Denise Welch has admitted she willed a plane she was on to crash as her depression took hold, while she was travelling to Australia with son Matt Healy, who has since written a song about her struggles.
Denise has been very open about her battles with mental health, drugs and alcohol over the years, whether it be during discussions on Loose Women or in her candid autobiography The Unwelcome Visitor. The former Coronation Street actress, who has just returned to screens in new Dave comedy Dead Canny, was back on the Loose Women on Thursday, to join host Kaye Adams and colleagues Coleen Nolan and Brenda Edwards.
One of the topics of discussion during the hour long show was 'Should you tell you kids when you are sick?' And, after Coleen spoke about how her late sister Bernie told her young daughter that she had cancer, Denise opened up on how much son Matt, lead singer or award winning band The 1975, was aware of her depression growing up.
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She explained: "Matt was used to mum being poorly in bed and so, initially with Louis as well, their dad would say 'Mummy's poorly or, with Matty, she's 'got her thing,' before going onto talk about Matt writing the track She Lays Down about Denise's depression, which she was completely unaware of until she listened to The 1975 album it featured on.
She continued: "I told him when he was older and he could understand it, that I used to...depression depresses everything, every emotion; so it robs you of the ability to love and I said I used to lie down on the bedroom floor and I'm not religious, but I used to pray to be able to love my child again and that's why he wrote She Lays Down."
Denise then went onto read some of the lyrics of the song, adding: "One of the things I told him and I never realised it resonated with him so much...I never tried to take my own life, but, there were times I was so poorly I wanted that job to be done.
"I said I was taking him to see his dad in Australia when he was about one and I had a massive recurrence of my illness and it was crippling and debilitating and I prayed that the plane would go down, because it would take everything away."
Host Kaye then interrupted Denise to show her a clip of Matt singing the bit of She Lays Down about the plane, in which he sang: "The engines all go bust, we turned to dust. And I've no reason to complain, yeah," adding: "She's appalled oh she doesn't love me at all. She wears a frown and dressing gown. When she lays down"
A visibly moved Denise said she didn't think she'd seen the clip, before Kaye told her the fact Matt could write a song about her depression, proved "the strength of her relationship."
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