This is not the first time the actress Ileana D’Cruz shared her experience in dealing with Body Dysmorphic Disorder and battle against depression. She even revealed how her boyfriend Andrew Kneebone helped her in this fight against such mental conditions.
In an interview with the IANS, Ileana said, “Things had got so bad that I was pushing people away. I didn’t realize how much I was alienating people. I would constantly refuse to go out when friends would call. At one point, I didn’t realize I was at home for a week... After that, I got an ultimatum from him.”
The actress also confirmed that at one point of time she had ’suicidal thoughts’. She said that depression can be dealt with when it is accepted and then through proper counseling. She added, “Now I don’t look at life where I’d say: ’Oh gosh, my life’s over if I don’t have films anymore’. My approach is that there’s so much more for me to do... It (depression) really was in a way god sent... That depression and that phase in my life, as horrible as it was, was needed in a way to switch things back and change who I was as a person.”
Ileana discussed the reason which stirred up her depression at the 21st World Congress of Mental Health. She said that it was due to the fact that she always wanted to be ’accepted by everyone’. To be precise she said, “I used to feel low and sad all the time but didn’t know I was suffering from depression and Body Dysmorphic Disorder till I got help. At one point, I even had suicidal thoughts and wanted to end things. However, all of it changed when I accepted myself and what I was going through. I think that is the first step towards fighting depression.”
Mrigaya Dham
