Jodie Sweetin is getting candid about everything from fame to parenthood.
The “Full House” star sat down to talk with entertainment journalist Allison Kugel for her “Allison Interviews” podcast.
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Looking back on her time as Stephanie Tanner on the classic family sitcom, Sweetin explains why she never actually had a crush on co-star John Stamos.
“People always asked, ‘Oh my God, wasn’t John Stamos so cute?’ I’ve known John since I was five. I’ve seen him roll into work in old T-shirts and sweatpants with holes in them, and not looking all that cute. He was always just John to me. I know him too well to think he’s hot. He’s a big dork and I love him. You get to know people so well that you’re like, ‘Oh my God! No, no, no,’ when it comes to that stuff. I know he is good looking, but I’ve seen some things, and that would be like having a weird crush on your uncle.”
Being famous also means having people recognize you in some of your lesser moments, as the actress can attest.
“Look, there are plenty of times I’ve had to yell at my kids in the grocery store,” she shares. “I know someone is recognizing me or is watching me, and I’m thinking, Look, my kids are being bad and Stephanie Tanner had to yell at her kids in the grocery store. I’m sorry.”
Still, for Sweetin, protecting her kids’ privacy is very important, and she feels the same way about tabloids hounding the children of the Kardashian and Jenner sisters.
“For kids like that who are born into notoriety, into a famous family with famous parents, I started working when I was three, so it’s just always been what I know,” she says. “I think there is almost more of a shock when it happens to you a little later in life, when you’ve spent your entire life being normal, and now you’re like, ‘What the hell is this?’ When you grow up with it, it’s just par for the course.”
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She adds, “I was attacked as a kid in the tabloids. I can’t stand tabloid magazines or even social media these days. I think anyone who goes after these kids, whether it’s how they dress, or how someone is parenting them when they are out in public, leave them alone. That just happens to be their parents. They didn’t ask to be given all this attention. Back off or respect when the parents say, ‘Please don’t photograph my kid. Don’t put pictures of them in magazines.’ People should respect that.”
Sweetin also talks candidly about her struggles with addiction, telling Kugel, “How do I manage my own head that is just loud and negative and awful to me sometimes, but nobody else can hear it? You’re stuck in it. The thing about anxiety is, people think of panic attacks, but there can be a raging screaming voice in your head all the time that you just can’t get quiet. You just don’t want to listen to this voice, and especially when mental health wasn’t talked about, it’s worse. Having that wiring in your brain, something switches on when you’re an alcoholic. It feels like there is never enough. I can’t ever fill this hole because there is a bottom missing in the cup, and I just keep trying to fill it. I think that is something I’m really grateful for now, is the de-stigmatization of talking about mental health.”