Hayden Panettiere Dead: Final Instagram Post Was Heartbreaking

A former child star, Panettiere was open about the challenges she faced throughout her career in the spotlight, including opioid addiction and postpartum depression after giving birth to her and ex-fiancé Wladimir Klitschko‘s daughter Kaya, now 11, in 2014.

But she’s also learned ways to cope with her struggles, including her grief after the 2023 death of her brother Jansen Panettiere due to an undiagnosed heart condition.

As the Remember the Titans star shared ahead of the May release of her memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, she had been prioritizing her mental health in recent years.

“I do have a great therapist, but always checking in with myself, being self-aware, being surrounded by healthy people who bring out the best in me,” she told E! News. “Just trying to keep in touch with myself and what’s going on, and then setting personal boundaries, not being a yes person all the time.”

Panettiere added, “I’m an empath, so if I make somebody feel uncomfortable or disappointed or upset, I feel it myself, so I don’t want to let anybody down. But now I’m putting up more personal boundaries.”