Jennifer Esposito is opening up about her traumatic health journey — including her stay in a psych ward — after being considered “crazy” amid her quest for a diagnosis in her mid-20s.
“I will say it was seven of the most excruciating hours of my entire life, because I was yet again pleading for my sanity,” Esposito, 53, recalled of her brief psych ward stay during the Wednesday, August 12, episode of the “Heal Squad x Maria Menounos” podcast.
Esposito, who experienced health issues since childhood, explained that she was hospitalized about a month or two after finally being diagnosed with celiac disease. (Celiac disease is an autoimmune disease that triggers an abnormal reaction from your immune system when you eat gluten, according to Cleveland Clinic.)
While the Blue Bloods alum said she was happy to finally have answers about her health, she wasn’t instantly better.
Esposito explained that she cut out gluten following her diagnosis and also realized she was vitamin D deficient — but the troubles got worse before they got better.
“When I stopped the gluten and I went through this detox, I couldn’t even tell you,” she shared. “They had me on four Klonopin a day, and I was still a trembling mess.”
The Mistresses actress recalled, “I was literally sleeping in my kitchen, because it was the only place that didn’t have a window, because the stimulus from the light would make me tremble and shake, like, I couldn’t talk. It was horrendous.”
At that time, Esposito was seeing a specialist in New York who was studying her severe case of celiac.
Esposito recalled telling the specialist on one particular day, “You got to keep me here because I’m jumping out of my skin. I’m going to jump out the window.”
She expressed worries about her physical and mental state while trying to navigate celiac and the other issues that had popped up as a result of the illness. Esposito said she told the doctor she wanted him to perform tests to combat her being “vitamin deprived,” and he made her think he was going to do just that.
When the doctor sent her to another area of the hospital, Esposito said she didn’t think much of it and went downstairs to check in as “Betty Franklin,” an alias made up of her dogs’ names to keep her anonymous.
“Within a half an hour, I was wheeled upstairs to the psych ward,” Esposito said, claiming her physical symptoms were once again being overlooked and she was being classified as mentally unstable.
The former NCIS star explained to host Maria Menounos that her father was there when she checked in, and he luckily didn’t leave her alone.
“If my father wasn’t there and I didn’t literally look at him with the look of death … I was like, ‘If you leave me here, I’m dying, because I’m going to fight these people,’” Esposito said.
She noted, “You can’t put someone who is having a severe panic disorder in a locked space. And you’re still telling me this is my mind.”
Esposito realized, “It was because I said I was going to jump out the window and they thought I was going to harm myself.”
Once she was admitted to the psych ward, Esposito was faced with a “pompous man” who allegedly called her “really hostile.”
She remembered telling herself to “calm down” because she wasn’t being heard by the physicians, who suggested she “just stay” and eat a lunch filled with gluten, which she couldn’t have with her illness.
“He had no concept of celiac disease,” Esposito said. “I remember thinking, ‘Keep it together.’”
At one point, Esposito said the doctor asked her father in front of her, “If she gets out of hand, can we restrain her?”
After seeing some of the other patients, Esposito knew that she had to get out of there.
“I connected with this man and he was gone. He was looking at me like he wanted to say something,” she recalled. “And I thought, ‘That will be me if you leave me here.’ They are so quick to put a label of ‘crazy.’”
Esposito did leave under her father’s supervision that same day. She went home to her apartment and vowed to start fighting for herself and others who were being overlooked by the healthcare system.
Esposito later wrote a book about her health ups and downs and how she has managed living with celiac disease — which she wasn’t diagnosed with until she was acting on Samantha Who? alongside Christina Applegate from 2007 to 2009.
“I cannot tell you how ill I was, from the time I was a child. … It went in waves,” she said on the podcast. “The physical symptoms, stomach issues, hair falling out, nails falling off. But then the panic disorder. I was agoraphobic for a year. I didn’t leave my parents’ home.”
Esposito said her parents brought her to a psychologist. She was put on “every medication” and was even advised to do shock treatment because she “wasn’t responding” to treatment.
She was in her 20s when she had a dream to “check your vitamins,” which is when things started to click — but only after she got really sick on set.
“I was actually on Samantha Who? when really things started to collapse,” Esposito explained. “I had hair falling out, nails falling off. Like, breaking midway.”
She remembered having a tooth fall out of her mouth “literally in the middle of a scene” and being “mortified.”
“I had been so ill that I just went hysterical. Like, somebody has to help me,” Esposito continued. “Not to mention the amount of medication they had me on. Because I had recurring sinus infections. They had me on steroid after steroid after steroid.”
Esposito then went to another doctor, who initially thought it could be in her head — even with all of the physical symptoms she outlined.
When this doctor ran blood tests, however, she realized Esposito had celiac. The doctor called her one day and said, “Not only do you have celiac disease, but you have the worst case I’ve ever seen.”
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org.
