horrid, basically bullying someone on my page". Many of the comments centred around the 21 year age gap between the couple, who have been romantically linked since October last year. "It makes me upset. It makes me sad that during this time when we really all need to be together, we need to be supporting one another, we need to be loving one another – the world is aching," she continued. "The world is dying, and a few of you decided to bully for no reason." "I am 24 years old. I do not need you to tell me who I should and should not love, and I would not ever in my life ever, ever tell anyone who they can and cannot love," the Little Women star added. "It is not your place and really it has nothing to do with you. So if those rules are something that you do not like, then please unfollow me because the abuse that you throw at him is abuse that you're throwing at me, and I don't want those followers." "I don't want to have to be protecting my comments every time I post a picture of him. I really hope that I can continue this relationship with a lot of you, that I can keep cooking and dancing. But I really don't' want this on my page; it's embarrassing and sad," she said, as she ended the message. "To those who do not agree with any of the things I have said, I hope that you unfollow me." You can watch her video in full below.