Mariska Hargitay has suffered “secondary trauma” as a result of her long-running role on ‘Law + Order: Special Victims Unit’.
The 60-year-old actress – who has played Olivia Benson on the NBC drama series since 1999, making her alter ego the longest-running life-action character in primetime TV history – admitted it can be hard to shake off the show’s tough plots surrounding abuse and domestic violence and she’s not always managed to “protect” herself from the dark themes.
Speaking to Selena Gomez for Interview magazine, she said: “That’s been a process. When I started the show, I wasn’t aware of how deeply it would go into me. My husband Peter is always like, anytime I go anywhere, my first question is, What’s the crime rate here?’ So it’s on the brain.
“There’s been times when I didn’t know how to protect myself, and I think I was definitely a victim of secondary trauma from being inundated with these stories and knowing that they were true.
“Those were the parts that I didn’t know how to metabolise, just because of the sheer volume of it.”
However, Mariska noted there has been a positive side to the gritty role because it inspired her to create the Joyful Heart Foundation in 2004.
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She added: “That’s also why I started Joyful Heart [Foundation], so I would feel like, well, at least I’m doing something about it…
“I learned that one in three women will be assaulted, and one in six men.
“That’s when I started going, ‘I have to do something,’ because the show was obviously tackling the subject matter, but when I learned the statistics, I said, ‘Why isn’t everyone talking about this?’ And if I didn’t know, I figured nobody knows what an epidemic violence against women is.”
The actress is amazed she’s been on the show for so long.
