Sandra Oh says quick rise to fame with the success of “Grey’s Anatomy” was “traumatic” and led her seek out a good therapist.
Oh appeared on “Sunday Today” over the weekend with Willie Geist, where she spoke about losing her privacy when she first became famous. Oh, who played Dr. Cristina Yang for the first 10 seasons of The ABC medical drama, said it all happened so fast.
“To be perfectly honest, it was traumatic,” she said. “The reason why I’m saying that is the circumstances you need to do your work is with a lot of privacy.”
She continued, “So when one loses one’s anonymity, you have to build skills to still try and be real. I went from not being able to go out, like hiding in restaurants, to then being able to manage attention, manage expectation, while not losing the sense of self.”
She was able to cope with the help of a therapist.
“I’m not joking. It’s very, very important,” she said. “You just have to work at finding your way to stay grounded. And a lot of times that’s by saying no.”
Oh announced her departure from the show in 2013. She landed five Emmy nominations and a Golden Globe Award for her performance on the show.
While Season 17 of “Grey’s” saw the return of Sarah Drew as April Kepner, Patrick Dempsey as Derek Shepherd, T.R. Knight as George O’Malley, Chyler Leigh as Lexie Grey, and Eric Dane as Mark Sloan, Oh has not returned.