Drew Barrymore

Many people nowadays would look at Drew Barrymore and think, “Wow. She has her life together. She looks happy. I’m glad being a child actor didn’t ruin her life,” but for a period of time, that wasn’t the case at all. Barrymore likes to think that she “got it over with” at the age of fourteen, but in reality, this was a major disruption in her life that defined her at the time.

By age twelve, Barrymore had already attempted suicide once and been through a stay in rehab. Her parents were divorced, and her mother would take her to nightclubs instead of actually parenting her. At this young age, with little to no parental supervision, Barrymore had no way to understand her actions and decide right from wrong. At age thirteen, this all culminated to her mother essentially abandoning her by admitting her to a psychiatric institution that became her home for a year and a half. By the time she got towards the end of her long stay in the mental hospital, the institution suggested that becoming legally emancipated from her mother would provide her a better environment for growth. With voluntarily leaving your parents, especially to cause an improvement in your living arrangements, there comes a tremendous mental toll. This was then amplified by the fact that after her stay in the mental institution, she was seen as unemployable. She had been out of acting for so long and was seen as “unstable” and “too big of a gamble.” She worked odds and ends until she was able to get back into her acting career and get where she is today.

Many people when they think of Drew Barrymore either see the little girl from E.T. or the Drew Barrymore that the news reports on today who is still acting and now raising her own children. Many people tend to focus on the positives of others’ lives and just notice how happy they seem on the surface when really there may be so much more going on. This is much more typical in everyday life than we acknowledge. With this in mind, there are people out there who speak out and share their story. This can help others going through similar problems. Sometimes all a person needs to hear is that they aren’t alone and someone else is, or was, in their shoes. Barrymore released her story in her biography, “Little Girl Lost,” and talks about her struggles frequently hoping to help others, but many people suffer in silence while appearing put together on the outside. 

https://www.310recovery.com/how-drew-barrymore-overcame-childhood-addiction/