Divorces are difficult and messy. It is hard to not view them as failures. Many people who are going through it often seek solace in a bottle. Actor and talk show host Drew Barrymore can relate.
She recently opened up about her mental state after her divorce from Will Kopelman in a new interview with the Los Angeles Times. She was seeing therapist Barry Michels to help her cope with the difficult situation. Barry quit being Drew’s therapist because he thought her drinking was problematic.
“He just said, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’ It was really about my drinking,” Drew revealed. She knew that she had a problem and was not actively working to fix it.
Drew responded with her usual class. “I said, 'I get it. I’ve never respected you more. You see I’m not getting better. And I hope, one day, that I can earn your trust back,'” she recalled.
Drew viewed her divorce as failure not only for herself but for her kids. She and Will share two daughters, Olive, 10, and Frankie, 8. Drew wanted so badly to give them a sturdy nuclear family and could not cope with the fact that things did not work out as she intended.
Her friends noticed Drew’s erratic behavior and shared her therapist's concerns. Cameron Diaz found it “difficult to watch.” She knew Drew would pull through with the help of her community.
“But I knew that if we all stuck with her and gave her the support she needed, she would find her way. I have absolute faith in her. You can’t even comprehend how hard it was to be her as a child, and then she shot out the other end with the ability to save herself,” Cameron said.
Drew and Will were married from 2012 to 2016. It took Drew until 2019 to find her feet again. A lot of this had to do with her new talk show, The Drew Barrymore Show. She knew that to be excellent at it, she would have to be on top of her game.
“I think the opportunity at a show like this really hit me. I was like, ‘I can’t handle this unless I’m in a really clear place,’” she revealed. She stopped drinking after filming the first episode.
Drew got back in touch with Barry. The two began working together professionally again. Drew asked herself the hard question: “When are you going to be enough for yourself?”
Even though she still has issues to work through, as all of us do, she is happy and hopeful for the future. Someday she will have an honest conversation with her girls about all this. But for now she can just be.
“I realized that just with me and my girls, I am truly happy,” she said. “I’d always thought I’d be on this hamster wheel for this whole life. But maybe there will be something different before the lights go out.”
