- Let's talk about the Deppers.
Johnny Depp, Amber Heard and the trial
that is going on right now,
there are a million reaction videos floating around.
I want to address more the mental health
and relational health side of things.
And instead of trying to be on top of every little detail
that's going on and give my opinion
on whether I'm team Depp or team Heard,
and what my opinions are on the individual's mental health,
I wanna touch on what this is bringing up
to the public consciousness that can affect each
of our lives.
Namely, personality disorders, domestic abuse,
and how to respond to these things in your own life
for your own health and wellbeing.
Mended Light.
(upbeat music)
So for those of you who aren't especially
in the know, Mattie.
Johnny Depp and Amber Heard met on the set
of the film The Rum Diary back in, I think, 2009, it was.
He was married at the time.
They started dating, he got divorced.
They got married and a year after they got married,
she filed for divorce and accused him of domestic violence,
said that there is a monster.
That there is Johnny Depp, the man I love,
and then there is this monster, this other side
of him that comes out when he drinks and he gets abusive.
And I'm terrified of the monster and I can't live like this.
Johnny's career in shambles because of the accusations,
but they settled and they both agreed
to not defame each other, to not speak negatively
of each other out in public.
So there was a settlement and then the dust was starting
to settle and they were gonna move on with their lives.
And then she posted an op-ed, an opinion piece
in a newspaper talking about what her experience was like
as a domestic violence survivor.
And she thought she was in the clear
'cause she didn't mention him by name,
everybody knew who she was talking about.
So Johnny sues her for defamation of character.
She sues him back and now we're in the middle of all this.
And lots of things are coming to light.
For example, video and audio of her admitting
that she hit him and that she was abusive to him.
- [Johnny] In arguments, you tend to throw punches.
- [Amber] I'm talking about arguments.
I'm not talking about the times when it got physical.
I'm talking about arguments.
- And mocking him and sneering at him and telling him
that no one's gonna believe him because he's a man.
So who would believe that he is the one being abused?
- [Amber] You can please tell people
that it was a fair fight and see what the jury
and judge thinks.
Tell the world, Johnny, tell them, Johnny Depp.
I, Johnny Depp, man, I'm a victim too of domestic violence.
- [Johnny] Yes.
- [Amber] And I know it's a fair fight.
- And so there is a lot of fervor in the media
and everyone's following this, well, not everyone,
but a lot of people are following this trial very closely
because there's a lot of juice.
There's a lot of drama.
It's great for gossip.
I think is why a lot of people are following it.
That's definitely why some
of the gossip mags are following it and promoting it.
But there's something more universal,
which is that we all want to feel safe, respected and loved.
With the emphasis here on safe.
We get into relationships hoping
that we can trust the person that we're with.
We get into relationships because the world is scary
and tough and sad and tragic and gritty
and heavy and vicious.
And we hope that a relationship could be a safe haven.
Somebody who cares for us, somebody who adores us,
somebody who protects us,
and of course, we protect them.
Somebody who stands up for us
and somebody who won't hurt us.
Right now this is honestly feeling like an election year.
It does to me feel as if Johnny Depp
and Amber Heard are both running for office.
And there's a lot of mud slinging
and dragging each other's name through the mud
and presenting themselves as largely
without fault, and whatever my bad behaviors were,
they were largely the doing of the other person.
I'm not gonna give my opinion
on any specific mental health diagnosis.
There's been psychologists in court who said
that Ms. Heard has borderline personality disorder,
histrionic personality disorder.
There's been people jumping in there talking
about Johnny's substance abuse.
And they're both pointing fingers saying, "You were violent
with me," "No, you were violent with me."
You've got other actors and former lovers
of Johnny Depp coming forward saying he's gentle
and he's never been violent.
You've got fans clamoring for Amber Heard
to be removed from Aquaman.
You had fans clamoring for Johnny Depp
to be kicked off of Pirates of the Caribbean.
This whole thing, it's like, they're fighting
and we're all getting dragged into it.
(Jonathan laughing)
So here's my thoughts.
First of all, whatever the facts of this case are,
however things play out, domestic violence happens
in all directions.
Stereotypically, it is men who are abusive to women,
but women can be abusive to men
and not just verbally, physically.
I have worked with couples where the men were abused
and they didn't fight back because they knew,
as the man, everyone's gonna side with her.
What's the difference between mutual domestic violence
and self defense?
We start to get into that gray area.
I mean, in the moment,
if I'm being attacked and I defend myself,
how far can I go without becoming abusive myself?
In my opinion, if someone is physically attacking you,
and I'm not a legal expert,
what is the appropriate use of force?
When someone says, "She was hitting me and punching me
and kicking me and clawing at me so I pinned her arms
to keep her from doing it.
And I was holding her so strong
that she got bruises on her arms."
Is that domestic violence?
I would say no.
"She was hitting me so I broke her nose."
Yeah.
"I punched her in the face."
Yeah.
I mean, but those are gray areas, at least legally.
What about in therapy?
In therapy, it's the same as anything.
Everyone's responsible for themselves.
I don't get to blame my violence
on my partner's harsh words.
If my partner is cruel and mean and vicious to me,
that is wrong, but it's a separate thing
from if I hit them in response.
And it may not feel like it, it feels like no,
this is cause and effect, right?
If they hadn't said those things, I wouldn't have hit them.
And we get into that,
"Well, if you hadn't have done that,
I wouldn't have hit you."
But isn't that like "If you hadn't dressed like that,
I wouldn't have raped you?"
Everyone's responsible for their own behavior.
And the fact is, if someone is verbally cruel to me,
they're responsible for that.
That's wrong.
That doesn't mean I was right to react violently.
When someone tells you that they've been abused
in any way, shape or form,
the common reaction, sadly, in society is to doubt.
'Cause we want to protect people from false accusations,
which is fair.
We wanna protect people from false accusations
and we want to believe
that people are good.
"Well, you got hit because you acted this way.
You got raped because you acted this way.
And I can believe that if I don't do those things,
then I'm safe."
And so we tend to blame the victim.
We tend to disbelieve.
And while it is important for people
to be innocent until proven guilty,
it's also important to protect people during that process,
because proving someone guilty takes time.
You have to make enough room to believe a person
who says they're abused, enough room to protect them,
to get them out, to get them someplace safe,
to make sure that they are heard.
Are there manipulative people out there
who will level false accusations?
Yes.
Are there manipulative people out there who will exaggerate
and make things bigger to hurt someone who's hurt them?
Yes, there are.
It's not as cut and dry as we want to believe it is.
And yet, there are enough instances of actual abuse.
It is so tragically common that even
if we're not willing yet to label someone
as completely guilty and have them face all the consequences
without the evidence, we need to make space for it.
It's possible that this is true.
If this person is innocent until proven guilty,
then this person is also honest until proven otherwise.
And we have to make room for both of those
even though they feel conflicting and there's tension there.
But that's how we ensure that justice is done.
That's how we ensure that people are protected.
There are people who are violent when they drink.
There are people who are violent when they do drugs.
I personally don't use any substances.
I don't drink.
I don't smoke.
I don't use drugs.
Big part of that is because I want
to be able to be in control of me and be accountable
for me and everything that I do.
If you drink, know your limits.
I love Daniel Radcliffe, the actor from Harry Potter,
he doesn't drink.
And the reason he doesn't drink is
'cause he did drink for a couple years
and while his friends could casually have a couple beers
and that was it, he couldn't keep it under control.
And it was leading to problems at work,
it was leading to problems in his relationships,
and he saw a future where things got bad for him.
And so he just doesn't drink anymore.
When it comes to personality disorders,
something that's being brought up,
Amber Heard has been diagnosed, kind of.
I didn't follow closely enough to know
if it was her therapist.
I don't think it was.
(Jonathan laughing)
That would be awful.
But she's been diagnosed with borderline personality.
That would be awful, I mean, as a therapist,
to get summoned to court.
Because there are times when HIPAA compliancy is waived
in court cases and therapists are required to testify.
I've done it once before, I hated it.
That's why I said that would be terrible.
But the psychologist said
she had borderline personality disorder.
Borderline personality disorder is extreme, intense,
unstable moods.
It's characterized by relationship instability.
People who have borderline personality sort of want love,
but they're scared of it.
They're scared of it
because there are self-worth issues there.
They believe that they are unlovable.
And so they have a hard time trusting
that this person is going to stay with me.
And what ends up happening very often is this person says,
"I'll love you no matter what,"
and the person with BPD subconsciously says,
"Oh, yeah, what if I do this?
And what if I do that?"
And they test the boundaries
and they do intense, sometimes violent,
aggressive behaviors verbally or physically
to see, I think, subconsciously
if the person really is going to stay.
And at a certain point, they drive people away
and then it feeds into, "See, I knew it.
I knew that I'm unlovable.
I knew that they would leave."
Explosive anger, self-harming behaviors,
violent lashing out are all possible
with borderline personality disorder.
Does Amber Heard have borderline personality disorder?
I'm not gonna say.
I'm not her therapist.
I do know that based on the tapes that both he
and her had plenty of recordings,
that both of them got very volatile in this relationship.
Both of them needed to walk away
when they were instead engaged in fighting.
And this relationship could have used counseling
very early on.
If your relationship seems toxic to you, volatile,
explosive, most people rather, I think it's pride,
and also not wanting to admit
that things are as bad as they are.
They think we got it.
"We got this.
We don't need help."
Most people who come to therapy it's
in the 11th hour when the relationship is about to die
and they're like, "Please help us."
And they drop this hot mess in the therapist's lap.
Far better to get help early on.
Far better to say, "Hey, this is not getting better.
And while we might be able to fix it on our own,
how much better will this be if we get the help
and support we need, get the tools we need right now
so that this doesn't escalate and snowball
into a multimillion dollar public defamation suit?"
Or whatever else might happen in your case.
I'm watching this case fairly closely.
I'm interested in what happens, but at the end of the day,
it's their life played out in public.
And the only way it really has worth for us beyond gossip,
which isn't any worth anyway, is if we take a look
at ourselves and we see this as a cautionary tale.
Speaking of cautionary tales, I don't know what's going on
in Will Smith's life, but it all came to head at the Oscars.
What are my thoughts on that?
Watch this video right here.
What are your thoughts on Johnny Depp, Amber Heard,
personality disorder, substance abuse, domestic violence,
this whole cocktail we've got going on right now?
What are your opinions on the case?
Let us know in the comments below.
And what would you like me to react to?
I'd love to hear.
If you've got a toxic relationship situation
and you need to get help,
you can schedule a complimentary 15 minute consultation
with a member of my team.
They are skilled and trained and able to help you.
The link is right here below.
As always, keep shining, because we need your light.
I'm Jonathan Decker and I'll see you next time.
(upbeat music)
And there's that Will Smith video.
What do you know?
Here it is.
Hmm.