Rene Russo no doubt surprised her fans and members of the entertainment industry this week when she announced during a taping of Queen Latifah’s talk show that she is bipolar. The episode that was taped this past Monday will air on October 30th.

Russo will appear on The Queen Latifah Show to promote her new movie. Nightcrawler also stars Jake Gyllenhaal–who appeared on The Queen Latifah Show with her–and is directed by Rene Russo’s husband, Dan Gilroy. She didn’t go on the show expecting to talk about bipolar disorder.

Queen Latifah asked both Rene Russo and Jake Gyllenhaal to describe a time in their lives when they were forced to ‘push through’ something and come out successful on the other side. That’s when Russo made her startling admission.

“I pretty much hit a wall,” she said. “My mom said my whole childhood, ‘You’re stop-and-go.’ I stopped and I had to like, ‘Whoa,’ that was it for me.”

Rene Russo has bipolar disorder. How she–and other women–are helping make it OK to talk about mental health: http://t.co/t7cWy7p9Ct

— Glamour (@glamourmag) October 17, 2014

A shocked silence ensued before Rene Russo began speaking again.

“For all the people that are having trouble and maybe feel bad about taking medication, I didn’t expect to say this, but that was really it for me,” she said. “It’s okay — you will make it through. It’s not easy but you will make it through.”

Queen Latifah praised Rene Russo for being brave and asked her what finally compelled her to seek help for her bipolar disorder.

“I literally crashed, hit a wall and couldn’t get out of bed,” Russo said. “I thought it was depression, but if you take antidepressants it speeds you up more. I’m kind of stop-and-go, I either crash or speed. I haven’t shared this, but I think it’s kind of important. I have some friends who don’t want to go on medication, and they are suffering.”

Kudos to Rene Russo for sharing that she has bipolar disorder. Hopefully others will see how successful her life has been since starting on bipolar meds, and be inspired by her actions.