The dark side of stardom: A superstar’s childhood of pain

After the divorce, his mother’s struggles intensified. She slipped into deep depression and attempted suicide by overdosing on pills. Though she survived, she was never the same. “She lived on the couch and weighed about 70 pounds,” Depp recalled. The environment became even more unstable—and it was there that his own substance abuse began.

Depp has said he started taking his mother’s “nerve pills” at age 11, smoking by 12, and experimenting with drugs by 14. “It was the only way that I found to numb the pain,” he later testified. Looking back, he said something striking about his upbringing: “I thank her for that… She taught me how not to raise kids. Just do the exact opposite of what she did.”