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Christy Carlson Romano, 35, is a former Disney actress who starred on Even Stevens with Shia LaBeouf from 2000 to 2003. She currently does TV and voiceover work and is launching a cooking YouTube channel later next month. Christy wrote an article for Teen Vogue describing her rough young adulthood. She writes that she went through depression, alcoholism and seeking for answers. Christy credits husband Brendan Rooney, whom she met in a screenwriting class, with helping her escape her self destructive spiral and her feelings of inadequacy. They have two young daughters, Isabella Victoria, two, and Sophia Elizabeth, three months. Here’s some of what she wrote, with more at the source.
I once paid a psychic $40,000 for a crystal because I thought it would fix my broken life. Is that the kind of thing Ren Stevens would do?
While many witnessed my costar Shia LaBeouf struggle publicly, I have largely suffered in silence. I am not a victim, but I have never been perfect or pulled together as my reputation or the successes of my young adulthood might suggest. During a period of time in my life, I grappled with depression, drinking, and more, desperate to find fixes for how I felt.
Until I landed my first main role on Even Stevens when I was 14 — which relocated me to Los Angeles, away from my family on the East Coast — I traveled the country with musical road shows and took the train into New York City from my small town in Connecticut.
Nothing could have prepared me for fame and the responsibilities that came with being on television screens everywhere. I was somewhat protected (or stultified) by staying on my set and making friends with whoever showed up to be cast as my best friend that week. I worked full days and would go home and be tutored in a different subject every night. The idea of one day having a college life became my greatest fantasy. I would watch teen movies and become intensely jealous of “normal” kids, feeling, at my moodiest, like a misfit…
She went to an ivy league school then dropped out
I ran from school and back into the arms of the New York theater community. What I didn’t realize was that starring in a Broadway show was very hard work for a 19-year-old. I was highly criticized for my youth, which fueled my desire to prove everybody wrong. I became a bit harder-edged, binge-drank more at loud nightclubs, and started to accept the transient natures of love, sex, and friendship.
I struggled with all of my relationships, alcohol usage, and career path for ten years before going back to school and re-centering myself.
She also writes that two of her friends from the Disney Channel committed suicide. That was one of the best and most revealing cautionary tales about child actors that I’ve ever read. The part about the psychic seems to have been a turning point for her, when she realized she was desperate. (I left it out of the excerpt as it’s long, but she basically paid a ton of money for guidance.) It’s clear that Christy has done the work to process and come to a better understanding of what she went through.
The story about spending $40,000 on a crystal reminds me so much of Spencer and Heidi Pratt of The Hills. They also wasted their money on unnecessary security, an arsenal and luxury goods, but they have hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of crystals, and Spencer believes in them. At least Christy realizes she was duped and has been able to get away from that environment and put it into perspective. I want the same for so many other former child actors. The industry needs more protections for children and teens.
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