Mena Suvari: 'I'm lucky I survived'

THE ACTRESS SPENT YEARS IN THE GRIP OF SEXUAL ABUSERS AND DRUG ADDICTION. NOW HAPPILY MARRIED AND A NEW MUM, SHE’S FINALLY SHARING HER STORY

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Performance was a way of life for Mena Suvari, even when the cameras weren’t rolling. “Every time I would walk onto a set, every time I was interviewed … I was acting the whole time,” says the 42-year-old. “It was another role for me to play – that I was OK.”

In reality, she was anything but. “Between the ages of 12 and 20,” she reveals, “I was the victim of repeated sexual abuse.” The nightmare began in Year 6 when she was raped by a friend of one of her older brothers. Later, starting out in Hollywood, she became involved with a series of older men who abused her. She numbed the pain with hard drugs – and never shared the secrets of her traumatic past. “I turned to any form of self-medicating I could find, just to get by,” she says. “I was just trying to survive.” But now, in a new memoir, The Great Peace, she’s sharing her harrowing story for the first time. She hopes she can help others who feel as “completely and utterly alone” as she once did. “For the first time, I gave myself permission,” she says, “and found the voice that I wished I had.”