Brooke Shields can relate to the many women who have suffered from “terrifying” postpartum depression.
Shields revealed that she almost crashed her car into a wall on California’s 405 freeway after giving birth to her oldest daughter, Rowan, who is now 19.
“I thought I was going to drive my car into the wall on the 405,” she said in her documentary “Brooke Shields: Pretty Baby.” “You see it [happening].
“It has pictures. They rush, if you close your eyes, into your brain.”
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Brooke Shields revealed just how scary things got while she was suffering from postpartum depression. (Jamie McCarthy)
The documentary, which premiered Monday on Hulu, showed that the “Pretty Baby” star was on the phone with her doctor during the situation, and the doctor said, “You’re going back on the medicine immediately.”
Shields was hesitant to take medication because she thought she could “fix [her]self” but inevitably followed her doctor’s recommendations to “get everybody off my back.”
“It was so bleak,” she recalled. “My mother-in-law called me and said I had dead eyes. I finally said, ‘OK.’”
Brooke Shields revealed she had postpartum depression after the birth of her daughter Rowan, left. She also shares Grier, right, with husband Chris Henchy. (Getty Images)
She shared on the “WTF with Marc Maron” podcast she went “cold turkey” and stopped taking her medication prior to the incident on the freeway.
“I started just feeling more myself, so I went off … because clearly I was a doctor by that point,” Shields admitted.
The “Blue Lagoon” star gave birth to daughter Rowan in 2003. Shields and Chris Henchy welcomed their second daughter, Grier, in 2006.
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Brooke Shields, Grier Henchy and Chris Henchy all attended the “Brooke Shields: Pretty Baby” New York premiere in March. (Jamie McCarthy)
In the documentary, Shields also addressed Tom Cruise commenting on her decision to take antidepressants.
At the time, Shields had just released a book, “Down Came the Rain: My Journey Through Postpartum Depression,” while Cruise was doing press for his movie “War of the Worlds.” In a conversation with Matt Lauer on “The Today Show,” Cruise discussed his problems with psychiatric drugs.
Cruise, who co-starred with Shields in the 1981 film “Endless Love,” described psychiatric drugs as “dangerous,” which he says is independent of the Church of Scientology’s choice not to use “mind-altering psychotropic drugs.”
Brooke Shields told Jay Leno in 2006 that Tom Cruise had apologized to her for his comments about antidepressants. (Amy Sussman/Jeff Spicer)
Shields boldly responded to Cruise’s initial comments, writing an op-ed piece for The New York Times.
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In the article, Shields addressed his interview, writing in part, “I WAS hoping it wouldn’t come to this, but after Tom Cruise’s interview with Matt Lauer on the NBC show ‘Today’ last week, I feel compelled to speak not just for myself but also for the hundreds of thousands of women who have suffered from postpartum depression. While Mr. Cruise says that Mr. Lauer and I do not ‘understand the history of psychiatry,’ I’m going to take a wild guess and say that Mr. Cruise has never suffered from postpartum depression.
Brooke Shields’ documentary explored all aspects of her life. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images)
“Comments like those made by Tom Cruise are a disservice to mothers everywhere. To suggest that I was wrong to take drugs to deal with my depression, and that instead I should have taken vitamins and exercised shows an utter lack of understanding about postpartum depression and childbirth in general. If any good can come of Mr. Cruise’s ridiculous rant, let’s hope that it gives much-needed attention to a serious disease.”
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Shields later told Jay Leno on “The Tonight Show” that Cruise had apologized.