Natalie Bassingthwaighte opens up on mental health, her true calling and saying goodbye to Neighbours

Natalie Bassingthwaighte reveals why new doco Space 22 and her own mental health issues have helped her to find her true calling.

After nearly 25 years acting, singing and dancing on stage and screen, as well as a chart-topping music career, Natalie Bassingthwaighte has finally found her purpose.

The multi-talented mother of two hosts the new ABC documentary Space 22, which follows seven strangers living with mental illness as they take part in an experiment run by the Black Dog Institute to see if participating in art can help heal their wounds.

Given her background in the arts, not to mention her own struggles with mental health dating back decades, it felt to Bassingthwaighte the gig was something she needed to do and pitched hard to land it.

“After the first day of filming I was so moved and taken aback by the honesty and vulnerability of the participants,” she says from the spacious yard in the Northern Rivers of NSW home she shares with husband Cameron McGlinchey and their two children Harper and Hendrix.

“I rang my husband and said ‘I think I have found my purpose’.

“That’s a big thing to say after a life of lots of different flavours but I felt like it was so honest and raw and real and I thought it was the culmination of my entire life all coming into this one big spark. I thought that this is why it’s happening, this is where I am supposed to be, this is why I have done what I have done and this is why I have been through what I have been through. And here I am.”

Natalie Bassingthwaighte in a scene from ABC documentary Space 22

Bassingthwaighte opens the six-part series, which also features psychotherapist Noula Diamantopoulos, artist Abdul Abdulla and musician Eddie Perfect, with some candid mental health admissions of her own.

She has been dealing with anxiety and depression for most of career in the spotlight, first in musical theatre, then on Neighbours, as well as her successful pivot into music as the singer for ARIA-winning electro-pop act Rogue Traders.

She recalls being mystified by her emotions of overwhelming sadness and feeling “broken” and went into therapy three times a week, while going on medication.

Her star rose at a time in the early 2000s when mental health was still very much taboo and she worried that if her issues became public, her career would suffer.

“Life has seemed to be perfect from the outside and for the most part it has been amazing,” she says.

“But it’s also been really hard at times and to try to navigate that in the public eye can be confronting and to feel that you don’t want to talk about it because of the stigma and fear around people not employing you and thinking you are crazy. Now I just go ‘I am crazy – that’s part of who I am and part of what makes me fabulous’.”

Bassingthwaighte wishes now that she’d been able to use music as therapy in much the same way that the participants in Space 22 do, but admits that there were times before going on stage with Rogue Traders that she was almost crippled with fear.

Natalie Bassingthwaighte and Tracey in a scene from ABC documentary Space 22

“There were times when I was singing in the public eye when I was not in a good way,” she says.

“I had to perform and I was just terrified and thought ‘I can’t go out there’. I didn’t think I was very good and I was doubting myself but again, it was just one of those moments in my mental health brain that wasn’t working.

“It was telling me negative things, that I shouldn’t be out there. I was fragile, so it didn’t help me then. It was horrible. But coming out the other side, music does bring me joy and it does bring me happiness.”

Things came to a head for Bassingthwaighte about five years ago when she suffered a breakdown after taking herself off her medication without consulting a doctor.

While she can “hand on heart” say she’s never been suicidal, Bassingthwaighte says the six-week ordeal left her feeling like she was “in a vortex” of negativity with seemingly no way out.

“It was so terrifying and I felt like … if that was going to be my every day forever, I couldn’t do it. It was so hard. I felt like everything around me was negative – like everything. I couldn’t speak to my kids, I couldn’t go anywhere, it was just negative thoughts on top of one another. Anyway, I did all the work, I went back on medication and did all the other work too.”

Natalie Bassingthwaighte in Rogue Traders with husband Cameron McGlinchey (right).

Meditation, mindfulness and a constant reassessment of people and work priorities are part of Bassingthwaighte’s daily routine now, as well as a recognition that “mental ill health is an ongoing process that you always have to nurture”.

And if there was a silver lining to come from the terrifying experience, it was that she emerged with a renewed determination to be open about her journey, hoping that she could help others dealing with mental health issues by sharing her own.

Space 22 and its participants made such an impression on her that she’s keen to do more to keep the mental health discussion going, even if she isn’t quite sure what that might be yet.

“I learned that there is more to life than the moments that we sometimes think are everything,” she says of her experiences on the show.

“We put so much pressure on ourselves in certain situations for them to be the be-all and end-all but time goes fast.

“It can be really important one day and not the next, so stand up for what you believe in and try to love the moments that you are living in because you’re not here for very long. Help support people, be a part of something. That’s made me realise that everything in my life has led to this.”
Space 22, May 17, 8pm, ABC.

Anyone experiencing distress can contact Lifeline (13 11 14), Kids Helpline (1800 55 1800) or Head to Health (headtohealth.gov.au).

FAREWELL TO IZZY

After weeks of speculation, Natalie Bassingthwaighte has finally this week been confirmed as one of the roll call of famous Neighbours alumni making one last visit to Ramsay St before the long-running soap finishes on August 1.

Bassingthwaighte, who played “superbitch” Izzy Hoyland from 2003-2007 (and briefly returned in 2018) says she’s sad to see the much-loved Aussie staple finish after 32 years but says she appreciates all the show taught her.

Natalie Bassingthwaighte, pictured with Alan Fletcher, says she’s grateful for her time on Neighbours.

“There’s a real sadness that it’s ending but you just have to be grateful that it happened and that it was amazing,” she says.

“I am so happy that I worked with such brilliant people – it really gave me the best work ethic and I am forever grateful for that.”