Hayden Panettiere has opened up about the severe postpartum depression she battled after having her daughter.
To recap, Hayden became a first-time mom in December 2014. She welcomed a daughter, Kaya Evdokia Klitschko, with her then-fiancé, Wladimir Klitschko. In August 2018, however, she and Wladimir split. The Heroes actor then made the tough decision to sign over full custody of her daughter while she struggled with postpartum depression as well as an addiction to alcohol and opioids.
The Heroes star was “incapable of being a semi-decent mom”
“I had it all planned out in my head,” Hayden told US Weekly of how she imagined motherhood would be before welcoming her daughter.
“As the plans just collapsed, the postpartum came, and I was completely out of control,” she went on. “I was nowhere near the mom that I had sworn to myself that one day I was going to be … I was incapable of being an even semi-decent mom, in my mind.”
For Hayden, this turn of events was “devastating.”
“[It] was heartbreaking,” she continued. “I’m such a perfectionist in so many ways that being at least a good mother was just so, so important to me.”
Although she admitted she probably hasn’t been able to fully process “those emotions in a healthy way,” she now has an “incredible” relationship with both her ex and their daughter.
“I can’t even put it into words. She’s just an incredible gift,” the actor said of Kaya. “She is just such an incredible human being.”
“She’s otherworldly,” she went on. “And it’s incredible for me to be able to watch her thrive in areas that I struggled with growing up.”
You can read more about Hayden’s postpartum struggle in her upcoming memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, which is released on May 19.
TELL US – DID YOU KNOW ABOUT HAYDEN’S STRUGGLE WITH POSTPARTUM DEPRESSION? AND, WILL YOU READ HER MEMOIR?
