Robin Meade comes off as a happy-go-lucky, confident anchor on HLN's daily "Morning Express."
But not so long ago, she suffered from near-crippling anxiety and self-doubt that almost sidelined her career.
"I dealt with it for two years before I got help," says Meade, who documents her battle with anxiety in a new book, "Morning Sunshine! How to Radiate Confidence and Feel it Too," out Sept. 10 from Center Street books.
Meade, whose HLN show is enjoying its best ratings ever, said the anxiety emerged one night while she was doing weekend newscasts at a station in Chicago and was handed some breaking news to read.
"I felt sweaty," she writes in "Morning Sunshine!" "Just as I opened my mouth to speak, the set seemed to fade into a gauzy haze. My breathing was jagged."
A co-worker gave her some water. By the time the video clip for the piece ended, she had calmed down a bit, but the incident exposed a larger problem.
"Some things are seared into your brain," Meade says of the incident. "That day is for me. I know the outfit I wore, I never wore it again."
Meade reveals that she was at first embarrassed by her general practitioner's preliminary diagnosis: anxiety attacks.
She eventually found help from Amelia Case, a chiropractor who heads up the Universal Health Institute and who taught her how to come to terms with her anxiety and lack of confidence.
The book follows Meade from that night in Chicago through the diagnosis and treatment and to HLN. Along the way, she offers ideas on what she - and the readers - can learn from her experiences.
For many, the tale will come as a shock. "I don't think my bosses here, or the people I worked with, had any idea that I struggled with anxiety," she says. "One of the most freeing experiences was when I handed in my manuscript."
When the book was done, she gave it to her bosses at HLN.
"I'm not hiding part of myself," she says, 'Not that I needed to hide anything. It's not like you say, 'Hi, my name is Robin, and 10 years ago, I had self-esteem issues.'"
Meade says her problems stemmed from focusing on what people thought of her, not on what she thought of herself.
"My measurement was whether I was likable or not," she says.
Part of the problem, she says, was being so focused on her job and never saying no. In addition, she didn't have the ability to be comfortable as herself.
It's different now, she says, She's comfortable in her role at HLN, where she started in 2001, and in her own skills.
Even so, Meade says she still has to work on her anxiety and confidence.
"If I feel like I'm slipping back into a tendency of wondering, 'How was that, do you like me,'" she says. "I can catch it and get myself out of it."
also: http://robinmeadeblog.com/?page_id=5052
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2009/08/31/2009-08-31_anxiety_attacks_nearly_put_an_end_to_hln_anchor_robin_meades_career.html
