Whoopi Goldberg Gets Candid About Her Mother’s ‘Mental Issues’ on ‘The View’

Whoopi Goldberg recently opened up about her mother Emma Johnson’s struggle with mental illness during a candid discussion on The View. The 69-year-old EGOT winner shared her personal experiences as a child witnessing her mother’s challenges, shedding light on how society’s approach to mental health has evolved.

The conversation arose during the Thursday, Jan. 9, episode, where Goldberg and her co-hosts spoke with ABC News Chief International Correspondent James Longman about his memoir The Inherited Mind, which explores his family’s history with mental illness.

While commending Longman for his vulnerability, Goldberg reflected on societal changes regarding mental health. “I find that how people felt about these things, how they hid them in the ’50s and ’60s, started to evolve as kids got older and said, ‘You should not be hiding me.

You should be helping me figure out what’s going on,’” she stated. “So we’ve gotten better at saying, ‘There are better ways to do this.’” Goldberg recalled how the stigma around mental illness left families in the dark. “Because before, you couldn’t get—if your parent went to the hospital, you never saw them again until they came out…

And nobody ever told you anything. And you’re left going, ‘Is it me?’ And that starts a whole other thing,” she explained. Reflecting on her own experiences, Goldberg shared how her mother’s mental health struggles affected her. “If they have mental issues, as my mom did, and you suddenly start developing things, you’re like, ‘Wait a minute. I’m not doing this. Somebody needs to talk to me.’”

Goldberg also referenced her memoir, Bits and Pieces: My Mother, My Brother, and Me, in which she detailed the profound impact of her mother’s hospitalization for electroshock treatment. At just eight years old, Goldberg recalled the heartbreaking moment her mother returned from the hospital and didn’t recognize her or her brother.

“Living without my mother, who was always my world, who had always been that center of gravity. Suddenly the center of gravity wasn’t there,” she shared in a May 2024 interview with PEOPLE.

Goldberg’s reflections serve as a powerful reminder of the importance of addressing mental health openly and with compassion, as well as the lasting effects of stigma on families.