Jennifer Lawrence has opened up about her “isolating” postpartum experience after welcoming her two children.
The 34-year-old actor, who earned her first Oscar nomination with her breakthrough role in Winter’s Bone in 2010, had her three-year-old son, Cy, in February 2022 and welcomed a second child, whose name and gender are unknown, earlier this year with her husband Cooke Maroney.
In her latest project, Die, My Love, Lawrence plays a new mother, Grace, whose life unravels when she develops postpartum psychosis. The adaptation of Ariana Harwicz’s 2017 novel is directed by Lynne Ramsay, with Robert Pattinson playing Grace’s husband, Jackson.
Postpartum psychosis is a severe and debilitating mental illness that affects 1,400 women in the UK each year. Between one and five of those result in suicide. Symptoms often come out of nowhere, often within the first two weeks of giving birth, and range from low mood and mania to delusions and hallucinations.
Speaking at a press conference promoting the movie at Cannes Film Festival, Lawrence candidly reflected on her postpartum experience.
“As a mother, it was really hard to separate what I would do as opposed to what [Grace] would do. And it was just heartbreaking,” Lawrence said of shooting the film, according to Variety. “I had just had my firstborn, and there’s not really anything like postpartum. It’s extremely isolating, which is so interesting.”
She continued: “When Lynne moves this couple into Montana, she doesn’t have a community. She doesn’t have her people. But the truth is, extreme anxiety and extreme depression is isolating, no matter where you are. You feel like an alien.”
Postpartum depression is a common mood disorder that affects more than one in every 10 women within a year of giving birth, according to the NHS.
Lawrence also revealed she filmed Die, My Love while five months pregnant with her second child. “Having children changes everything. It changes your whole life. It’s brutal and incredible,” she said.
“So not only do they go into every decision of if I’m working, where I’m working, when I’m working, they’ve taught me — I mean, I didn’t know that I could feel so much and my job has a lot to do with emotion.”
She explained: “It’s almost like feeling a blister or something — like, so sensitive. So they’ve changed my life, obviously, for the best and they’ve changed me creatively. I highly recommend having kids if you want to be an actor.”
Read The Independent’s three-star review of Die, My Love here.
If you have been affected by this article, you can contact the following organisations for support: mind.org.uk, nhs.uk/livewell/mentalhealth, mentalhealth.org.uk.
