‘This could be career ending!’ Waterloo Road’s Richard Mylan admits to 20-year heroin addiction

‘It was the biggest mistake I ever made’: Waterloo Road’s Richard Mylan admits to ‘career ending’ 20-year heroin addiction which stemmed from his ‘crippling anxiety’

  • Detailing how his personal and work relationships suffered in the candid interview, he revealed ‘chunks of his life’ were taken away and he felt as thought he had been ‘washed up on a shoreline’
  • The actor, 48, who notably played deputy headteacher Simon Lowsley in Waterloo Road, admitted his ‘crippling anxiety’ as a West End star at the beginning of his career was to blame for his bad choices 
  • He told how he has been in recovery for 10 years and wants to ‘alleviate’ the stigma associated with addicts so they can seek help
  • Richard – who has also appeared in The Bill – said ‘it was the biggest mistake he ever made’ and even claimed his admission could be ‘career ending’ in a video

Richard Mylan has confessed to a 20-year heroin addiction, which he has kept a secret up until now.

The actor, 48, who notably played deputy headteacher Simon Lowsley in Waterloo Road, admitted his ‘crippling anxiety’ as a West End star at the beginning of his career was to blame for his bad choices.

Detailing how his personal and work relationships suffered in the candid interview, he revealed ‘chunks of his life’ were taken away and he felt as thought he had been ‘washed up on a shoreline’.

‘It was the biggest mistake I ever made’: Waterloo Road’s Richard Mylan has admitted to a ‘career ending’ 20-year heroin addiction which stemmed from his ‘crippling anxiety’

He told the BBC how he has been in recovery for 10 years and wants to ‘alleviate’ the stigma associated with addicts so they can seek help.

Richard – who has also appeared in The Bill – said ‘it was the biggest mistake he ever made’ and even claimed his admission could be ‘career ending’ in a video.

He began: ”It just seemed to spiral more and more out of control as my life progressed, and my personal relationship suffered, my work relationships suffered, it robbed me of my inner ambition.

Tragic: Detailing how his personal and work relationships suffered in the candid interview, the actor, 48, revealed 'chunks of his life' were taken away from him (pictured in 2005)

Tragic: Detailing how his personal and work relationships suffered in the candid interview, the actor, 48, revealed ‘chunks of his life’ were taken away from him (pictured in 2005)

‘Ultimately, I’d had enough. I’d just had enough of that cycle of just being dragged under. It’s almost like being washed up on a shoreline, half dead and thinking, “Enough.” 

‘And that’s why we have to challenge stigma, cos if we have any chance of fellow addicts plugging back into that, we have to alleviate some of that stigma at the very least because it keeps people down there.’ 

While Waterloo Road is returning to BBC Three later this year, with filming having already begun, it is unclear whether Richard will reprise his role. 

Opening up: He told how he has been in recovery for 10 years and wants to 'alleviate' the stigma associated with addicts so they can seek help

Opening up: He told how he has been in recovery for 10 years and wants to ‘alleviate’ the stigma associated with addicts so they can seek help

Wow! Richard - who has also appeared in The Bill - said 'it was the biggest mistake he ever made' and even claimed his admission could be 'career ending' in a video

Wow! Richard – who has also appeared in The Bill – said ‘it was the biggest mistake he ever made’ and even claimed his admission could be ‘career ending’ in a video

Richard shares son Jaco Mylan, 17, with his make-up artist Tammie Dineen wife, who successfully fought an unspecified type of cancer in 2018. 

Speaking at the time of their wedding, he said: ‘We met on the set of Waterloo Road, we were both single and we often found ourselves at stupid o’clock in the morning together and we got together really quickly.

‘We really just hit it off straight away. In fact, I pretty much knew as soon as I met her I wanted to marry her.

‘I proposed to her on a bench that we used to sit on a lot overlooking the River Clyde.

Fingers crossed! He played deputy headteacher Simon Lowsley in Waterloo Road, although it is unclear whether Richard will reprise his role in the BBC Three reboot later this year

Fingers crossed! He played deputy headteacher Simon Lowsley in Waterloo Road, although it is unclear whether Richard will reprise his role in the BBC Three reboot later this year

‘Waterloo Road had finished filming and I was returning to Cardiff and she was going home to Dundee and I set up my camera and said we should take some photos of our special place.

‘I think she wondered what on earth I was doing because I kept setting it up for different poses and then I went down on one knee!’

Richard won two Welsh Baftas for a documentary he made with Jaco documenting his life with autism.

Couple: Richard shares son Jaco Mylan, 17, with his make-up artist Tammie Dineen wife, who successfully fought an unspecified type of cancer in 2018 (pictured in 2016)

Couple: Richard shares son Jaco Mylan, 17, with his make-up artist Tammie Dineen wife, who successfully fought an unspecified type of cancer in 2018 (pictured in 2016)

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