"I was postnatally depressed but I didn't know it."
Lena Headey has faced a lot of ups and downs in her personal life over the course of filming Game of Thrones.
Since taking on the role of Cersei Lannister on the hit HBO series over five years ago, the 43-year-old actress has given birth to two children, gone through a divorce, gotten engaged and moved out of Los Angeles, California.
Headey recalls to Net-A-Porter's digital magazine The Edit that after her 7-year-old son, Wylie, was born in March 2010, she started filming GoT and struggled with postpartum depression. "I was postnatally depressed but I didn't know it," she shares. "I saw a doctor for the medical check, and I just burst into tears. She said I was postnatally depressed and I went, 'Am I? Why is that?'"
The three-time Emmy nominee has since worked through her setback, but it wasn't easy. "I saw a great guy and he sorted me out, but I did the first year [on Game of Thrones] in that space, figuring out motherhood and going through a weird time personally," she adds. "It was tricky."
In 2014, Headey also spoke about her struggles following the birth of her first child. "Then I had postnatal depression, which I didn't realize for a long time," she told The Telegraph. "I went a bit nuts and eventually went to a guy who mixes Western and Eastern philosophy in terms of medicine and he put me on a course of something that changed everything. But I would never want to be dependent [on medication]."
Headey -- who is also mom to daughter Teddy, who turns two next week -- isn't the first celebrity to speak out about postpartum depression.
In March, Chrissy Teigen wrote an essay for Glamour magazine about her struggle following the birth of her and John Legend's daughter, Luna. "I was different than before. Getting out of bed to get to set on time was painful," the 31-year-old model admitted. "My lower back throbbed; my shoulders, even my wrists, hurt. I didn’t have an appetite. I would go two days without a bite of food, and you know how big of a deal food is for me."
Check out more of Teigen's essay: