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Alan Ritchson has revealed that he attempted suicide after being sexually assaulted multiple times. “I hung myself,” the Reacher star told the Hollywood Reporter.
Ritchson reportedly tried to hang himself with a green extension cord in the attic of his Encino, California home. “It all happened so fast, and I was dangling there,” he recalled.
Ritchson survived after pulling himself up at the last moment, before blacking out. He said he made the last-minute decision after seeing a vision of his sons, Calem, 11, Edan, 10, and Amory, 8, in their mid-30s. He shares his children with Catherine Ritchson, his wife, whom he has been married to for nearly 20 years.
The 41-year-old actor said he sought help after the incident, and was subsequently diagnosed with bipolar at the age of 36. When he was 40, he found out that he was also battling ADHD.
‘Times and situations where I was put in horrific environments’
Ritchson said that he endured years of sexual abuse while he was in the modeling industry, which followed him into the acting world. It “broke” him, he confessed.
“There are very few redeeming qualities to working in [the modeling] industry. Let’s be honest, it’s like legalized sex trafficking,” he claimed. “The industry is not regulated, and it’s a widely known secret that if you’re hired on a job, you’re basically being passed off to a photographer to be trafficked.”
“The number of times and situations where I was put in horrific environments where sexual abuse was the goal and the paycheck that you were desperate for in order to survive was the carrot, I can’t count on two hands. It was quite often,” he added.
There was one incident that he alleged made him quit the modelling world completely. “I was booked for a shoot for this very famous photographer,” he remembered. “I was sent into a hotel room to do nudes with the promise that if I did the shoot, he would offer me a very lucrative campaign for a magazine and a clothing line. I was sexually assaulted by this guy.”
‘I was super depressed’
Ritchson later transitioned into the television and film industry. However, here he suffered another blow.
Ritchson recalled that he had been having business meetings with a person he partnered with for a film fund all day. But things turned scary when the person threatened him. “She gave me an ultimatum to come to her room and said that if I didn’t, she would destroy the business and she would destroy me by calling TMZ to claim I sexually assaulted her,” he recalled.
The incident devastated Ritchson. “I was super depressed and didn’t know how to navigate that,” he said. Shortly after, he attempted suicide.
Ritchson is always in contact with his psychiatrist as he deals with his mental health struggles, and speaking about his past issues fuels his soul. “I came out of that whole thing asking myself, ‘OK, if I am going to choose to be alive here — a decision we all make, some to a greater degree than others — what am I doing? Why am I here?’” he recalled.
“What I kept falling back on was the meaning and purpose of life as someone who believes that there is a creator and we are created beings, our purpose in life is, without qualification, to make the world a better place and serve others,” Ritchson said. “That is what life is all about.”
Discussing suicides can be triggering for some. However, suicides are preventable. If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the National Suicide Hotline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
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