Suits star Patrick J. Adams is opening up about his difficulties during the series’ seventh season when he left the long-running USA Network legal drama.
In an interview with Jesse Tyler Ferguson on the Nov. 26 episode of Ferguson’s “Dinner’s on Me” podcast, Adams acknowledged “I wasn’t taking good care of my mental health, and I was drinking too much come the end of seventh season. I was in a zone of living a pretty unexamined life. was pretty miserable … was, I would say, pretty depressed.”
“I didn’t have the tools to deal with that depression beyond just spending money and drinking too much, you know, and not really knowing how to talk about it or in therapy sort of, but not really doing it,” Adams continued. “You know what I mean? Like, there are all these things that I knew I needed to probably be doing and I wasn’t doing.”
Adams portrayed Mike Ross opposite Gabriel Macht as Harvey Specter on the legal drama for the first seven seasons, returning for the final two episodes of the series.
“I would numb myself [to] deal with my insecurity and my fears,” he continued. “And they just weren’t working. And they were taking a toll on my relationship, for sure, but also just making me a very not present father. That for me was a breaking point when I was like, ‘I think I should stop drinking probably, because I don’t wanna be that dad.’ The best thing I think I ever did for myself was stop drinking. It just needed to happen in order for all these other things to happen.”
Adams shares two daughters, 6-year-old Aurora, 6, and 3-year-old Elliot, with his wife, Pretty Little Liars alum Troian Bellisario. They’ve been married since 2016.
“The only reason to stay was … money. I didn’t know what else to offer. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and think about the money [Macht] made those last two years, but I never regretted the decision for a second. It was the right thing for my marriage … it was time,” he admitted.
Suits has seen a major resurgence of popularity on Netflix, racking up 57.7 billion total minutes on the streamer last year.
The upcoming spinoff series Suits LA stars Macht in a reprisal of his role. Upcoming, Adams will be seen along with Michelle Pfeiffer and Kurt Russell in Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone contemporary spinoff series The Madison. He’ll also star in the upcoming BBC/Netflix limited series Lockerbie and in Netflix limited series Wayward.
