Hayden Panettiere's life of struggles alongside screen success

ByIan Youngs

Culture reporter

Hayden Panettiere, who has died astatine the property of 36, lived astir of her beingness successful the spotlight - from occurrence arsenic a kid prima to pb roles successful deed TV shows Heroes and Nashville - but besides endured struggles that went on with the pressures of fame.

Panettiere appeared successful her archetypal commercialized erstwhile she was 11 months old. Her parent Lesley Vogel was an histrion and acceptable her girl connected the aforesaid path.

By the property of four, Hayden was successful US TV amusement One Life to Live, past astatine 8 joined different soap opera, Guiding Light.

Her earthy acting quality was evident, but the burgeoning puerility vocation came astatine a cost.

"From a precise young age, I mislaid the accidental to person a mean childhood, friends, relationships, and my privacy," Panettiere wrote successful her revealing autobiography, This Is Me, which was published earlier this year.

She was "groomed" to beryllium an actor, she told the Hollywood Reporter, external. "I was similar a small worker and I ever person been. No was ne'er an option."

Panettiere's vocation flourished and she soon earned roles similar the dependable of Princess Dot successful Pixar's A Bug's Life successful 1998, becoming 1 of the youngest ever Grammy Award nominees for the accompanying children's read-along album.

She starred with Denzel Washington successful American shot play Remember the Titans successful 2000; and had roles successful TV's Ally McBeal and 2004's Raising Helen with Kate Hudson.

When filming 2005's Racing Stripes, a children's movie astir a zebra who thinks it's a contention horse, she suffered a backmost wounded erstwhile she fell disconnected a zebra, and "over 20 years later, these injuries inactive fuss me", she wrote.

She besides starred successful 2006 cheerleading drama Bring It On: All oregon Nothing, the 3rd instalment successful the Bring It On movie series.

Also successful 2006, she achieved a caller level of fame erstwhile superhero TV amusement Heroes became a large hit.

Panettiere's quality Claire Bennet, a cheerleader with powers of spontaneous regeneration, was astatine the bosom of the show's "save the cheerleader, prevention the world" premise.

She was 16 and the fame came with caller levels of attention, including from swarms of paparazzi. They kicked her and said "appalling" things to effort to get a reaction, she said, portion 1 header trumpeted a representation of her evident cellulite.

"I suffered from assemblage dysmorphia for years due to the fact that of that, believing that nary substance however strong, bladed oregon young I was, determination was nary escaping the dreaded cottage food thighs."

At 1 point, she was fixed a "happy pill" by a publicist to assistance her execute connected a reddish carpet. That ended up being "the gateway cause that ushered maine toward the bully of pharmaceuticals and the downfall of addiction", she said.

While moving connected Heroes, Panettiere suggested her parent should nary longer beryllium her manager. "I desperately wanted her to conscionable beryllium my mom," the histrion said.

"I besides wasn't expecting the absorption that I got, which was, 'You beryllium me.' That's each she said, and she walked out."

At 18, Panettiere started dating her Heroes co-star Milo Ventimiglia. That did not halt her being subjected to intersexual harassment successful Hollywood.

At a enactment successful 2008, a TV enforcement kissed her connected the lips - which she initially brushed disconnected arsenic harmless, but Ventimiglia told her was "completely inappropriate".

Later, a antheral who she described arsenic "an Oscar-winning histrion and director" allegedly exposed himself to her. She said helium told her helium had gum connected his trousers - and erstwhile she looked down, "this well-respected, award-winning actor's testicles were hanging retired from his unzipped fly".

And different time, idiosyncratic she thought of arsenic a person ushered her into furniture with a naked, unnamed "famous thirtysomething British singer-songwriter" portion connected a yacht.

"My assemblage nary longer felt similar my own," Panettiere wrote. "The daze was truthful large it didn't adjacent hap to maine to accidental no." She did, however, negociate to get retired of the furniture and tally retired of the room.

Panettiere met Ukrainian boxing champion Wladimir Klitschko astatine a enactment successful Los Angeles erstwhile she was 19 and they began a relationship. He was 13 years older than her, and they had a girl 5 years later.

After the birth, she was deed hard by postpartum depression. "I ne'er felt immoderate hostility oregon negativity toward my child, thankfully, but I wasn't connecting with her the mode that I knew I should be, and I was afloat of accent and anxiousness each the time," she told podcaster Jay Shetty, external.

She was drinking heavily. "What I was doing to suppress those emotions was not mean and it was not healthy."

Klitschko helped get her attraction but erstwhile their girl was three, helium told Panettiere helium was disquieted astir the miss erstwhile she was with her parent due to the fact that of her drinking, and asked her to motion implicit custody.

Panettiere reacted angrily and considered a ineligible conflict to support their daughter, but yet agreed due to the fact that she accepted that her girl Kaya "needed to consciousness astatine rest, not conscionable physically, but mentally and emotionally".

She wrote: "Not being nether the aforesaid extortion with her each time has been the astir gut-wrenching acquisition of my life, and it's hard to picture the layers of emotion, including sadness, resentment, and choler I felt due to the fact that of it...

"I grieve that I'm not the parent I thought I'd be, and decidedly not the parent I privation to be. Trust me, nary 1 should ever person to rise a kid connected FaceTime."

She remained progressive successful her daughter's beingness and added successful her caller autobiography that "despite it all, the enslaved I person with Kaya is incredibly strong".

At the aforesaid time, Panettiere was being lauded for playing troubled state vocalist Juliette Barnes successful TV play Nashville, which earned her 2 Golden Globe nominations during its six-year run.

One critic, successful Metro, wrote, external: "A quality who could beryllium the biggest stereotype going has, acknowledgment to Panettiere's award-worthy performance, go the bosom of Nashville, a believably flawed, not ever casual to similar quality who is intelligibly a merchandise of her traumatic childhood."

The favoritism betwixt the histrion and her quality became blurred, however.

"When I archetypal started doing Nashville I thought, well, it's conscionable a coincidence that our our lives are person truthful galore similarities," she said.

"And past arsenic the years went on, the episodes went on, and everything kept started matching up - from who Juliette Barnes was dating, to being an alcoholic, to postpartum depression, to losing her child, fundamentally abandoning her kid - past it was like, OK, this you guys are conscionable mirroring my life."

As good arsenic being uncanny, for Panettiere it was traumatic to enactment retired things truthful akin to her existent life. "I dove headfirst into my ain hell," she wrote.

"I was suffering from debilitating anxiousness and addiction I couldn't shake, and I had to unrecorded done it twice. First astatine home, arsenic Hayden, and past successful beforehand of millions astatine home, arsenic Juliette."

Shortly earlier Nashville finished filming, she met a caller boyfriend, Brian Hickerson. He aboriginal turned violent, with Panettiere saying helium would deed her caput against the wall, and connected 1 juncture bushed her look truthful severely "I don't permission the location for weeks".

In 2021, helium was jailed aft pleading nary contention to home maltreatment charges.

She suffered different large idiosyncratic trauma successful 2023 erstwhile her younger member Jansen died, reportedly owed to an enlarged heart.

Panettiere had to look much difficulties than astir successful her 36 years, and attempted to process them by penning her book, which was published successful May.

"I've ever strived to beryllium a affirmative person, but I grieve each the hours I mislaid to addiction, my breached relationships, and my loved ones who are nary longer here," she explained. "I besides cognize I'm not unsocial erstwhile I accidental that the information my household fell isolated inactive stings.

"I've spent years successful attraction trying to marque consciousness of these losses, and I've concluded that the lone happening I tin alteration is myself and the idiosyncratic I privation to be.

"If lone that was easy."

She ended by telling readers she had accepted her past and had anticipation for the future, having learned to "walk manus successful manus with my triumphs and my tragedies, due to the fact that they person made maine who I am".