“America’s Got Talent” judge Simon Cowell said his 10-year-old son saved him from the depths of depression.
Cowell noted that after losing both his parents, everything in his life changed for the worse. “I think particularly when I lost my mum, I was on a downward spiral at that point,” he told host Steve Bartlett in the emotional June 10 episode of “The Diary Of A CEO” podcast. “I was desperately unhappy, I wasn’t particularly enjoying my work and I just thought, ‘You know what? I’m just going to become a vampire then,’ and I would work through until 7:00 or 8:00 in the morning. I would wake up at 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon and I actually got addicted to that kind of lifestyle. I just loved the intensity. It was almost like because of the loss I’d had, I’ve got to find something else to fill it.”
The famous television personality went on to explain the pain he felt at the time.
“I lost everyone, you know, I’ve lost my parents. It’s finality now.”
“What I said about the material things I’ve got, everything just meant nothing at that point,” he said on the podcast.
No matter what he did, the void of losing both his parents just wasn’t being filled.
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA – SEPTEMBER 13: (L-R) Lauren Silverman, Eric Cowell and Simon Cowell attend a “America’s Got Talent” Season 17 Live Show at Sheraton Pasadena Hotel on September 13, 2022 in Pasadena, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images)
“And it was I’m just going to be a ridiculous workaholic, and I was very successful but I wasn’t happy, I really, really wasn’t happy,” Cowell said.
The 64-year-old explained that when his fiancée Lauren Silverman, announced that she was pregnant with their first child, his entire life turned around.
“When I got the call from Lauren, which starts, any call that starts with, ‘Are you sitting down?’ You know what’s coming next. It was like, ‘Are you sitting down?’ ‘Yes,’ ‘Well,’ and she told me.”
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“And yes it did absolutely change, it changed everything in my life. It made me happy again,” Cowell said.
Cowell seemed to hit the reset button when his son, Eric, was born. When Bartlett asked if his son “saved” him, Cowell replied with conviction.
“Without question, without question,” he said. “I really, really had reached the point where nothing mattered. Even to the point that I almost can’t remember everything from that period.”
“It hit me so hard, the hardest thing also was being on television as well … I felt like a clown here because I’m dying inside,” Cowell said.
Cowell explained the physical, mental and emotional turmoil he faced at the time.
“I’d put on a ton of weight, I was eating junk, if I had got hit by a bus the following day, well, I’d be dead, but I wasn’t worried about anything like that,” he said. (RELATED: Reality TV Star Savannah Chrisley Admits To Attempting Suicide By Downing A Bottle Of Pain Pills)
BRIDGETOWN, BARBADOS – DECEMBER 22: Simon Cowell seen with Lauren Silverman and their children Adam and Eric on the beach on December 22, 2019 in Bridgetown, Barbados (Photo by Ian Lawrence/GC Images)
“The whole time was dark. I can absolutely relate to when people reach the lowest levels you possibly can, where essentially being alive doesn’t matter anymore, because you just go, ‘Well, what have I got to live for?'”
Cowell clarified that he never contemplated suicide during his dark days, but he was definitely not in a good place.
“Not thinking I want to take my own life, but thinking if something terrible happened it wouldn’t bother me, to myself.”
