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Mel B opens up about her suicide attempt in 2014

Photo credit: Getty Images
Photo credit: Getty Images

From Cosmopolitan

Spice Girls band member Melanie Brown (known better to the world as Mel B) has bravely revealed that she tried to commit suicide four years ago.

Back in 2014, the singer was starring as a judge on The X Factor, but behind the smiles and the glamorous outfits, Mel was struggling. Things got so low that in December 2014, just days before the final of the talent show, she tried to take her own life.

Opening up about the difficult time in her new memoir, Brutally Honest, the Spice Girl said she felt "emotionally battered, estranged from my family."

Photo credit: Amazon
Photo credit: Amazon

"I felt ugly and detested by the very man who once promised to love and protect me, my husband and manager Stephen," Mel wrote.

In 2007, Mel married Stephen Belafonte, but the pair finalised their divorce in August this year following her allegations that he was emotionally and physically abusive. In her revelatory book, Mel described her life as "a mess" and recalled seeing no other way but to end it.

"It’s Thursday night. 11 December 2014. I’ve come back from dinner with my husband Stephen. Tomorrow I’m going to The X Factor," an excerpt from Brutally Honest, published in The Sun, reads.

"It will be the red-carpet launch for the final weekend. I’ll be wearing a beautiful dress, my hair and make-up will be perfect. But if you want the absolute truth, I don’t care about any of it. My life is a mess and I want out."

Photo credit: Getty Images
Photo credit: Getty Images

The singer goes on to detail in her book how she proceeded to try to take her own life, stopping at each stage to confirm with herself: "Are you sure?"

She details how she had prepared notes for her children, and how she envisioned them carrying on life without her.

"I wrote frantic, disjointed notes for Phoenix, my eldest daughter, my soulmate - the girl who is little sister, friend and daughter to me. It was going to be up to her to get my other little girls, Angel and Madison, to Leeds where they could all live with my mum," the extract reads.

Photo credit: Getty Images
Photo credit: Getty Images

But as soon as she'd taken the steps to harm herself, Mel recalls realising she "didn’t want to go anywhere. Suicide was not the answer.

"I had to make my life count," she writes.

Mel was hospitalised with liver and kidney damage following her suicide attempt, and awoke to her daughter Phoenix at her bedside.

"It was the saddest moment of my life," the Spice Girl recalls. "All I ever want is for her to know how sorry I am, how lost I was and how I’ll never, ever abandon her again."

Two days later, Mel appeared on The X Factor final without her wedding ring. This, she says, is when she knew "the fightback had to start", and years down the line she is in a far stronger place.

Photo credit: ITV
Photo credit: ITV

Of her book, which is released on November 27, Mel says: "Good, bad or ugly, I'm going to peel back the layers and tell it like it was. You can judge me or you can try and understand me."

If you are feeling suicidal or are worried about a loved one, contact The Samaritans on their free, confidential, 24-hour phone support available by calling 116 123 or emailing jo@samaritans.org.

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