Caroline Flack’s family reveal they always feared the Love Island host would take her own life because she was ‘fascinated’ with suicide and secretly battled depression
- Caroline Flack’s mum Christine and twin sister Jody tell how the late TV star was always ‘fascinated’ by suicide and they feared she would take her own life
- They reveal Caroline previously tried to kill herself following a relationship breakup before she found fame and she always struggled with ‘heartbreak’
- In a new C4 documentary, Caroline Flack: Her Life and Death – which airs on Wednesday, March 17 – the family open up about the presenter’s mental health
- Christine, 70, and Jody, 41, reveal Caroline, who took her life aged 40, attempted to hide her problems because she was ‘frightened’ of the public’s reaction
- Her family hope the film will give Caroline’s fans the confidence to talk about their struggles and break down the stigma still attached to depression
- For help call Samaritans for free on 116 123 or visit www.samaritans.org
Caroline Flack’s family have revealed they always feared the Love Island host would take her own life, 13 months after her tragic suicide.
In a new Channel 4 documentary, Caroline Flack: Her Life and Death, the late TV presenter’s mum Christine, 70, and twin sister Jody, 41, tell how she was always ‘fascinated’ by suicide and previously tried to kill herself following a relationship breakup before she found fame.
And in a bid to encourage her fans to open up about mental health, they revealed Caroline attempted to hide her own problems – she had battled depression since becoming a teenager – because she was ‘frightened’ of the public’s reaction and how it might impact her career.
‘She didn’t handle heartbreak well’: Thirteen months after her tragic suicide, Caroline Flack’s family have revealed they always feared the Love Island host would take her own life
Christine said: ‘She had a long relationship when she was in Cambridge but that ended and then we got a call, she’d taken some pills, she spent time in hospital and then you could tell it wasn’t right, her reaction wasn’t right. Yeah, she didn’t handle heartbreak well.
‘We went through all the doctors and they saw to her and thought no it’s just a one off but there was always that fear after then that… I don’t know, you always worried in case anything happened.’
Jody added: ‘It feels so weird talking about it because I know it’s something she never wanted anybody to know about.
‘Each serious boyfriend, she sort of took a lot of tablets, drank a lot, and ended up in an A&E situation a lot of times. She really didn’t think she could cope with that feeling so it was her trying to control it.’
‘You always worried’: In a new C4 documentary, Caroline Flack: Her Life and Death, the late TV star’s mum Christine and twin sister Jody tell how she was always ‘fascinated’ by suicide
Shining a light: In a bid to encourage her fans to open up about mental health, they revealed Caroline attempted to hide her own problems as she was ‘frightened’ of the public’s reaction
Her family hope the film – which airs on Wednesday, March 17 – will give Caroline’s fans the confidence to talk about their problems and break down the stigma still attached to depression.
They believe if the former X Factor host had opened up about her illness, she may still be here today.
Christine explained: ‘She hated the thought of people thinking she was this awful person.
‘Even when she’d taken pills as a young person, she didn’t want anyone to know, she didn’t want anyone to know she got down and I know they say everyone’s talking about it now but I think a lot of people that really suffer with depression still don’t talk about it, they don’t. I think people are still frightened to say it.’
‘She didn’t want anyone to know’: Christine and Jody believe if the former X Factor host had opened up about her illness, she may still be here today (Caroline pictured in 2019)
‘She wasn’t perfect but that wasn’t her’: Christine explained that while Caroline had her flaws she didn’t hurt anyone and she wants her daughter to be remembered in a ‘positive light’
Before Caroline passed, she endured an onslaught of trolling on social media from tweeters that branded her an ‘abuser’ and said she deserved to be sacked from Love Island after she was charged with attacking boyfriend Lewis Burton, 28.
Christine feels more needs to be done from platforms like Twitter and Instagram to protect users from trolls after Caroline became ‘addicted’ to reading often-hateful comments about herself online.
She said: ‘When I was young, if you were bullied at school you could get away from it but you can’t get away from it now because it follows you home, it follows you on your phone and Carrie was the worst one, she would look at her phone all the time. It took her over.
‘There could be 30 nice things said but one bad thing and that was it.’
Damaging: Before Caroline passed, she endured an onslaught of trolling on social media from tweeters that branded her an ‘abuser’ and said she deserved to be sacked from Love Island
Christine explained that while Caroline had her flaws she didn’t hurt anyone and she wants her daughter to be remembered for more than just the final months of her life.
She said: ‘I wanted to show Carrie in a positive light, I wanted all the last months of the things that were written about her and said about her, her being an abuser, and things like that, they’re the things that stuck and got repeated and I just wanted to show she was an ordinary girl, that wasn’t her.
‘What was shown at the end wasn’t her. She wasn’t perfect but that wasn’t her.
‘Everyone was saying you can’t say anything yet but I wanted to show a positive side to Caroline and the memory to be of this positive, nice person, and my daughter, and a sister, she never changed and she was good to us and lovely.
‘It took her over’: Christine feels more needs to be done from platforms like Twitter to protect users from trolls after Caroline became ‘addicted’ to reading often-hateful comments online
‘For me, it’s when she’s little and you think she’s got that life ahead and you don’t know what’s going to happen with your kiddies, do you?
‘And you can protect them up to a certain age or time and then it’s just how life goes, all the things that happened to her… and it was just a silly thing at the end that happened… and it ended her life.’
Director Charlie Russell had met with Caroline shortly before her death to discuss the makings of a documentary that would finally tell her side of the story following her 2019 arrest.
Charlie said Caroline felt like ‘she wasn’t being heard’ in the mist of her axing from Love Island and the courts deciding to proceed with the case despite Lewis not pressing charges.
The film they created instead was about how her hidden battle with depression made the complexities of fame even more difficult to handle.
And for Caroline, she especially couldn’t bear the thought of the world one-day knowing that behind her fun-loving personality she secretly suffered with terrible demons.
‘Silenced’: Director Charlie Russell had met with Caroline shortly before her death to discuss the makings of a documentary that would finally tell her side of the story following her arrest
During a Q&A held by BAFTA in honour of the documentary, Christine explained: ‘It was strange because the coroner had sent me a note to say who was her doctor because they couldn’t find one, and that was simply because she went to different doctors all the time so no one would find out that she had been because she was so fearful of anyone knowing anything and printing it.
‘When she had these downtimes and went to clinics she would say “don’t tell anyone”, everything had to be so secret, which is so sad isn’t it?
‘Perhaps we should have said to her “no it can’t be a secret” but she was in her 30s, you can’t make someone do that.
‘She was frightened certain jobs, “oh if you’re going to have a bad day on this job” it would affect her but I don’t think it would have done.
‘Most of the productions she worked for did have care and they did look after her but she still didn’t want them to know and she definitely didn’t want the public to know, which was really hard, I wish she had.’
- Caroline Flack: Her Life and Death will be on Channel 4 on Wednesday 17 March at 9pm, and available on All4
Suffered in secret: The film they created instead was about how her hidden battle with depression made the complexities of fame even more difficult to handle
Source: Read Full Article