My daughter lived with my wife being ill since she was 2.
My mother was very ill when I was 18. She had a brain operation and then a nervous breakdown. It's very strange when you see your parents, who have always been your pillars of strength, suddenly become vulnerable. You don't know whether to be angry that they are not strong or devastated.
I was a middle child and was used to negotiating. But there was nothing I could do to reverse my mother's condition.
My entire youth was spent with an incredibly ill parent... I don't think you can grow up that way and not be marked by that experience.
Sara: "You are so brave," I tell her, and then I smile. "When I grow up, I want to be just like you." To my surprise, Kate shakes her head hard. Her voice is a feather, a thread. "No Mommy," she says. "You'd be sick.
I was sent to boarding school at the age of ten. I think Mummy was trying to protect me in her own way, trying to spare me living through the day-to-day reality of her illness.
My father was unwell when I was 11, had a stroke at 14 and died when I was 18. My mother going to work at seven in the morning and coming back to look after him and me and my brother left its mark on me.
That used to be one of my greatest fears growing up: my mom would get sick and then she wouldn't be able to go to work and then there is no food or money for rent.
As an adult, it's hard for me to remember my mother before her sickness. But if I go back into childhood, I can access that.
When I was in 4th grade, my mom was diagnosed with oral cancer. It was not looking good, it was serious when they found it. Obviously, I didn't know much about what was going on. I remember feeling a lot of guilt about it, feeling like I somehow contributed to it. I think that's just something that kids often do.
You can't predict when a crisis might hit your family, whether it's with an elderly parent or with your children.
My father was sick when I was little, and we had a woman, a nanny-type, who was from Ireland. Her daughter was in Irish dancing, so she put me in it, and in the summertime, every weekend was filled with traveling somewhere to dance in competitions.
My father fell really chronically ill when I was 13 and that's when I phoned up an agent and started to act.
My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer when I was four. And she was re-diagnosed when I was seven or eight, and again when I was 13, and my dad was very unhealthy, too. I was living on the edge of mortality my entire childhood.
