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| Actress Constance Wu put her mental health before her career. |
Few of Constance Wu's fans knew how deeply she was affected by the social media storm that followed her controversial tweet after her show, Fresh Off the Boat, was renewed for another season.
She was so distraught, she left social media for three years and contemplated suicide.
“Looking back, it’s surreal a few DMs convinced me to end my own life, but that’s what happened,” Wu wrote in a tweet today (Thursday, July 14). It was the first tweet from the Asian American actress in three years in what she called a slow return to social media.
Based on the roles she plays and her earlier social media posts, the image Wu presented to the public was one of a self-assured, feisty woman overcoming the racist and sexist environment of her industry.
As we later learned, that image was a cover for a sensitive, vulnerable actress, who like many others in her field, wore her emotions on her sleeve at the ready, in case those feelings are needed for a character she was playing.
In 2019, Wu tweeted her disappointment that the show that boosted her career, Fresh Off The Boat, was given a sixth season, writing, “So upset right now that I’m literally crying. Ugh. Fuck.”
The backlash was immediate and vicious, portraying her as "selfish" and "ungrateful" and not thinking about the hundreds of other workers and actors employed by the series.
In an attempt to calm the waters from her fans and fellow actors, she later said that she “was temporarily upset” because the renewal meant she “had to give up another project that I was really passionate about,” and her apparent displeasure had nothing to do with her show.
Still, her comments went viral, with many people in the entertainment business inferred that she was ungrateful for the opportunity the show had given her.
Wu said that she felt that she had become "a blight on the Asian American community. I started feeling like I didn't deserve to live anymore.
"Luckily, a friend found me and rushed me to the ER,: she continued. It was after that scary event that she decided to reassess her life. Just as she was getting momentum in Hollywood, for the next few years, Wu decided to put her mental health ahead of her career.
After the roaring success of Crazy Rich Asians in 2018, she disappeared from social media and foregoing the publicity circuit of talk shows and media interviews for her 2019 movie Hustlers with megastar Jennifer Lopez and The Terminal List, the Netflix film that debuted earlier this month.
Last Tuesday, July 12, she made a cautious return to social media explaining her absence from the public eye. It was in this post that she revealed that she made an attempt to take her own life.
She decided to use her "scary moment" as a teaching device and to reach out to others who are in a similar situation. Instead of being ashamed of the low point in her mental health and keep it to herself, she wrote a book and began taking small steps in returning to social media.
"Even though I'm scared, I've decided I owe it to the me-of-three -years-ago, to be brave and share my story so it might help someone with theirs," Wu concluded.
Following is Constance Wu's initial tweet upon returning to social media.
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