Shruti Haasan has been consistently spreading the word on mental health and the benefits of therapy. In a conversation with us, the actress spoke about how therapy saved her life, her early years of battling mental health issues and how she’s on a mission to destigmatise it in our society.

For me, it started when I was in school, and my parents had separated. As my parents (Kamal Haasan and Sarika) were so well-known in Chennai, the whole school knew what was happening and the press was writing about it. I got a lot of unsolicited comments and sympathy. I learnt early on that this is something I’m going to be exposed to, though I had no plans of joining films at that point. That incident gave me a strong base to realize what opinions are important and which aren’t. Entering the movies was a different beast, the first few reviews and maybe rightfully so, were negative, and again, I had to ask myself if I wanted to listen to this or take constructive criticism and move forward. So, I’ve always had a healthy relationship with my mind in that aspect.

In 2017, when I was doing well, particularly in Telugu cinema, I left for London and got into therapy. Only I knew the kind of pressure I was going through. I gave up alcohol and have led a sober life ever since. When I came back, I knew I had to talk about therapy, and its benefits because I feel it saved me. In an interview I spoke about choosing a sober life and people tried to shame me for saying I drank. That’s when I started to read about how many closeted alcoholics there are in the country because of the social stigma around women drinking. There were some supportive people who felt I should share my story, but others said I would lose out on movies and come across as crazy, which is precisely why I had to speak about it. Removing alcohol from my life greatly helped my state of mind and taught me how to socialize without these crutches.

What affects me and even people outside the film industry across ages is the comments section on social media. The world runs like a giant comment section box today and that concerns me for everyone.

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Talking about how mental health continues to be a stigma in our society, Shruti says, “Recently, I could not make it to an event because of the flu and people said I was having mental issues. So, my daily goal is to destigmatize mental health. When I was in therapy, I was diagnosed with anxiety disorder and chose not to take medication for it, but I never judge those who need medication because each one’s body is different.”