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Hayden Panettiere Opens Up About Postpartum Depression: “It’s Really Scary”

Hayden Panettiere on Live! with Kelly and Michael
Hayden Panettiere opened up about her experience with postpartum depression after the birth of daughter Kaya during an appearance on Live! with Kelly and Michael on Monday, Sept. 28

Honest Hayden. Nashville’s leading lady Hayden Panettiere hopes that women will become more comfortable talking about some side effects that come with motherhood. The actress opened up about her own experience with postpartum depression after the birth of daughter Kaya last year during an appearance on Live! with Kelly and Michael on Monday, Sept. 28.

Related: PHOTOS: Hayden's best bikini moments

“I can very much relate. It’s something a lot of women experience. When [you’re told] about postpartum depression you think it’s ‘I feel negative feelings towards my child, I want to injure or hurt my child.’ I’ve never, ever had those feelings,” Panettiere, 26, told the ABC co-hosts. “Some women do. But you don’t realize how broad of a spectrum you can really experience that on. It’s something that needs to be talked about. Women need to know that they’re not alone, and that it does heal.”

hayden on live with kelly and michael
Hayden Panettiere on Live With Kelly and Michael

Panettiere and her fiancé, boxer Wladimir Klitschko, welcomed Kaya in December 2014. Earlier this month, the former child star told Us Weekly in her 25 Things feature that she “suffered a bit” from postpartum depression. “You’re not alone or crazy, ladies!” she said at the time.

Related: PHOTOS: 2014's babies of the year

The Heroes alum shared that same sentiment during the talk show on Monday. “There’s a lot of misunderstanding. There’s a lot of people out there that think that it’s not real, that it’s not true. That it’s something that’s made up in their minds, that, ‘Oh, it’s hormones.’ They brush it off,” she said. “It’s something that’s completely uncontrollable. It’s really painful and it’s really scary and women need a lot of support.” (Panettiere’s Nashville character, new mom Juliette Barnes, is experiencing PPD in her current story line.)

Despite experiencing PPD symptoms, Panettiere is excited to have more children one day. In fact, she wouldn’t mind giving Kaya three siblings.

Wladimir Klitschko and Hayden Panettiere
Wladimir Klitschko and Hayden Panettiere

“I’m not going to speak too soon. One at a time. I mean, I would love it if Wlad figured out a way to get pregnant and he could have the baby. We would be going right now, no problem,” she said of her 6-foot-6 Ukranian beau, 39.

Related: PHOTOS: How stars worked around their baby bumps

She laughed: “When I was pregnant, he did this thing where he would suck in his stomach and then I would put my stomach to his so that he could feel when she was moving, almost like she was in his stomach. He wanted to feel what it was like to have a baby as close to him as it was to me.”

Panettiere kept mum on when she plans for pregnancy No. 2, but for now, she’s cherishing each moment with baby Kaya. On Monday, she revealed that the couple brought their daughter to Germany to get baptized.

“This kid loves water. She’s never cried anytime we’ve put her in the shower, the bath or the ocean. She loves swimming. And of course the one time that we need her to not cry is the priest dipping her into the holy water, and this kid is just wailing,” Panettiere recalled. “The priest, at one point, he takes a little bit of her hair and cuts it. It’s part of the tradition. And she was like, ‘Honey, you take my hair, I take yours.’ She took his beard and yanked.”

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