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COMEDIAN AL PORTER has been praised online for producing an unprecedented moment on Irish television when he showed his antidepressants on RTÉ One.
Porter was speaking on the Cutting Edge programme and told host Brendan O’Connor that he even hid the pills in his house so they wouldn’t be found.
“I am going to tell you something now that I didn’t even tell my mam until two hours ago, when I rang her because I knew I was going to say it to you.”
Porter went on to say that a prolonged depression led to a friend suggesting that he may be suffering from a chemical imbalance.
“I went to a doctor, I wouldn’t even go to my family doctor, I was afraid to go to my own doctor. I went to a doctor in Carlow, because I wanted to get out of Dublin, who said ‘listen you need antidepressants’ and I never thought I would be that person.”
He continued:
I have been hiding them in my house, I have had my friend pick them up because I didn’t want to go in with the prescription. I’ve got them prescribed under a different name because I didn’t want to use my own.
In a particularly moving moment, Porter took the pills out of his pocket and, with his hands shaking, pointed them down the camera saying:
All I needed to do was go to a doctor get told that I needed these, these are Lexapro they’re only 10mg, I got given them and I take one tiny tablet a day. I’ve been doing it a few months and I’m functioning much better. It’s changed my life, that’s all I needed.
“The thing is, to anybody who’s watching, if you need them go. If I need them in a year I’ll still need them in a year,” he said.
Porter’s fellow panelists praised Porter’s openness, as did many people online:
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