Sir Patrick Stewart had to have therapy after "losing his way" in his 50s.
The 83-year-old veteran actor had recently split from wife Sheila Falconer - with whom he has Daniel, 56, and 51-year-old Sophie - in the early 1990s and soon turned to alcohol and pills to cope but found his way out of the dark time with professional help.
Writing in his new memoir, 'Making It So', he said: "I felt my life had lost its way. Sleeping pills, yes. Alcohol, yes. They became a part of my life. But, eventually, I became able to deal with that. Again, that’s the advantage of beautiful therapy – that you can talk to someone. Of course, most of the time they say, ‘And how did that make you feel? What was that like?’ You know, I think most of us spiral downward from time to time. There are moments when we ask questions of ourselves, unfairly perhaps. My hope is that it’s all behind me.”
THe 'X-Men' star has had a strained relationship with his family over the years and recalled that there were times when he "hated" his father - who struggled with alcoholism during his life 0 but wishes now that he was around to sit and talk to him.
He told The Observer: "There were years when I hated my father so deeply and feared him, too. My self-discipline – sometimes at a cost. But the impact of him, the subtle impact, I have only come to understand. This is the result of 25, 30 years of therapy. I wish so, so much to be able to sit down with him. To say, ‘OK, I’m 83 now, you’re 100 and whatever, let’s talk.'"
