The world’s total weight. Bridgerton’s Ruby Barker is on the road to recovery with her mental health and she’s crediting Shonda RhimesThank you for your support.
In a video posted via Instagram on Thursday, May 26, the 25-year-old actress revealed she was recently hospitalized for an undiagnosed mental health condition after realizing she had been “really unwell for a long time.”
“I just want to be honest with everybody, I have been struggling,” she said at the beginning of the clip. “So, I’m in the hospital at the minute, I’m gonna get discharged soon and hopefully get to continue with my life and I’m gonna take a little bit of a break from myself.”
The England native credited Rhimes, 52, and Netflix “for giving me an opportunity, for saving me” as well as her best friends who “know who they are.”
Barker said that although she had to abandon a West End production, it was not the first time she had done so.Running with Lions after contracting COVID-19 in addition to dealing with mental illness, she has high hopes for herself once she’s able to be discharged.
“I cannot wait to fulfill all of my engagements and to have a good career and a good life,” she said on Thursday. “Because I do not want my diagnosis to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. I want to survive and I will survive, and I’m going to. You are also. That’s the beauty of it, so are you. If you’re with me, you’re in good hands. Thank you.”
The actress portrays Maria Thompson, a distant cousin to the Featheringtons. In the streaming series, she is sent to London to enjoy Regency-era high social life. She has spoken out about her admiration for the show’s colorblind casting.
“I’d seen Belle, the film about Dido Elizabeth Belle, who was a mixed-race aristocrat in the Georgian period of time. I saw that film and was like, ‘Wow, it would be so amazing to play that character but it’s already been made, I’m probably not gonna be in a period drama simply because of my race,’” Barker told The Daily Mailin a February 2021 interview. “Then obviously, getting the casting [information]From Bridgerton and seeing it’s a Shonda Rhimes thing, that diversity is the main objective of the show — it was just amazing to be a part of it.”
Barker had originally planned to audition for another Netflix hit. Sex Education, before getting the news she’d been cast in the Shondaland production — something she considered a dream come true.
“I got the phone call from my agent,” the How to stop a recurring nightmare star told The Daily MailAt the time. “And she was like, ‘Oh, my God you’ve landed Bridgerton,’ and all of a sudden I didn’t care anymore whether I got [Sex Education]. … I was like, ‘I’ll just leave.’ I did the casting anyway, but I thought, ‘Who cares, I’ve got this job.’ The best role of the year.”
