Entertainment
Towie’s Mario Falcone speaks out on past suicide attempt: ‘I had to stop pretending to be okay’
Mario Falcone has opened up about his past suicide attempt and the importance of speaking openly about mental health.
The former Towie star, 33, has previously spoken about attempting to take his own life in 2012 after struggling with a break-up and other issues in his life.
Trigger warning: Mental health and suicide
Mario revealed on the Breaking Mum & Dad podcast with Anna Williamson that he wished he had spoken more about his feelings and could see that things would eventually get a lot better.
He explained: ‘When you look back now and think how irrelevant those things that were affecting you at the time were, and I think now it’s because I’m not in Towie, I’m not in that space anymore.
‘The things that were so bad at the time really aren’t now, but at the time they were everything.’
Mario, who now lives with his fiancée Becky Miesner and their son Parker, two, admitted that his past relationship breakdown and a friend betraying him led to a feeling of isolation.
He explained: ‘All of a sudden I actually felt really quite alone. As well, I didn’t know what this feeling was, it’s not like now when we speak so openly about anxiety and about depression, it was all so alien then.
‘Even when I talk about it now I feel it. It’s like this weight, I can’t breathe, it’s a lack of motivation, it’s an inability to actually see good. There would’ve been an array of really amazing things in my life at the time I just couldn’t see them.’
Mario added: ‘I didn’t understand it and I just found it really tough to get through the day and I just felt like I didn’t want to live with that feeling anymore. Because I didn’t understand it I felt embarrassed and I really didn’t know how to voice that.
‘I used to be scared of being left on my own because of my own thoughts, I would make everything seem so bad and the only way I felt like I could get rid of that feeling was to not be around.’
He revealed that he had wanted to ‘stop that feeling’ but had to stop ‘pretending to be okay’ while struggling internally.
Mario believes that speaking more openly to friends has helped him and that things have come on a lot in the past nine years with regards to the stigma of men talking about their mental health.
He explained: ‘When I’m out with the boys now it still comes up because we will get to that point where we have one too many pints and they will say how they can’t believe I may not have been here.
‘And it is good that this sort of things come up because we all speak so openly about it now. I am much better at dealing with things now because my perspective is completely different.’
Mario also credits seeing a counsellor with helping him stay on top of his mental health, but acknowledges that he still suffers from anxiety, which he has learned to live with.
Need support? Contact the Samaritans
For emotional support you can call the Samaritans 24-hour helpline on 116 123, email jo@samaritans.org, visit a Samaritans branch in person or go to the Samaritans website.
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