- Colton Underwood opens up about his battle with depression and anxiety
- The TV personality shares how his past suicide attempt pushed him to open up about his struggles and get proper treatment
- The new Chief Community Officer of mental health app WhiteFlag, he encourages people to get help even if they’re not “ready” for traditional therapy
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Colton Underwood was struggling with depression, anxiety and a slew of personal issues. Everything in his life was going wrong, he says, and he “didn’t see a way out.”
The former Bachelor was alone in his Los Angeles home when he attempted suicide, which thankfully was unsuccessful. He calls it the turning point in his mental health journey.
“I woke up the next morning and I remember vividly staring into my dog’s eyes and realizing I needed help, ” he tells PEOPLE. “That was my moment of, I have to make some changes because I’m not healthy right now.”
“I immediately loaded my dog into my Jeep and drove 15 hours to Colorado to my parents and I told them everything that was going on,” Underwood recalls. “The next week I was seeing a therapist and a psychologist and getting on a game plan.”
The 32-year-old’s mental health struggles were rooted in him spending years of his life concealing who he was. Underwood came out as gay in April 2021 during a Good Morning America interview. Before that, he hadn’t acknowledged to himself that he was gay — even as he tried to find love with women on multiple shows within the Bachelor franchise.
“I was depressed because I wasn’t living my most authentic life. I was sort of hiding myself and had a lot of shame and guilt around who I was,” he explains, in honor of World Mental Health Day. “And I also had a lot of anxiety because I was so publicly straight and I sort of doubled down so many times in my life and career who I was projecting to be. So that all really caught up to me.”
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“I think I knew deep down for a while that I was struggling, but I couldn’t say it out loud. I couldn’t even say it to myself,” he says. “And unfortunately it got to be so much that I had that failed suicide attempt.”
For Underwood, after getting an official diagnosis of his mental health struggles, he required different forms of treatment.
Recognizing that “mental health is always a journey,” over the years the former NFL player has gone to therapy, taken medication and leaned on his loved ones. Now he is at a point where he feels comfortable and healthy.
“I think that for different people, different things are going to work at different times,” he says. “I needed peers at times, I needed a therapist at times, I needed a psychologist at times, I needed medication at times.”
“Everybody can relate to that,” he adds. “They need to be able to be free of the stigma and the shame that a lot of people always carry around the words ‘mental health,’ and get properly diagnosed. I think that’s the first step to healing: being vulnerable enough to ask for help.”
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Since going public with his sexuality and mental health struggles — specifically in his Netflix reality series, Coming Out Colton — the TV personality says he’s had a lot of people reach out and confide in him about their own battles.
While he graciously offers support, he also wants to introduce people to other sources of help. That’s one of the reasons why Underwood is the new Chief Community Officer for WhiteFlag, a free mental health app that provides specialized and anonymous peer-to-peer support to those struggling.
“I might be someone they feel comfortable reaching out to but I also understand that I might not be the most qualified in all of the matters. Peer-to-peer counseling was something that worked really well for me,” he shares. “The way that WhiteFlag is built really allows people to take a step in the right direction of healing their mental health without it feeling like they’re all of a sudden diving into therapy right away.”
“For me, it’s so helpful to talk through things with other people,” he continues. “‘Trauma bond’ is the word I like to use. Comparing our healing processes is something that I felt really strongly helped me along my way.”
Today, Underwood says, “I feel great,” noting he’s gotten a good grasp on navigating his mental health.
The star — who recently welcomed his first child, son Bishop, with husband Jordan C. Brown — admits that becoming a parent has also motivated and inspired him in a way that surprised him.
“Now, I’m helping contribute to a world that my son’s going to grow up in and I want to continue to break barriers down for whatever he’s going to go through in his little life,” he says. “I want to pave the road and feel like I’m contributing to the healing of our country. We are in a mental health crisis right now and people don’t know how to ask for help at all times.”
“I have the opportunity to be what my parents were to me, to hundreds and thousands of people who reach out. And I definitely don’t take that lightly,” he adds, pointing to his Stride For Kindness: End Bullying Challenge, which he hopes will promote healthy wellness habits.
As he continues to embrace his “responsibility” as an advocate, Underwood tells PEOPLE that he often looks back on how long it took him to seek help for his depression and anxiety. He hopes that people hear his journey and feel encouraged to take action sooner.
“Keep taking steps forward,” he stresses. “Even if you feel like at times you’re going backwards, keep taking a step forward. Even if it’s a baby step, start small, ask for help.”
“Understand that there is no one solution, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all type of approach to this, and you shouldn’t be afraid to explore and experiment different types of treatment methods,” Underwood says.
If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988, text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741741 or go to 988lifeline.org.
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