Subscribe
Previous Post
This post is part of Celebrity Health Week at the b5media Health & Wellness Channel. For more information about Celebrity Health Week posts here at Mental Health Notes, visit Introducing Celebrity Health Week: Celebrities And Mental Illness.
We covered female celebrities with mental illnesses yesterday, and in this Celebrity Health Week post we’ll take a look at some male celebrities who have a mental illness – or had, in the case of the deceased. We’ll look at actors, singers, and other well-known male figures.
Please note that I am not an authority on celebrities and mental illness. For a celebrity to be on this list, either he or a spouse or reliable family member must have publicly discussed – verbally or otherwise – his mental illness, or, in the case of the deceased, professionals must have addressed it later on.
Read on.
In addition to the various male celebrities and well-known figures listed in yesterday’s Celebrities And Depression (including Owen Wilson, Mike Wallace, Rod Steiger, Terry Bradshaw, Tom Wolfe, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dick Cavett, Buzz Aldrin, Frederic Chopin, Abraham Lincoln, Eugene O’Neill, and Tennessee Williams), the following popular male figures have battled mental illness:
Dave Matthews, whose music has helped me numerous times through my own depression and who cannot marry me because he’s already married (and because Wenti simply would not go for it), has spoken about being depressed in his life.
Barret Robbins, formerly of the Raiders, has battled bipolar disorder and alcoholism.
John Nash, recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1994 and the subject of A Beautiful Mind, lives with schizophrenia.
Earl Campbell, former football pro and current founder and president of Earl Campbell Meat Products, Inc., manages panic disorder and documented his life with panic disorder in The Earl Campbell Story: A Football Great’s Battle With Panic Disorder.
Willard Scott, former weather reporter for The Today Show, also deals with panic attacks.
Francis Ford Coppola, a world renowned filmmaker, is included in many directories of celebrities who have bipolar disorder.
Anthony Hopkins, a well-known actor, talked about his struggles with depression and alcoholism in a New York Times interview.
Sting, aka Gordon Sumner, has spoken of being manic depressive.
James Taylor, another brilliant musician, has spoken of depression.
Axel Rose, frontman of Guns N’ Roses and the singer of many of the songs on the soundtrack of my childhood, admitted to being diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails has dealt with both depression and social anxiety disorder.
Freddie Prinze, Jr., actor, has spoken of his depression.
DMX, aka Earl Simmons, has admitted to having bipolar disorder.
Ben Stiller, hilarious actor, is pretty open about his bipolar disorder from what I gather.
Note that this is not a comprehensive list of male celebrities who have mental illness; it’s merely a list of the celebrities for whom I’ve found information. If you know of any others – and can provide credible sources – feel free to leave them in the comments.
Note, too, that many male political figures have been linked to mental illness (including Teddy Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Sen. Thomas Eagleton), as well as famous writers (such as James Joyce and Ernest Hemingway) but we’ll cover political figures and mental illness on Thursday and famous writers with mental illness on Friday.
Images: Newscom
91 days ago
[...] mental illness. In the past few years, several men have opened up about mental illness struggles. A list at Bliss Tree of male celebrities/public figures with mental illness struggles includes: Dave [...]
101 days ago
[...] mental illness. In the past few years, several men have opened up about mental illness struggles. A list at Bliss Tree of male celebrities/public figures with mental illness struggles [...]
Naturally, genius and mental illness all go together. However, there seems to be a “way out through” by using mindfulness and directly facing the issues. It’s a bit more like being” gored through” but otherwise how can one exit from the depths unless they’re willing to feel the issues. It’s a delusion that must be broken to quit. It’s harder than seems possible. I guess that’s why everybody acts so nonchalant when working with me, it’s a heavy load to bear and it’s not theirs so they’re very laissez-faire and rightly so. Drugs are not the answer unless someone want to be addicted which makes thing worse forever unless you quit them, I did. It was more than I expected AND I lived. Here I AM.
Love,
Stephanie
Wow.thankyou.
T
I was amazed at the many celebrities that suffer from bipolar and depression, but not surprised. I have suffered all my life from depression, sometimes debilitating. My son is bipolar and in a mental institution. Bipolar is biological in nature and futher aggravated by drug/alcohol use. I believe that bipolar personalities are very creative, while at the same time, can be so overwhelming and real to the person that he/she cannot understand what is real and what is “created” by the illness. How do the celebrities deal with it; are they on psych meds too? Richard Dreyfuss? He is such an excellent actor and citizen. It’s hard to comprehend. Ben Stiller? so many creative minds! It is truly amazing. Patty Duke. What can I do to help my son? He is on clonopin and Selexa right now, but is still delusional at times.
Diana
@ roger fritz – Thanks for your thoughts. I think treatment for mental illness goes a bit deeper than just changing one’s mindset.
@ siegmonde – Thanks for chiming in. I do agree that “lack of freedom” could wreak havoc on one’s mind.
Many of celebrities has mantel illness they know about this problem but they are not able to get rid of from their mindset.
________________________
roger
Addiction Recovery Tennessee
[..]Male Celebrities and Mental Illness[..]
This is just a natural for a person for him to have a kind of problems. There are different ways to get this kind of mental illness. A good example would be lack of freedom to do want you want to do.
__________________
Siegmonde – ‘We are the same’
1440 days ago
[...] Male Celebrities and Mental Illness [...]