Sharon Osbourne Says She Underwent Ketamine Therapy After ‘The Talk’ Exit, Controversy

Sharon Osbourne revealed this week that following her exit from earlier this year, she developed anxiety that led her to seek out therapy in the form of ketamine treatments. Osbourne, 68, told the Daily Mail on Monday that she has struggled with the fallout of her controversial exit. She left The Talk in March after she was accused of using racist, homophobic and bullying language in her interactions with her former co-hosts. She also faced backlash for defending Piers Morgan’s statements about Meghan Markle.

“I definitely went through a difficult patch at the beginning,” Osbourne, 68, told the outlet. “I found it embarrassing. The humiliation that people would think that I might be racist.” She continued, saying that she and her husband, Ozzy Osbourne, hired round-the-clock security after receiving death threats. She said she developed anxiety and tried ketamine therapy treatments at the suggestion of her friend and former co-host Sara Gilbert.

“I went through three months of therapy,” Osbourne said. “I had ketamine treatment and I got it all out. All the tears and everything that I felt, you know. All of that, it’s gone.”

Ketamine is a medication used on patients as an anesthetic, but people also take it illegally to get high. A 2019 study at Massachusetts General Hospital found that patients with anxiety experienced lessened symptoms just 40 minutes after taking a low dose of ketamine. The FDA approved a nasal spray that same year derived from ketamine as a medication for depression. However, taking straight ketamine for depression is not currently approved by the FDA.

Osbourne said that the therapy helped her move past her exit, but she does not plan on getting back into daytime TV. “I’m not going to go on another TV show that’s talk because I know right now it’s not a safe place to be,” she said. “The slightest thing and you’ve pissed off half the nation and I don’t want to put myself up for that grief. I really don’t.” Disclosure: PopCulture is owned by ViacomCBS Streaming, a division of ViacomCBS.