Hayden Panettiere Postpartum Depression: ‘Nashville’ Star Opens Up About The Support She Received After Public Battle

Hayden Panettiere is opening up about her battle with postpartum depression following her rehab stay, which she voluntarily checked into to improve her health. Panettiere shared her story with postpartum depression months after she gave birth to her daughter, Kaya, in December.

Now, Panettiere is coming forth to talk about the enormous amount of support she received when she decided to share her story in going through postpartum depression.

In an interview with Yahoo Style, the Nashville star said, “I was always so terrified that people weren’t going to accept me. I finally just went, ‘I’m tired of living afraid. I’m tired of living in fear of what people are going to think, so you know, I’m just going to put it all out there on the table and I’m not going to worry about the judgment.'”

That said, the fact that people were open to hearing her story surprised the actress.

“The more open I was, the more acceptance I got from people. I got so much support and so much love. I was floored. I feel much more exposed, yes, but in a great way.”

In order to make people more aware of the condition, the writers at Nashville decided to give Panettiere’s character postpartum depression as well. The star said that putting herself into her characters was typical and didn’t feel strange to her.

“The way I do things is to pull from my own personal experience and sometimes even turn myself into what I’m portraying so that I can pull from my life and step into that person’s shoes by being able to relate.”

The loves of my life ?? @Klitschko pic.twitter.com/MwpUKRxS4w

— hayden panettiere (@haydenpanettier) March 5, 2016

Panettiere checked into rehab in October of 2015.

At the time, her rep told E!, “Hayden had been suffering for a long time and she just wants to get better for her family.”

The announcement came on the heels of a canceled event. Hayden was originally scheduled to speak at a domestic violence awareness event in New York City but had to pull out due to her decision to voluntarily check herself into rehab.

When she first opened up about postpartum depression, Hayden Panettiere said that she only knew of one type, where the mother wants to harm their child. She said that she never had that overwhelming feeling, but she explained that going through her own experience made her aware that there was a spectrum of postpartum depression as a whole.

As the actress is slowly getting back to living her life, her character on Nashville is, too.
As the Inquisitr reported, Panettiere’s co-star Charles Esten shared that the actress was back to filming via his Instagram account. In the photo, Hayden is simply glowing as she gets back to work.

Esten captioned the photo with a sweet message for his co-star.

“The first face I saw as I walked out of my first NASHVILLE audition belonged to this beautiful girl. And she was clapping. Still can’t get over that.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/BBBSiXwTSDi/

In the end, the actress went on to tell Yahoo Style that she realized people connect with being human and just “doing your own thing.”

Panettiere continues her activism to let people know more about postpartum depression.

[Photo by Jason Kempin/Getty Images for The Critics’ Choice Awards]