Rebecca Gibney has been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
The actress – who was inducted into the Logies Hall of Fame in 2024 – sat down with Australian Women’s Weekly to share the details of her shock health discovery, admitting that she is “still coming to terms” with the diagnosis.
The 61-year-old dubbed the last few months “hard” and “very emotional”, before revealing how she found out about her condition last year.
“I’ve cried a lot more in the last few months than I’ve cried in a long time, which I thought I’d gotten over as a woman over 60. I was like, ‘No, I’ve got all that stuff sorted’.”
According to Gibney, she was diagnosed by her psychologist after having some “major struggles” on Dancing With The Stars last July.
Since then, the New Zealand-born star has admitted she’s still getting to grips with the diagnosis, despite her new label explaining a lot of her past behaviours.
“I’m still coming to terms with it because it’s answered a lot of questions from my past – my panic attacks, my years of masking, which started obviously at a very early age,” she shared.
However, Gibney can’t help but wonder what life would have been like if she had been diagnosed earlier.
“There’s that slight mourning – gosh, if I’d known this 40, 50 years ago, would I have gone through all the stuff that I went through?” she questioned.
This isn’t the first time Gibney has opened up about her lifelong mental health battle.
In November last year, the Millionaire Hot Seat host opened up about her panic attacks and crippling anxiety on social media, adding that she’d struggled with them “for most of my life”.
“As a teen, I was often erratic, impulsive, prone to rages and bored easily,” she wrote in an Instagram post.
Gibney went on to confess that her mental health struggles saw her leave high school at the age of 15, only to fall into acting by chance.
By her early 30s, Gibney admitted that, despite having a “thriving career”, “solid family”, and “extraordinary friendships”, she was mentally spiralling.
“The weekly panic attacks became daily, then hourly,” she wrote.
“The self-loathing was constant and my pain was so deep, I didn’t know how to deal with it. I just knew I wanted it over.”
She went on to reveal she got help and “eventually came home to myself”, encouraging others experiencing a rough patch to lean on people.
“We all mask our pain but we all also feel it. You’re not alone,” she said.
“Light really does follow the dark.”