Gisele Bündchen may seem confident on the runway, but the Brazilian supermodel recently claimed that she battled with acute anxiety at the height of her career, prompting suicidal thoughts and panic attacks.
The 43-year-old former Victoria's Secret Angel felt “suffocated” during the height of her fame and refused to utilize elevators for fear of being stranded. I couldn't breathe in tunnels. Once in studios, I felt suffocated, she said.
“I lived on the ninth floor, and I had to go up the stairs because I was afraid I would be stuck on the elevator and hyperventilate,” the Nourish author admitted. “When you can't breathe even with the windows open, you think, ‘I don't want to live like this.’
Bündchen revealed suicide concerns in her 2018 memoir, Lessons: My Path to a Meaningful Life, and in her CBS interview. When marketing her book, she told People, "I actually had the feeling of, 'If I just jump off my roof, this is going to end, and I never have to worry about this feeling of my world closing in.'"
She added: "Outside, things might appear wonderful, but you don't know what's going on. I thought it was time to disclose some of my weaknesses, and I realized that everything I've been through would never alter me because I think those events made me who I am."
the mom-of-two, who divorced Tom Brady after 13 years, said she tried to separate her modeling persona from her daily persona to cope with the job's stress and anxiety.
She called herself "her" the model and "Gisele," the regular person. She claims she no longer has to do it after leaving fashion. "They didn't hire Gisele; they didn't know me," she said. "They admired my appearance and figure in garments... Now I can be myself."
Gisele still fronts magazines and ad campaigns (we love her new Louis Vuitton advertisements), but she's more picky about her employment, which appears to have helped her conquer her anxieties.
"I have more options. Before I was surviving, now I'm living, which is different "She claimed she no longer has to divide her two selves, which she called "liberating." Bündchen said: "I'm letting myself be Gisele now, not 'she.' I can skip character play. I can be me. It liberates."