Drew Carey Opens Up About His Suicide Attempts & Mental Health Struggles
Drew Carey has been getting candid about his ongoing battles with mental health, including the two suicide attempts when he was a young adult, which he says were “calls for help.”
The Price is Right host appeared on Max’s Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace? on Friday, January 26, where he opened up about his depression, revealing he had attempted suicide twice, the first time when he was 18 and then again in his early 20s.
“I think the suicide attempts were calls for help,” he said, per Entertainment Weekly, noting how the first attempt happened during a fraternity party. “I was so mad that everybody was having a good time. I remember that. I remember walking down the stairs, and everybody’s drinking, and I was like, ‘What the hell are they so happy about?’”
He continued, “I was just angry that they were so happy. I was just tired of my life and [thought], ‘who’s gonna miss me?'”
Adam Torgerson/CBS
The long-time game show host survived those attempts and later found more “purpose” in his comedy career and by attending a Marine boot camp, which he said gave him “three meals a day” and a routine, which was better than being “broke, lost, and sleeping on my brother’s couch.”
However, he admitted that those negative feelings still rear their head sometimes. “I have a lot of that still. Like, the who’s-gonna-miss-me type of thing,” he said. “A lot of times I think to myself, like if I die, I’m just gonna have my body cremated. No funeral and anything associated with, like, all my mementos and stuff. You can just burn them and give them away. Like, who cares?”
Carey shared how he’s in a better place now with his mental health but confessed, “I still get depressed, often, just like everyone else. But it’s not as bad. I mean, just because you’re a celebrity and you have money doesn’t mean bad things don’t happen to you or you don’t have bad days. Everybody’s a person.”
The comedian, who has hosted The Price is Right since Bob Barker‘s retirement in 2007, ended with a joke he often repeats while hosting the long-running game show.
“I’m a regular guy from Cleveland,” he said. “My girlfriend ties me to the bed one leg at a time, just like everyone else.”
The Price Is Right, Weekdays, CBS
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