‘I never wore clothes to garner sexual attention’

Christina Ricci shares her story about her first marriage, her motherhood and the reasons she tried to keep tabloid attention away from her appearance.

“I didn’t enjoy that,” the actress, now 42, tells Sunday Times Style Her changing body was the focus of all her attention. “I never wore clothes to garner sexual attention, because I have always felt that kind of attention in a very threatening way.”

She reached adulthood when she was Addams Family star — who will appear in Netflix’s new Wednesday series — leaned into edgier roles, with a “feral and wild” lifestyle to match. Ricci sees this as a “reaction to her chaotic upbringing.” While the…” Mermaids Star, who has been estranged with her father since she was a teenager, hasn’t shared many details about her family. She tells the Times She says she was raised in chaos. She was the youngest child of four and quickly learned to harness her precociousness to advantage. She notes that her ability to be charming could distract from or diffuse situations.

As a youngster, her ability to be emotionally attuned helped her career take off. However, it became “exhausting” over time and Ricci learned how to let go of her emotions.

“I just felt no passion, no care,” she says. “I made a lot of important decisions completely dispassionately, which ended up being a problem later — so, note to anyone, don’t make important life decisions when you are going through periods of nihilism. However, it was really a reaction. It was exhausting to be so upset and in pain all the time.”

Eight years ago, her life was forever changed by the birth of her son Freddie.

“My son’s birth really broke my nihilism and it was a pretty surprising change,” she says. “I believed I would love him deeply and feel many emotions towards him. I didn’t realize that it is all or nothing.”

Ricci’s father, James Heerdegen was Ricci’s first husband. She accused him of emotional and physical abuse when she obtained a restraining or last year. Ricci is not willing to discuss the divorce, but she did talk about her struggles to see things as they are.

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“Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but it took me a long time to admit to myself what was going on, what it should be called,” says Ricci, who welcomed a daughter with second husband Mark Hampton last December. “Denial is very strong. Of course you don’t want to accept that the worst possible thing is happening and that you put yourself in that situation. So it took me a really long time to realize that.”

Ricci was not only hurt emotionally, but also lost her finances. She had to sell some Chanel handbags that she had amassed throughout her career.

She says that certain traumas in life can be combined with financial traumas, extended court cases, custody situations, fighting for restraining order. “Having said that, I’m absolutely doing fine, there’s no issue. However, I have learned to use these investment pieces in other ways. I also had a Chanel Fine Jewelry collection that I put to good use.”

With a new husband and baby, and an Emmy-nominated job on Yellowjackets, Ricci looks ahead, not for pity.

“I think it is important to say that I don’t feel like a victim in any way,” she says. “I don’t feel sorry for myself. I don’t even feel like saying, ‘Well, it’s been a really hard road for me.’ Everybody has their personal issues and this has been mine, and it has been about finding my own self-worth and position and strength and power.

“I only tell my story because I know that I have been in similar situations. I looked for success stories and stories that could help me get out of them. Today I am not ready to talk about it in more depth, but I do think it is important that we have examples for other women — that, as scary as it is, changing your life and saving yourself is the only choice.”

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