Speaker 1: Hey, fam, I'm Jada Pinkett Smith and this is the
Speaker 1: Red Table Talk podcast. All your favorite episodes from the
Speaker 1: Facebook Watch show in audio produced by Westbrook Audio and
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. Please don't forget to rate and review
Speaker 1: on Apple podcasts. Mental health and mental well being was
Speaker 1: a top request from our Red Table Talk family. Joining
Speaker 1: us at the table today is Kick Cutty. When I
Speaker 1: heard that Cutty had been struggling with mental health issues,
Speaker 1: I related deeply because of having to deal with my
Speaker 1: own suicidal thoughts, my own depression. Kick Cutty is an
Speaker 1: award winning hip hop icon and an inspiration to millions.
Speaker 1: Kick Cutty is one of the main dudes I listened
Speaker 1: to you all the time. He saved my life. You
Speaker 1: saved my life. I would to kill myself, but that
Speaker 1: there's me. Any if you're twenty five and under, I
Speaker 1: truly believe that Kick Cutty say of joy. This usually
Speaker 1: very private star shocked his fans with a Facebook post
Speaker 1: revealing his struggle with anxiety, depression, and suicidal urges. Cut
Speaker 1: He shared this time I fixed me. Being that he's
Speaker 1: his hip hop icon, a lot of people would think
Speaker 1: that he would be exempt from that kind of suffering,
Speaker 1: but he's not. None of us are here. We are
Speaker 1: at the red table ladies once again. Today's subject matter
Speaker 1: is mental illness. I think there's such a stigma and oh, absolutely,
Speaker 1: you know. And I think also how we define it.
Speaker 1: I call it emotional. Oh, because mental illness can be
Speaker 1: a little extreme. Sometimes think that emotional illness can cause
Speaker 1: mental disturbances. Sometimes the chemicals are just you know, just
Speaker 1: all that. That's a lot of what mental illnesses. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the root of it could be emotional instability. The root
Speaker 1: of it could be the final imbalanceal imbalanced. I would
Speaker 1: say for me, I had an emotional breakdown that definitely
Speaker 1: I feel like affected my mental stability. I had gotten
Speaker 1: to l A and gotten a certain amount of success
Speaker 1: and realized that that wasn't the answer, that that wasn't
Speaker 1: what was going to make everything okay. Actually made things worse,
Speaker 1: and I became extremely suicidal and I had complete emotional collapse.
Speaker 1: How old was that the twenty I guess I called
Speaker 1: gam in a panic. It's like when you just don't
Speaker 1: have control over your emotions, your your all. You feel
Speaker 1: completely and utterly out of control. And I don't even
Speaker 1: think at that particular point of time, I understood what
Speaker 1: I was going through. Now I know that it was
Speaker 1: what people would consider a nervous breaking. I absolutely understood
Speaker 1: that I didn't know what was going on. I understood it.
Speaker 1: But it was also a time where I really felt
Speaker 1: really powerless, you know, like I didn't know and I
Speaker 1: really know what to do to help her. I know
Speaker 1: we needed professional help, but yeah, you cannot manage yourself.
Speaker 1: Every moment of the day. You're talking to yourself, trying
Speaker 1: to keep yourself on track, like don't do that, trying
Speaker 1: to keep yourself safe, trying to keep you trying to
Speaker 1: keep yourself from hurting, from hurting yourself, trying to keep
Speaker 1: yourself from other people realizing that something's wrong. But they
Speaker 1: know something's wrong because every minute I was just bursting
Speaker 1: into tears and didn't know why, you know, and just
Speaker 1: trying to figure out how to deal with the pain
Speaker 1: that you're feeling inside. I don't know why. I felt like,
Speaker 1: for some reason, and once I became successful, that I
Speaker 1: would be kind of like exempt, bro, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, thinking, Oh, all of my problems are going
Speaker 1: to go away now that you know I'm successful. Exactly money, exactly,
Speaker 1: you know. I was in an environment. For such a
Speaker 1: long time, I got stuck in a mentality that even
Speaker 1: with success, it was very hard for me to get
Speaker 1: out of, meaning like not really being able to embrace
Speaker 1: the opportunity that I had. I was still holding on
Speaker 1: to the idea of deprivation and loss and having a
Speaker 1: lot of guilt and shame that came with my success,
Speaker 1: like you have to leave so many people behind, and
Speaker 1: that was depressed. How do you guys feel about because
Speaker 1: you know, this is always a big controversy too, is
Speaker 1: adding medication For some people it does help. They put
Speaker 1: me on prozac for it was like five milligrams, but
Speaker 1: once to disrupted my sex drive. I said, look, that's
Speaker 1: the only thing I got in my life. I was like,
Speaker 1: that's the one thing that particularly up. That was the
Speaker 1: thing that got me off of prozac. They had put
Speaker 1: me on it to just get me to a place
Speaker 1: where I could talk about what was happening, and then
Speaker 1: where you could function, where I could function get up
Speaker 1: in the morning exactly, you couldn't get up like I
Speaker 1: was severely depressed, severely and that was something that I
Speaker 1: battled with four years. Waking up in the morning was
Speaker 1: like the worst part of the dead, it's just like huh.
Speaker 1: And then it would take me, it would take me
Speaker 1: hours to just get into and so by the time
Speaker 1: like the evening time came, I was like I was
Speaker 1: at least like okay, yeah, I'm good. But then you
Speaker 1: go to sleep again and then you restarted. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: gotta restart. And so then once I got off the prozac,
Speaker 1: I went on a long, long, long, long journey. I
Speaker 1: learned how to manage it to a certain degree, but
Speaker 1: it was a struggle finding your own path. And that
Speaker 1: it's difficult too, because like we went through a couple
Speaker 1: of therapists, just therapy just didn't work. And that's not
Speaker 1: to say that that's not the path for some people.
Speaker 1: Medication does work. I'm absolutely therapy does work. So not
Speaker 1: only does it work, but it's it's necessary medication. So
Speaker 1: I just had to find my path, which is why
Speaker 1: it probably took as long as it did. And you know, now,
Speaker 1: thankfully I don't get depressed. You know. I also think
Speaker 1: that I had to uproot some false beliefs and I
Speaker 1: had to just let go, you know, and just come
Speaker 1: to terms with just what life is and what your
Speaker 1: life right, what my life is. It was at the time.
Speaker 1: We have one of the most influential artists, one of
Speaker 1: my favorite artists, this particular artists. He has been a
Speaker 1: superstar icon voice of the children of this generation, my kids.
Speaker 1: He has been their inspiration, their motivation. Yeah, and as
Speaker 1: a mom, I'm so grateful for him because he's been
Speaker 1: so good to my children. And it's kid cutting and
Speaker 1: kid cutty. He um, he's had it was good good.
Speaker 1: I'm the grandmother. Have a scene. Now I have to
Speaker 1: have just a mom fan moment. Can I do that
Speaker 1: for a second. It's very rare that people get to
Speaker 1: meet their idols, right, and not only get to meet
Speaker 1: their idols, but their idols live up to who they
Speaker 1: have imagined them to be. And you have been just
Speaker 1: such a huge inspiration to every child in this house.
Speaker 1: And then but then that the opportunity to hang with you,
Speaker 1: work with you, with you, you know, to have your support.
Speaker 1: As a mom, I just want to thank you. Oh,
Speaker 1: that's no problem. Phenomenal job and will they are amazing.
Speaker 1: I have to be honest, I'm sixty five, I'm not
Speaker 1: fulfiliar with your music, But do you understand the effect
Speaker 1: that you have on your fan base? Like Willow and
Speaker 1: Jaden and Trey even just crazy about it seems like
Speaker 1: the whole generation, the whole generation. Do you understand that
Speaker 1: about yourself? It's kind of crazy. I tell me if
Speaker 1: I'm wrong. But I feel like at a certain point,
Speaker 1: like when you hear it so much and when it's
Speaker 1: so apparent, you're like, I get it, and I wanna
Speaker 1: I wanna live up to that, you know, And well
Speaker 1: that's where most of the bad stuff came in, because
Speaker 1: I was like, I have to live up to be
Speaker 1: this person exactly, and I don't feel like that. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like doing a comedy, but you're miserable. It's like my
Speaker 1: life was like this show and I was always supposed
Speaker 1: to be on, but like when the show was over,
Speaker 1: I was completely miserable. For a long time. I was
Speaker 1: not happy when I woke up in the morning. It
Speaker 1: started off with something simple as that, just being like,
Speaker 1: why don't I feel okay? Yeah, you know, and not
Speaker 1: really knowing what that was. I thought maybe it was
Speaker 1: stress or something. At that point, I was doing an
Speaker 1: album every year, so I thought maybe I was just
Speaker 1: overdoing it and I needed to take a break. It
Speaker 1: took me a minute to realize there was something going
Speaker 1: wrong with me. I thought I was past this in
Speaker 1: my life, you know, so you had experienced it before, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I did. Ten I was dealing with drugs at that time.
Speaker 1: I kind of got to that place of like, you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm in the party a little bit to
Speaker 1: try to like doctor this up and maybe maybe that
Speaker 1: will be okay. You know. That was before I kind
Speaker 1: of dealt with being famous and being successful and all that,
Speaker 1: because that was weird for me early on. It happened
Speaker 1: really fast for me, and like nobody coached me, no,
Speaker 1: no mentorship, Like I just was kind of like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I was a kid, is still a kid, you know.
Speaker 1: And it was a shock for me. And it was
Speaker 1: drugs that helped me find my footage, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. It was like, oh, maybe if I tried drugs,
Speaker 1: maybe I could be okay. We're in the studio too
Speaker 1: late night to like the wee hours. And that was
Speaker 1: the first time I tried cocaine. And from there it
Speaker 1: was just like I was on it. So then I
Speaker 1: got arrested and I got off of it quick cold turkey.
Speaker 1: I thought that was behind me. Fast forward to this
Speaker 1: album coming out two thousand and sixteen. I was editing
Speaker 1: the videos after after we did the video, which was
Speaker 1: really one of the best experiences. The music video was
Speaker 1: crazy because it was like that smile in the video,
Speaker 1: you know that that was a happy moment before it
Speaker 1: really got bad. Like I was happy with my work,
Speaker 1: but when I wasn't at work, it was a nightmare it.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm just trying to keep it together because
Speaker 1: Kick Cutty, everybody's like he Roll and this person that
Speaker 1: you look up to. So I didn't want to let
Speaker 1: anybody down, you know. But the same old thing. To
Speaker 1: find my footing, I chose to use drugs. So like
Speaker 1: I'm editing these videos, I'm sneaking off, I'm doing cocaine
Speaker 1: in the bathroom, getting loaded, drinking every day, like back
Speaker 1: to like how I used to do it all day long,
Speaker 1: and just going to the bathroom and just like doing
Speaker 1: a couple of bumps. So did you feel like your
Speaker 1: depression was a result of the using Did you feel
Speaker 1: like you were depressed already and you were using to
Speaker 1: try to manage your depression, that you were using to
Speaker 1: try to manage the depression that already was there, right right,
Speaker 1: Anybody tried to reach out to you and be like, hey,
Speaker 1: what's up, Like, not really because it's a very private thing.
Speaker 1: I was dealing with my alone. I never like did
Speaker 1: drugs around a bunch of people. Like there's nobody in
Speaker 1: this industry that can say, oh, yeah, I was with
Speaker 1: Cutty and we did some game, Like I was really
Speaker 1: good at keeping my troubles hidden, even from your friends,
Speaker 1: even from my friends. I understand, Like, I really like
Speaker 1: good with that. You can become a master about. And
Speaker 1: it's like scary because it's when you hear people say like, well,
Speaker 1: I had no clue, and then they feel like I
Speaker 1: want to be your friend, like I want to be
Speaker 1: there for you, and it's like, dang, you're going through
Speaker 1: all of this and I was so unaware. Like that
Speaker 1: kind of makes them feel like damn, like I'm not
Speaker 1: really doing my job as a friend trying to you know.
Speaker 1: It's sometimes when I let them know that it's not
Speaker 1: their fault, right, it was me. You know. I really
Speaker 1: went out my way to keep what I was going
Speaker 1: through hidden because I was ashamed. Wow, that's interesting, But
Speaker 1: I think that's why I quit the first time, because
Speaker 1: I got arrested and then everybody knew by it. But
Speaker 1: it wasn't like I quit for the right reasons. I
Speaker 1: didn't quit because it wasn't good for me. But I
Speaker 1: was really worried and I kind of like had that
Speaker 1: moment when I was just like do I really want
Speaker 1: to get back on drugs and do cocaine again? Like
Speaker 1: do I really want to take this journey? At thirty two?
Speaker 1: You know? I woke up one morning and I was
Speaker 1: just thinking like, man, this isn't healthy, and I don't
Speaker 1: know what else to do but get some help and
Speaker 1: find someplace I can go. And I found a place.
Speaker 1: My buddy didn't comes over and I'm like, I think
Speaker 1: I need to go to rehab, and he's like yes,
Speaker 1: because he's just like he's just like what, I'm with you.
Speaker 1: I'm supportive, you know. So then I was like, Okay,
Speaker 1: the only way I'm going to go to rehab is
Speaker 1: if I get loaded. That's that's the only way. And
Speaker 1: I found out that that's a lot of people go
Speaker 1: to rehab loaded absolutely, because that's your last opportunity if
Speaker 1: you're serious about it has to be. So you were
Speaker 1: loaded on your liquor? How long were you there for?
Speaker 1: I was there for a month. Yeah, you did your
Speaker 1: full time, man, So what help do you think you
Speaker 1: received from the treatment? Because it had for you, it
Speaker 1: had to have been more than just not using Yeah. Yeah, Yeah.
Speaker 1: It was a lot of talking. One thing that I
Speaker 1: didn't have in my life, you know, like I don't
Speaker 1: like working through your emotions, talking about the core of it,
Speaker 1: like yeah, And I don't think I ever really did
Speaker 1: that in my life, Like I never really like thought about, Ah,
Speaker 1: why am I depressed? Were you able to reach that
Speaker 1: core of sadness? Yeah, because you know, I thought that
Speaker 1: it was stuff from years ago when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: like for my father dying when I was eleven, and
Speaker 1: you know, and then my cousin dying and my favorite
Speaker 1: uncle dying like three years in a row. It was
Speaker 1: just like realizing these things and being okay with it,
Speaker 1: finding peace with it, you know, because I don't think
Speaker 1: I ever really found peace with my father's death. There
Speaker 1: was nobody that came to me and asked me if
Speaker 1: I was all right with that. It just happened. So
Speaker 1: what happened to your dad? He passed away from cancer? Okay?
Speaker 1: I was so. My mom and dad divorced when I
Speaker 1: was three, but my dad was very much in my life.
Speaker 1: And I'm the youngest of for so I was a baby.
Speaker 1: So yeah, that was really tough for me. What tools
Speaker 1: were you given in order to deal with your feelings? Um,
Speaker 1: whenever those feelings of depression come up? I know for
Speaker 1: me personally, that's been a bit part of my journey,
Speaker 1: just along the way, just constantly grabbing Okay, this tool works.
Speaker 1: You know. Even sometimes at night I'll go to the
Speaker 1: beach and just sit with the ocean. You know, as
Speaker 1: simple as that might be, it brings me happiness, you know, right, Well,
Speaker 1: that's what some of the things would be like, you know,
Speaker 1: finding the things that make you happy, doing those things, right,
Speaker 1: So even something that's simple is just like getting outside
Speaker 1: seeing things, you know, and and then talking. Like me
Speaker 1: and my mom have an excellent relationship, So like talking
Speaker 1: to her more because I didn't really talk to her
Speaker 1: about what was going on. You know. Did you not
Speaker 1: talk to her because you felt like you were burdening
Speaker 1: her or I just didn't want to worry, you know.
Speaker 1: I so understand that. So get that, and you're you're
Speaker 1: thinking in your mind, I got this. I don't need
Speaker 1: to bring anybody else into this until eventually you're in
Speaker 1: the hole so deep, you like, somebody better come home,
Speaker 1: love it, Mommy, get me. It's bad, it's bad you
Speaker 1: don't come down. Yeah, yeah, you know, I'm blessed to
Speaker 1: just have that with my mom and have that connection
Speaker 1: with my family and my siblings, you know, and that
Speaker 1: they were there for me. It's really awesome. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: that's that's so important. That brings up a big point Cutti,
Speaker 1: is like we have to have trust that people can help.
Speaker 1: How long have you been clean now, Um, it's been
Speaker 1: two years to half years. Yeah, that's good. It's a
Speaker 1: beautiful thing. I think just getting back out into the
Speaker 1: world doing what I love again has really been big
Speaker 1: for me, you know. Um. But then also spending time
Speaker 1: with my daughter. Oh yes, I was your and my
Speaker 1: daughter is my world. So that's really what helped me
Speaker 1: snap out of it and get some help because she's everything,
Speaker 1: you know, that's my little homie. We need those things,
Speaker 1: I know, for my kids. Lord, they definitely kept me
Speaker 1: from doing some deep destructive, self destructive things, you know,
Speaker 1: and they just kept me on the path until I
Speaker 1: could find the answer for myself. It is important for
Speaker 1: those of us who are going through a difficult time
Speaker 1: to find that thing that can just keep my head
Speaker 1: above water, you know, and that's sometimes that's if that's
Speaker 1: all we have, that's okay, you know, it's okay. What
Speaker 1: keeps on coming back is this emotional and mental illness.
Speaker 1: And I feel like I've been seeing so much of
Speaker 1: that recently, UM, like with Mac Miller passing and that
Speaker 1: that just like took me for a loop because so
Speaker 1: many young people are just dying because of trying to
Speaker 1: satiate those emotions with drugs. I'm just seeing it more
Speaker 1: and I feel like it's becoming such a huge problem
Speaker 1: amongst the youth. While new Mac and um, it was
Speaker 1: just one of those things that was devastating and I
Speaker 1: still have a hard time dealing with it. He was
Speaker 1: a sweet kid, had a big heart, He was really nice,
Speaker 1: he was he was awesome. UM. So his struggles with
Speaker 1: addiction was not a secret, right like yours was a secret. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think I think towards the people found out what
Speaker 1: he was dealing with. It seems like to me, though,
Speaker 1: these mental issues that we have, whether it's depression, UM,
Speaker 1: how it tends to cross over into um drugs as
Speaker 1: a solution, but that it starts with with emotional. Yeah,
Speaker 1: some kind of mental necessity. I have anxiety or you know,
Speaker 1: I'm depressed. So this is the thing that keeps me
Speaker 1: able to do I work teached me afloat. You know,
Speaker 1: you're anxious, you had a hard day. What do you
Speaker 1: do when you come home for work? You get a drink? Right?
Speaker 1: You know. I didn't know mac Miller, but once again,
Speaker 1: when I looked at his circumstances, I just felt for
Speaker 1: him because I just I knew. I was like, that
Speaker 1: could have been me easily, you know, because I was
Speaker 1: the same way in my depression, using ecstasy, drinking a
Speaker 1: whole lot, you know, and smoking a bunch of weed
Speaker 1: and trying to just find some peace in my mind.
Speaker 1: It's like I knew I was doing ecstasy because I
Speaker 1: wanted the party. I was doing ecstasy we and a
Speaker 1: bottle of cavassi, A okay, because I wanted to get right.
Speaker 1: I wasn't making the connection, and I knew. I was like,
Speaker 1: and maybe it had to do with because of my
Speaker 1: history with you, but it's like I knew I was
Speaker 1: on my on the course to addiction. I was very
Speaker 1: clear about that. I was just like, all right, we're
Speaker 1: gonna keep talking. This proud baby, We're gonna see we
Speaker 1: thank you. But just now you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So maybe we're just all in a whole lot of
Speaker 1: pain and we just give it. It's just like bunk it.
Speaker 1: We all and this makes us feel good, period. And
Speaker 1: the law it's It's really interesting though. It's something I
Speaker 1: have to keep I have to keep exploring and think about.
Speaker 1: The One thing that I've learned about the Red Table
Speaker 1: is that testimony is so much more powerful than even advice,
Speaker 1: like just people to know they're not alone. Real talk guys,
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you. Yeah, this is awesome. Yeah, definitely
Speaker 1: that was it. But I do want to introduce this
Speaker 1: somebody from our staff. Cutty. I got the end of
Speaker 1: Ghosts tattoos on my arm. I hope they understand that.
Speaker 1: I really understand that they don't understand. Yeah, I had
Speaker 1: to get it. Man. Ad meant a lot to me personally.
Speaker 1: But I went through a lot when I was When
Speaker 1: I was younger, my brother was killed and when I
Speaker 1: was first grade, I think we went to visit my grandmother.
Speaker 1: She was in the hospital and she ended up passing
Speaker 1: that day. Three or four years later, my cousin was
Speaker 1: murdered in the drive bine in southern California. All that happened,
Speaker 1: and I try not to not to care about like
Speaker 1: people around me or things around me, and just shut
Speaker 1: everything off, bottle everything in. And I started getting a
Speaker 1: lot of trouble, like fighting, trouble with the police. Like
Speaker 1: I didn't have any friends at that moment. I just
Speaker 1: moved and Man on the Move two had just came out.
Speaker 1: Every single day, I think I listened to that album.
Speaker 1: The album like helped get it like all way more
Speaker 1: than I think anything else did. Yeah, right on to
Speaker 1: join the Red Table Talk family and become a part
Speaker 1: of the conversation. Follow us at facebook dot com slash
Speaker 1: red table Talk. Thanks for listening to this episode of
Speaker 1: Red Table Talk podcast produced by Facebook Watch, Westbrook Audio,
Speaker 1: and I Heart Radio.