Ira Khan, daughter of Bollywood superstar Aamir Khan and Reena Dutta, has been quite vocal about issues related to mental health on different occasions. The star kid has often spoken about her own depression battle as well and how she has overcome it. For the unversed, Ira was diagnosed with clinical depression over five years ago.
Recently, Ira revealed that her parents’ divorce was one of the triggers of her depression. According to Ira, the divorce was ‘amicable’, but it did leave a huge impact on her mental health.
In an interview with ETimes, Ira said that though her parents’ divorce is one of the triggers of her emotional turmoil, she doesn’t ‘blame’ them for her mental health condition. She stated that she does feel that both Reena and Aamir Khan made her believe that getting divorced “was not a big deal”. Ira Khan was very young when Aamir and Reena got divorced in 2002.
Ira said, “My therapist said that one of the trigger points was my parents, who handled their divorce as well as they could at that point. It was amicable. I am not blaming them, but what they didn’t realise is that because they made it seem like divorce was not a big deal, there was a perception my mind created of the situation. We create perceptions and we don’t necessarily communicate to people about those. So, I blame myself for my depression. I spent 20 years thinking that you have to be sad for people to love you. But now how do I go back? I want to be happy! So now, I have to systematically undo everything that I have done”.
Earlier, in an old interview with the same portal, Ira Khan had revealed that there are mental health disorders in her family. This time as well, she said that depression in her case is partly genetic. The publication quoted the star kid as saying, “Depression is a little complicated. It is partly genetic, partly psychological, and social. In my case is partly genetic. There is a history of mental health issues my family on my mom and dad’s side.”
In 2010, Ira had shared a video about mental illness where she openly addressed her battles through the caption of the post on World Mental Health Day. Ira had written, “A lot has been going on, a lot of people have a lot to say. Things are really confusing and stressful and simple and okay but not okay and… life all together. There’s no way to say it all in one go. But I’d like to think I’ve figured some stuff out, or at least figured out how to make it slightly more understandable. About mental health and mental ill-health. So come with me on this journey… in my awkward, quirky, sometimes-baby-voice-y, as-honest-as-I-can-be… way. Let’s start a conversation. Happy World Mental Health Day,”
However, Ira now aims to be happy in life with her partner, Nupur Shikhare. The couple engaged last year. Recently, she has also launched the Agastu Foundation in an attempt to provide mental health support to people and wants to dedicatedly work for it in future.
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