Eric Dane felt "conflicted" about taking time out to battle depression because he didn’t feel he had "anything to be depressed about".
The 44-year-old actor took a break from his TNT series ‘The Last Ship’ in April to focus on his mental health, and has urged others experiencing similar issues to address their problems and seek help.
He said: "I took some time off — I was dealing with some depression, which was kind of odd to me.
"I felt very conflicted about it because I didn’t really feel like I had anything to be depressed about."
"Now I take a medication called Pristiq, which I thought just sounded like a good mood. And the depression is gone.
"You’ve got to listen to your body. It’s a very serious thing. Like I said, I felt very conflicted because I couldn’t figure out what I was depressed about. But it’s very real."
Eric – who has children Billie, seven, and Georgia, five, with wife Rebecca Gayheart – admitted it was a very "scary" time for him and he’s pleased he’s now come out the other side.
The former ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ star – who went to rehab in 2011 because of an addiction to painkillers – told ‘Today’: "That was a scary thing, when you wake up and you’re like: ‘I don’t want to get out of bed.’ I was seeing these doctors thinking that there was something physically wrong with me, because I’d never felt like that.
"I mean, I’d dealt with depression throughout my life, but it was always manageable.
"I just felt like, you know, everybody kind of feels a little blue. But this just hit me like a truck. I had to take some time off — I went away, I took care of it, and I’m feeling great."
Eric Dane’s depression conflict
