Good Morning Britain star Sean Fletcher struggled to keep his head above water – in his own words – following his son Reuben’s diagnosis of obsessive-compulsive disorder, aka OCD.
Sean – on screen with Sunday Morning Live every Sunday – spoke out about his son’s struggles with OCD. However, he only broke his silence after Reuben himself did.
So what have they shared about their experiences? Read on and we’ll tell you…
Sean Fletcher struggled to stay afloat after son Reuben’s OCD diagnosis
In 2014, Good Morning Britain host Sean Fletcher’s son Reuben got a diagnosis for his OCD. He was 13 years old.
OCD stands for obsessive-compulsive disorder. It’s a debilitating mental health condition that causes unwanted thoughts and repetitive behaviours to recur.
It affects about 1% of the UK population, it’s most common in people in their twenties, and the vast majority of people with OCD also have another mental health condition.
In Reuben’s case, he missed a year of school as a result of his personal struggle with the condition.
“The OCD was telling him that he shouldn’t do those things or something bad would happen,” Sean said during an episode of The Mirror’s Men In Mind spin-off podcast.
“I was really struggling… It’s really hard, you’re just tired all the time. It’s a bit like when you have a newborn, you can deal with problems when you have sleep, but when you don’t have sleep, the smallest things become big.
“I look back and I think I’m a much better presenter now I don’t have this struggle that we had at home. At the time I was just sort of fighting and just trying to keep my head above water.”
Reuben speaking out inspired Sean to do the same
At first, following Reuben’s diagnosis and in the thick of their family’s coming to terms with it, Sean refused to bring any of it to the table in the Good Morning Britain studio.
“I immediately just clicked into the mode, which was ‘don’t talk about it, don’t talk about it, don’t talk about it’. And I didn’t for a long time. I probably didn’t feel a television studio was a safe space.
“To be fair, I didn’t feel anywhere was a safe space to talk about it, but definitely not television.
“It was almost like the OCD was tearing our family apart,” he continued. “It was like a little gremlin sitting on the mantelpiece, making arguments start, making things difficult.”
View this post on Instagram
YoungMinds, a mental health charity for children and young people, interviewed Sean about his attitudes towards speaking publicly about OCD – and mental health in general – after Reuben chose to go public about his condition.
“Seeing Reuben so driven to tell his peers that they don’t have to suffer in silence made me realise I could do the same for parents of children with mental health issues,” Sean told the charity.
“When my son was first spiralling with OCD about 10 years ago, I called the charity out of desperation. YoungMinds was an incredible help.
“It felt like mental illness was ripping my family apart. And it feels like now more than ever, young people need that kind of support.”
Sean shares Reuben, now 21, with wife Luned. They also have a daughter, Lili, 26.
Read more: Ranvir Singh apologises to Sean Fletcher after hilarious dog incident on GMB
So, what do you think of this story? Leave us a comment on our Facebook page @EntertainmentDailyFix and let us know.