Entertainment News
2007-03-08
Rosie being
treated for depression
Rosie O'Donnell
says she started treatment for depression after the
Columbine school shootings and hangs upside down for up to a
Rosie O'Donnell
says she started treatment for depression after the
Columbine school shootings and hangs upside down for up to a
half-hour a day to improve her mental state.
When gunmen
killed 13 people at Columbine High School in Colorado in
1999, O'Donnell said she felt as if it had happened to her
children.
''I couldn't stop
crying,'' she said on an episode taped for ABC's The
View and due to air Friday. ''I stayed in my room. The
lights were off. I couldn't get out of bed, and that's
when I started taking medication.''
Anyone concerned
about the stigma of taking medication for depression
should know that ''it saved my life,'' she said.
When she began
taking antidepressants, O'Donnell, 44, said she began yoga
and ''inversion therapy,'' where she hangs upside down by a
swing for 15 to 30 minutes a day. She demonstrates it
on The View.
O'Donnell said
she also has seasonal affective disorder, often called
SAD, the wintertime blues that can strike when the days grow
short. SAD is characterized by recurrent major
depressive episodes during the fall and winter.
She's ''instantly
happy'' on sunny days but feels as if she's being
tortured when it's cloudy. She feels the most important
thing to do when you're feeling depressed is to get up
and move.
''Like in The
Wizard of Oz, the color goes out,'' she said. ''That
is what happens in depression. Everything gets gray.''
Friday's episode
of The View is devoted to women and depression.
Actress Linda Dano, who was diagnosed with clinical
depression after her husband and mother died within 10
days of each other two years ago, is a guest. (AP)
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