. In her revealing bestseller Call Me Anna, Patty Duke shared her long-kept secret: the talented, Oscar-winning actress who won our hearts on The Patty Duke Show was suffering from a serious-but-treatable-mental illness called manic depression. For nearly twenty years, until she was correctly diagnosed at age thirty-five, she careened between periods of extreme euphoria and debilitating depression, prone to delusions and panic attacks, temper tantrums, spending sprees, and suicide attempts.
Anna Marie "Patty" Duke was an American actress of stage, film, and television. First becoming famous as a child star, winning an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at age 16 for the role of Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker, and later starring in her self-titled sitcom, The Patty Duke Show for three years. She progressed to more adult roles such as Neely O'Hara in the 1967 film Valley of the Dolls . Duke was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 1982; afterwards she then devoted much of her time to advocating and educating the public on mental health issues. She was later elected president of the Screen Actors Guild from 1985 to 1988.