Drew Barrymore admits she was in a “very dark and fearful place” after divorce
Drew Barrymore is a brilliant, funny and hardworking mum of two and she’s proven yet again that she’s facing the same kinds of struggles as the rest of us.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BdI28m_B4x0/?hl=en&taken-by=drewbarrymore
“I personally was in a very dark and fearful place”
Hot on the heels of the season two release of her hit Netflix series, Santa Clarita Diet, Drew admitted she was in a really tough place when she accepted the role.
“I was not looking for a job,” Drew told Today. “I had actually stopped acting for several years because I wanted to raise my kids, but then a shift happened in my life and I was separating from their father and it was just a very difficult time.”
Drew hints at some pretty challenging mental health issues as she came to terms with her divorce, revealing she didn’t want to take this Netflix project on at all.
“I personally was in a very dark and fearful place, and then this script came along, and I was like, ‘Yeah, I don’t think it’s a good time.”’
Read more on Drew Barrymore:
The very good reason Drew Barrymore won’t FaceTime her kids
Drew Barrymore refused to pretend to be perfect
Drew Barrymore’s helpful busy-mum beauty routine
“The biggest failure”
Drew and Will Kopelman have two daughters together; three-year-old Frankie and five-year-old Olive. The pair announced their divorce in 2016, four years after they married, and Drew says she’s battled overwhelming feelings of failure and shame in the wake of her separation.
“When you break up with somebody, you’re like, ‘Yeah, that didn’t work,'” Drew told Chelsea Handler on Handler’s Netflix show.
“When you get divorced, you’re like, ‘I’m the biggest failure. This is the biggest failure.’ It’s so shameful and hard to actually go through that, even privately.”
Of course, there’s nothing shameful in the end of a relationship, and it’s certainly not a failure. That said it might feel like that to the parties involved (and they need lots of care and support as they come to terms with this transition).
“A thing that saves you”
Drew said while her initial instinct was to turn down Santa Clarita Diet, she’s glad she ignored that and pushed on through.
“Ironically I think it taught me a valuable life lesson, which was sometimes when you think something is the worst timing and the worst idea, it can actually become a thing that saves you and pulls you out and gives you a new focus and empowerment, and switches your constant stuck way of thinking and feeling and put it into something else that might actually get you to a healthier place faster,” she said.
This is further celebrity-endorsed proof that when we’re going through tough times, work and routine are a brilliant and bolstering salve.
“This is the adventure”
The actor and Flower Beauty company CEO says having kids has been a real saving grace, grounding her and giving her a fresh purpose after her own very traumatic childhood.
“They’ve made me such a calmer, better person,” she said. “I’ll never take the tone with them of work is bad, my past it bad, life is bad. This is the adventure and journey we’re on, but you have to be nice, and safe.”
That said, she’s totally ready to be a mum of teenage girls, and is sure her own early years have her extremely well-prepared.
“When my kids figure out some of the things I did in my childhood, I’m like, ‘Yeah, and that makes me all the more insightful to when you’re pulling crap on me,”’ Drew told Today.
“I was born for teenage girls. You are my karma and don’t worry, I know everything you’re up to. I’m basically in my 80s and I’ve seen it all darling. You ain’t pulling the wool over my eyes.”
