Eastenders actress Patsy Palmer has opened up about her battle with depression and admitted that her past experiences have “probably a bit over-sensitive” about her children’s mental health.

“It was quite a few years ago, when I was working at EastEnders before, and I wanted to change my life for the better, become healthier, stop drinking, stop the party lifestyle,” she said on the BBC’s Missing Live programme.

“After a couple of months I started to suffer from anxiety, and it went on for quite some time and then it kind of just built up and built up, and because I wasn’t talking about it – I tried all different kinds of ways, but that’s the point, keeping it to yourself is really not a good idea.

“It was very confusing not being able to accept that there was something going on mentally – I was suffering from depression.”

The turning point came when her brother took her to a treatment centre, she said.

“It was almost like I had gone in to some kind of blackout,” she said. “I just couldn’t face going in to work that day, I was lucky that I had my brother with me.”