**Content Warning**: This story discusses suicide and suicidal ideation.
Chris Appleton is reflecting on a dark period in his life. The celebrity hair stylist, who has worked with clients like Kim Kardashian and Ariana Grande, detailed his experience coming out as gay and how it changed his life forever, especially when it came to his children, Billy, 23, and Kitty-Blu, 21, whom he shares with ex-partner Katie Katon.
"Telling my kids was the hardest thing I could ever possibly do," Chris shared during a Jan. 14 appearance on The Viall Files. "As parents, all you want to do is protect your kids. To be the one causing pain to your kids—to me, I just felt so much failure and shame."
Indeed, the gossip mill in Chris's hometown of Leicester, UK, following his coming out, that he reasoned at the time, "I was like, 'It would be better if their dad was dead than if they had a gay dad.'"
The thought spiral got so bad that the now-42-year-old attempted to take his own life, before ultimately being saved by his ex. "Kate's the one who called the ambulance," he recalled. "She traced my call. I don't remember a lot. I was in the hospital for a while and it was just voices. I remember laying there and thinking, 'Well, I didn't die. I'm still alive.' I remember thinking I couldn't hate myself anymore."
For Chris, his time in the hospital after his overdose was a true wake-up call. "I couldn't try to run away from myself anymore," he continued. "I couldn't try and avoid who I was any more. I was like, 'What about if I just surrender? What if I just accept it? It wasn't a loud moment, but I just let go.' At that point, Chris—who was briefly married to Lukas Gage—saw a future for himself as a gay man.
"I didn't know what was next," he admitted. "I didn't know next steps. But that was the beginning of the journey." And while it was only the beginning, Chris emphasized that he "100 percent" felt a weight off his shoulders. As he put it, "I remember walking out of the hospital, just feeling lighter."
