Reese Witherspoon has conquered Hollywood and the enterprise world, however even 26 years after turning into a mom, she’s reflecting again on how powerful it was to battle postpartum depression after giving start.
The Legally Blonde legend and Hey Sunshine founder was simply named one in every of Harper’s Bazaar’s 2025 Ladies of the 12 months, and through her interview, she opened up about how whereas it was onerous to make it as an actor and even more durable to start out her personal media empire, fighting postpartum despair and anxiousness was “actually unhealthy.”
“It was actually unhealthy,” she said in the interview. “Within the first six months, I used to be concurrently blissful and depressed. I simply cried on a regular basis, I used to be up all night time, I used to be exhausted.”
The mother of Ava Philippe, 26, Deacon Philippe, 22 and Tennessee James Toth, 13, mentioned that she didn’t simply expertise signs after having her youngsters, she additionally skilled them when she stopped nursing months later — a hormone change that doesn’t get sufficient consideration.
“It was a hormone drop I didn’t anticipate, which I skilled proper after start and once more after I stopped nursing six months later,” she continued. “Everybody has an opinion. It’s onerous being a younger mother and having folks let you know methods to be, methods to react, methods to give start, methods to nurse and methods to feed your child. It’s inundating.”
She added {that a} good buddy helped assist her and get her the skilled medical assist she wanted, however that she was in a privileged place.
“I had the connections and the means to get to a health care provider, a mental-health specialist, however lots of people don’t. They wrestle on their very own and conceal it,” she mentioned.
This isn’t the primary time that Witherspoon has opened up about her mother psychological well being struggles. In 2020, on Jameela Jamil‘s I Weigh podcast, she described how her postpartum despair manifested in a different way with every of her youngsters.
“I’ve had three youngsters. After every little one I had a distinct expertise,” she defined. “One child I had type of gentle postpartum, and one child I had extreme postpartum the place I needed to take fairly heavy medicine as a result of I simply wasn’t considering straight in any respect. After which I had one child the place I had no postpartum in any respect.”
She added: “I’ve deep compassion for ladies who’re going via that,” she added. “Postpartum could be very actual.”
Learn Reese’s full Harper’s Bazaar interview here.
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