She went on to describe taking them as a "whirlwind for your body" and having to sit down midway through a photoshoot for her book cover because she was "so dizzy". She didn't tell anyone she was taking medication - including Simon Cowell - because she felt too embarrassed.
“I was mortified, which I now know is ridiculous and was all in my head,” she added, saying that she "eventually went to a juice retreat in the Mediterranean to wean myself off them" because she felt it was the only way she could "get them out" of her body.
Antidepressant stigma
Anyone who speaks as candidly as Flack has done about their experience of depression should be praised for doing so. It's this sort of awareness-raising by people in the public eye that helps to erode some of the social stigmas surrounding those who suffer from mental health issues and have, or are, undergoing treatment for them.
However, her singular description has raised some interesting questions about the continuing stigma attached to taking antidepressant medication, whipped up to fever-pitch by headlines describing doctors handing them out "like sweets", or of a nation "hooked on happy pills".
She’d also spoken about having hypnotherapy to deal with anxiety, seeking help ahead of her debut as Roxie Hart in the West End production of Chicago back in 2018. ‘When I had eight days to learn the role I went to see [a hypnotherapist] and he put my mind in the right place,’ she told Loose Women at the time. ‘Everyone’s different, if I’m going through a bit of a tough time I can just call him and say “hey can I come over and see you?”’ In the days leading up to Christmas 2019, she’d also liked a string of tweets encouraging Twitter users to reach out for help and that they’re never alone.
By Jenn Selby
Monday, 10th December 2018, 1:30 pm
Updated
Friday, 6th September 2019, 10:00 pm
Caroline Flack has had a tumultuous time in the media spotlight. From her relationship with a then-17-year-old contestant Harry Styles while she was presenting the X Factor spin-off show in 2011, to her on-off romance with fiancé Andrew Brady during a lucrative role as the host of Love Island, it's been stormy at sea. So it is refreshing and brave of her to discuss the struggle she was having with her mental health away from the glare of show business.
The presenter, 39, told the Sun on Sunday she became reliant on antidepressants following her Strictly Come Dancing win in 2014 and her ill-fated stint as the co-presenter of the X Factor with Olly Murs in 2015 (the pair were repeatedly panned for their stilted performances and on-air gaffes during the live shows).
Caroline Flack attends 'The Prince's Trust' event in March 2018. (Photo: Getty)
Caroline Flack attends 'The Prince's Trust' event in March 2018. (Photo: Getty)
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In the interview, she describes feeling like somebody had "covered my body in clingfilm" the day after the Strictly final - a sensation of heaviness and lifelessness she was unable to shake for about a year afterwards.
“Antidepressants helped me get up in the morning, and stopped me from being sad, but what they also do is stop you from being happy," she said.
“So I was just in this numb state. I stopped laughing at jokes, and that’s just not me.
“I came off them after six months, as I realised feeling something was better than feeling nothing at all.”
'I was mortified'
Flack was prescribed a drug called Citalopram - a type of antidepressant known as an SSRI, which stands for 'selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor' - after suffering a panic attack in her X Factor dressing room moments before she had to take to the stage.
“While antidepressants can work for some people, I became a little too reliant on them — if you forget to take one, you feel awful."
She went on to describe taking them as a "whirlwind for your body" and having to sit down midway through a photoshoot for her book cover because she was "so dizzy". She didn't tell anyone she was taking medication - including Simon Cowell - because she felt too embarrassed.
“I was mortified, which I now know is ridiculous and was all in my head,” she added, saying that she "eventually went to a juice retreat in the Mediterranean to wean myself off them" because she felt it was the only way she could "get them out" of her body.
Antidepressant stigma
Anyone who speaks as candidly as Flack has done about their experience of depression should be praised for doing so. It's this sort of awareness-raising by people in the public eye that helps to erode some of the social stigmas surrounding those who suffer from mental health issues and have, or are, undergoing treatment for them.
However, her singular description has raised some interesting questions about the continuing stigma attached to taking antidepressant medication, whipped up to fever-pitch by headlines describing doctors handing them out "like sweets", or of a nation "hooked on happy pills".
Daily Mail front page from Friday 29th November 2017.
Daily Mail front page from Friday 29th November 2017.
It is also this stigma that quite often puts people - who may need medication in order to lift their moods sufficiently for therapies like Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to have a greater impact on them - off taking them. The idea that depression or anxiety can always be solved by eating kale, going jogging and meditating has long been discredited - as has the theory that antidepressants are simply a jumped-up placebo that tricks the brain into feeling better by jolting the body.
In actual fact, SSRIs are one of the most popularly prescribed antidepressant drugs because they are non-addictive and have few side-effects which, by and large, wear off after two-to-four weeks of taking them.
Kara Rose Marshall, Caroline Flack, Fearne Cotton, Nicola Roberts, Leigh-Anne Pinnock and Louisa Rose Allen aka Foxes attend the House of Holland show during London Fashion Week Spring/Summer collections 2017. (Photo: Getty)
Kara Rose Marshall, Caroline Flack, Fearne Cotton, Nicola Roberts, Leigh-Anne Pinnock and Louisa Rose Allen aka Foxes attend the House of Holland show during London Fashion Week Spring/Summer collections 2017. (Photo: Getty)
The claim that they can stop people from being happy is also incorrect: SSRIs work by allowing the brain to take up more of feel-good hormone serotonin, the very ingredient needed to stimulate a positive mood.
Life-saving treatment
"It would be too simplistic to say that depression and related mental health conditions are caused by low serotonin levels, but a rise in serotonin levels can improve symptoms and make people more responsive to other types of treatment, such as CBT," NHS advice on taking SSRIs explains.
The NHS also advises being monitored by a doctor for the first six weeks of taking them to gauge the right dosage and move to a different type of drug if that particular version isn't working for the patient.
"About 17 years of ADs and I am such an advocate for them," @MarisaTacoma tweeted in response to Flack's story. "I've tried more than I can remember, & not all work forever. But medical treatments (from braces to chemo) are not the One Ring. There isn't any that just works for all."
Journalist Mollie Goodfellow started a popular thread on social media off the back of the interview.
"When I was non-medicated and very depressed I basically felt numb and nothing, was interesting in nothing and wanted to do nothing," she wrote. "ADs picked me up to a level ground, so I could do my life but I can still also feel everything? Happiness, sadness. I still have depressive episodes."
As with most medications and courses of therapy, there isn't a one-size-fits-all cure. Flack's experience sounds deeply isolating and confusing - and it also appears as though she may not have had the support she needed at the time to find a better medication or course of treatment.
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