TV star Rebecca Gibney has revealed her battle with crippling panic attacks.
The Halifax f.p. actress said she her mental health first started to falter as her marriage to musician Irwin Thomas broke down while she was rising to fame in the 1990s.
“It was pretty tough,” Gibney said on Channel Seven’s This Is Your Life on Monday.
“And that was the hard thing, you do put on a front. My career was going great guns,” she said.
“I just couldn’t verbalise there was a hole inside of me and I was tumbling into it.”
The Packed to the Rafters star said one of her lowest points came on a flight from France to Australia, on which she needed five Valium to “survive”.
At one point Gibney, 57, was having 15 panic attacks a day.
“I had anxiety attack after anxiety attack. I was in such a hole, and I thought I’m not going to make it,” she admitted.
“I was struggling, and I couldn’t verbalise what was wrong. I just knew there was a hole inside me and it was getting bigger and bigger, and I was tumbling into it.
“I didn’t even tell Mum, I couldn’t even tell my family, because I couldn’t explain it.
“It’s so important that now, people talk about their struggles. Because if you get the help, you can get through it.
“Now I know that if I start to slide into that pit, I know that there’s a way out of it.”
Gibney credits therapy for her recovery.
