WINFREY: Well, I've noticed during many of the shows we do
that a lot of women say that--because I talk to--
to the women after the show, and men, too, if you happen
to be here.
But we--we spend a lot of time talking after the show,
and we have gotten the overall impression over
the years that a lot of women are, first of all,
using THE OPRAH SHOW as an escape,
just wanted to get out of the house and leave the kids with
their husband or whomever for the day.
And some women feel really down and depressed.
We used to call it blue.
But I heard one woman recently describe it as
`living her life in gray' instead of in color.
Now most of these women we hear from are mothers,
so many of you who are at home working mothers.
And they often allude to the role of motherhood as being so challenging,
so all-consuming that they feel their very selves slipping away.
So we were in the process of developing a show about
women who feel lost in motherhood when a story broke in the
news that Marie Osmond was going through some of the very
same things that you-all are going through, depression.
We all see the celebrity side of Marie from her singing career
and her TV talk show with Donny, "The Donny and Marie Show."
But we don't usually see her personal side.
She was raised, as many of you know, in a family of nine children and...
Ms. OSMOND: I like the way you said that.
WINFREY & Ms. OSMOND: (in unison) Nine.
WINFREY: ...and is now the working mother of seven children.
She just had a baby in July, and recently told TV Guide magazine
that her depression is an incredibly dark place.
You said that you were still going through it.
I think because of my age, she said, and my particular stress
of starting a new talk show, having seven children
and having to go back to work in three and a half weeks,
that it's still something that you'll spiral into.
It is such an incredibly dark place. That's what you told TV Guide.
Ms. OSMOND: Right.
WINFREY: So are you still there in that place off and on?
Ms. OSMOND: Well, I think that anything--you--you know,
you mentioned the baby blues.
And as I look back on it, I--I probably have had it through
my life but never to this point. And I think a lot of it is age.
I am on--definitely on the upswing, which is one of the
reasons why I feel very comfortable talking about it at this point.
And I think that's one of the key things,
is being open enough and having that conversation,
letta--letting people know that you're not alone.
What happened in my case is that I had 20 hours of labor
and the baby never showed up.
And then I went to Utah and had another,
you know, 12 to 14 hours--I can't even remember--of labor.
And he finally put his cute little head into this world and was born.
And he's so beautiful. He looks like my husband.
We call him little Mini Me.
And he--I felt so incredible, Oprah.
It was, I thought, `Good grief, I'm 39 years old and I feel fantastic.'
And I went home and that's when it started.
And it was one of those things...
WINFREY: When what started?
Ms. OSMOND: Just--just that--the depression and...
WINFREY: And what did it feel like?
Ms. OSMOND: Well, it--it's just--it's very difficult to explain.
I know that in some cases, it's like your eyes are in the back
of your head and you just want to close them and never open them.
You're so incredibly tired.
Not only do you have a new baby to take care of,
but, you know, I have six other children as well.
WINFREY: Who range in age from?
Ms. OSMOND: Sixteen to my new one which is three months.
And, you know, I--what I found--one of the first times
I noticed it was everybody said, `Oh, leave her alone.
Give her a few minutes to herself.'
And we--we were in Utah, which we had not been in our home
for about a year because I'm living in LA now doing
"The Donny and Marie Show."
And I went downstairs to get something to eat.
And there was nothing that I could eat offhand except a jar of peanut butter.
And I sat--I--it was so funny.
Because I--I opened up this peanut butter and I sat on the
floor and I started eating it and I just started sobbing.
WINFREY: Crunchy or smooth?
Ms. OSMOND: Smooth, baby. Got to go for the smooth.
WINFREY: OK. And so you ate the jar of peanut butter and felt what?
Ms. OSMOND: Just incredibly depressed.
And--and to make a long, long story short, what happened
was is I was moving into a new house, I had the new show,
I had to be back to work in three and a half weeks
after I gave birth.
Just--just that whole stress of starting
the new show and--and having to go out and do the promotion
and being with the baby.
And what happened was you just--you start sobbing uncontrollably.
You question your mother skills, you know.
You don't want your children to see you.
WINFREY: You questioned your mother skills when you've already
done it six times?
Ms. OSMOND: Well, there you go.
WINFREY: I got it.
Ms. OSMOND: And so, you know, I'm a very analytical person.
I--I--I think that's probably one of the reasons that
I'm a woman and I've lasted in this business for 37 years, you know.
It's the fact that, you know, in the '70s, I didn't take
drugs and do all those things because there's a very
logical side of me that says, `What is the outcome of all this?
There's no--there's no up to it. There's no positive.'
So the analytical side of me said, you know,
`This is--this is not your personalty.
This is a very difficult place to be.'
And I basically gave the baby to my baby-sitter.
I wrote out of a couple checks and I said,
`My husband will be here tonight.'
He was working.
I said, `He'll be back in town.
And I've got to--I've got to leave and figure out what's going on.'
WINFREY: And so what'd you do?
Ms. OSMOND: I got in the car and I drove up the coast, and I just kept driving.
WINFREY: Where did you think you were going?
Ms. OSMOND: I'm not sure. I was getting away.
I was driving away from what--just--just--and--
and I'm sure that women can relate to this.
You know, you see this--this perfect person that you have to be.
If I have a bad day as an entertainer,
and you know that--you know, you can't have a bad day.
You--you are there to entertain and make everybody else happy.
And so it was one of those things that I--I just had to drive.
And, fortunately, my son, who was on a date the night before,
who's very excited about dating now that he's 16,
but I--I let him use what I call my mommy phone
so my kids can find me no matter where I am.
And I said, `Take the phone in case something happens and call me.'
Well, he had left it in the car. And the phone kept ringing.
I pulled over.
I found it was my husband.
And he talked to me for probably a couple of hours while
I kept driving and finally said,
`You need to pull over and check yourself into a hotel
and I will come and get you.'
And, you know, I get very emotional because
he's the most incredible person in the world.
And he sat there and he just--you know,
I guess it was probably about a--a day and a half.
He just held me.
WINFREY: In the motel?
Ms. OSMOND: Yeah, and just said, `I love you.
It's OK. It's a beautiful thing.
I like every day waking up.
I feel like I'm having an affair with another woman every day.
And I love you like this.'
And, you know, just--and the humor is what I live by.
That's how I get through my life is to always--
you know, find that reason to laugh.
And there wasn't even--there wasn't even a reason to laugh.
It was very serious. Ended up going on some medication.
And that was another thing that I'm sure that
there are people who have taken anti-depressants
and things like that.
From my standpoint...
WINFREY: So you leave the hotel and--and got some help,
right, because you realized...
Ms. OSMOND: Yes, right.
Went to my doctor and said, you know,
`This is not my personality. I mean, you know,
I'm--I'm a wild and crazy gal.
And I love to have a good time.'
And--and he put me on--on some medication that was really terrific.
It took away the terrible lows.
But it also took away any joy I had.
WINFREY: Zoloft. Are you allowed to say it?
Ms. OSMOND: I think it--I think it was Zoloft. Yeah.
WINFREY: OK. And, yeah, I read that it was Zoloft. I don't know.
Ms. OSMOND: Yeah.
Well, don't believe everything you read, Oprah.
WINFREY: OK. I know. I don't. So I'm with the producer going,
`Was this true? Was this true? Is this true?'
You have to always check because you never know.
Ms. OSMOND: Well--and Mary Murphy who did the interview for TV Guide--
I think one of the quotes was
"I just took away because--I took and left them because I--
you know, I felt like I was a terrible mother and--
and I couldn't--didn't want my children to have that kind of mother."
And--and, you know, when you do those interviews,
you never quite know how it's going to come out on print.
That's not what happened.
What happened was I--I could not let my children see me like that.
I mean, I went in my closet, sat on the floor and sobbed.
And there's great joy--I have great passion for the things that I do.
And I had to go to QVC, which was the first
show I did coming back from my baby.
And I remember I went into a department store,
and my husband called--our friend works there.
This friend and he said my--you know,
`Marie is going to be there.'
And you guys have to know my personality.
I have been in the entertainment business my whole life.
Talk to me about makeup, talk to me about clothes.
You know, my weight has gone up and down through the years.
And I know how to hide it beautifully, you know.
I mean, give me a jacket and a pair of black pants and,
you know, you're looking good.
And so, you know, there--there are ways to--
I walked into that department store and I looked--
and I--I was so overwhelmed.
I did not even know where to start.
I looked at the makeup counter and I said,
`Well, I know I need some makeup and'--
I sat there for 25 minutes just...
WINFREY: Yeah, because the simplest things become overwhelming.
Ms. OSMOND: ...overwhelmed. And--and bless her heart.
She came down and she looked at me, and she went `Ooh, scary.'
And she said--she said, `Well, let's start with pantyhose.'
And that's--and she literally walked me through.
And that's the thing I think more than anything else is that you
need to help your friends.
Women are the nurturers.
We take care of our husbands, we take care of our kids,
we take care of our bosses, we take care of our work,
we take care of our friends.
Who takes care of us? Other women. And that's
why it's good to talk about it and let people know they're not alone.
I'll tell you what was the turning point in my life was
when my mom called me up on the phone, and she said,
`I'm going to tell you something I've never told anybody.
Thirty-seven years ago, I was so overwhelmed.
I had my last child.' She said,
`I gave the baby to your father, and I got in the car,
and I drove up the coast.'
And she said, `I just fell apart.
And it's OK.
It's really OK to fall apart because, you know, you're not alone.'
And when I thought, `Good grief, if my mother
could go through it and come out, there is hope.'
But I'm telling you, at that point, there was no--
there wasn't even a light at the end
of this dark tunnel, it was so dark.
And--and you just think `I don't know how I'm going to get through it.'
But you just take it a day at a time and you spend a
lot of time on your knees and you say a lot of prayers.
And you...
WINFREY: I was going to say,
`What d--where does your faith come in here?'
Ms. OSMOND: Oh, well, I think--you know, that's the basis of my entire life.
I am what I am because of my beliefs.
And, you know, definitely get on your knees.
But also God expects you to be wise.
And you have to get help.
You--you know, whether it's medication.
For me, it was starting to exercise again.
It was being very nutritionally conscious.
I stay away from carbohydrates because carbs turn to sugar.
And sugar's a dangerous thing.
WINFREY: Don't we know.
Ms. OSMOND: But aren't they good?
WINFREY: Yes! More with Marie Osmond when we come back.
WINFREY: So Marie Osmond is here sharing her experience with depression
following the birth of her seventh child this past July.
We often hear people say they're depressed and it's
a difficult thing for those who haven't experienced it to understand.
Now some people say,
`Why can't you just snap out of it?'
Can you describe what it's like and why you can't
just snap out of it?
Ms. OSMOND: You know, I--I think that's the thing I--
I hated the most was when people said,
`Oh, come on, you know, deal with it.
You know, get over it.' Yeah. Right.
You know, how do you say--how do you just get over it?
You can't.
And there has to be understanding on the people around you.
And that's why, I think...
WINFREY: And doctors, too, especially.
Ms. OSMOND: Doctors--you know, when they say,
`Oh'--esp--they don't understand.
WINFREY: Toughen up.
Ms. OSMOND: Yeah. `Toughen up. You know, `deal with it.
You've got to fix your attitude.'
`No. Doctor, you need to fix my attitude.'
WINFREY: When did you know that it was--
that it had it--the--
the name was depression and that it wasn't just
I'm sitting there eating a jar of peanut butter?
I mean, there's--in--in the...
Ms. OSMOND: When it wasn't just baby blues.
WINFREY: When it wasn't just baby blues.
Ms. OSMOND: Yeah.
WINFREY: There's a--there's a point in the TV Guide article
where it's written that you were unpacking boxes
and you'd put the seven children in the car
and you'd driven to LA and you're trying
to get the cribs and get the beds--
I'm like didn't you have somebody to help you?
Ms. OSMOND: You know...
WINFREY: It sounds like you are doing that all yourself,
trying to lay out beds for seven children.
Get some help!
Ms. OSMOND: You know, there are a lot of women that can't afford help.
And I'm--this--I know this sounds crazy.
But I don't have live-in help.
I have--I--I didn't have seven children to have somebody else raise them.
And, you know, I--I figure what good are kids
if they can't be their own slaves, right?
So that's the way I was raised.
And--and so my children packed their own boxes.
They unpacked their own boxes.
They put their own rooms together.
They do the dishes. They mop the floors. They sweep.
I have a lady that comes in once a week to clean my room.
WINFREY: And so now where are you in this--in this cycle?
Ms. OSMOND: I--I have a bad day once in a while.
And I usually find it's when I'm working really long days.
I--I--I think sleep is something that is non-existent for mothers.
I think it's something that you get it when you can.
Everybody's going...
WINFREY: Look at the whole audience nodding.
Ms. OSMOND: You know what?
Can I tell you that I'm so happy to see your heads nod?