It wasn’t stories of campaigning with the country’s most controversial and charismatic prime minister that she came to discuss. Nor was it for tales of partying with the Rolling Stones, but something she has lived with all her life that flew underneath the media’s radar.

Margaret Trudeau, former wife of the late Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, was at Jasper Park Lodge on Saturday night (May 15) to spend an evening of dinner and discussion about mental illness and bi-polar disorder – something Trudeau has battled all her life.

Hosted by Global Television’s Lynda Steele and put on by Edson-based group, Reflections, an adult community centre that provides support for those suffering from mental illness, Trudeau captivated the crowd with her story of the highs and lows of her well-publicized life and how she struggled through bi-polar disorder throughout her time as the PM’s wife and well into her later years.

Depression, which Trudeau explained is controlled by serotonin, a chemical in your brain that, when levels are low, allows you to fall into sadness, no longer enjoy life, friends or jokes. It can last for days, months and even years.

“Depression is totally disabling. It just takes your life away, it takes all the light and the joy and the happiness and the spontaneity and laughter. It leaves you feeling so alone and isolated, even if you are at a table with your family and friends, you don’t get the jokes, you don’t care about the jokes, you don’t care about the food, you don’t care about the conversation,” she said.

Trudeau’s speech was emotional at times, while bringing out laughs every so often from various quick remarks and hints of her hippie days, such as when she took to marijuana like ‘a duck to water’ in her university years at Simon Fraser University.

Despite admitting the pot kept her highs and lows to an even keel during her studies and helped her focus and settle her mind, she stressed that all studies show marijuana is really not a good drug for people who are suffering from bi-polar and can trigger you into being more depressed.

Trudeau talked of how deep her depression became after her second baby, and how she barely wanted to feed him or even get out of her bed, and how her and Pierre Trudeau sought help for her through various doctors and institutions over the years.

“I tried my hardest to be balanced, and Pierre was very careful with me and we tried hard. But I just couldn’t find the peace of mind…what I didn’t understand is that peace of mind is something that I would never find with the chemical imbalance in my brain... I thought it was something that you had to try to get... I didn’t have the chemical balance in my brain that normal people had,” she said.

One of her key points of the evening was that people who are depressed or have bi-polar need an advocate: someone who can help them and keep an eye out for them and listen to the doctors. Often, even a person who is hopeful and positive about feeling better may not fully realize a circumstance or issue.

For Trudeau, it was her sister, Heather, and her daughter, who was an advocate even during her teenage years.

Trudeau has faced many hardships in her life, including losing her son Michel to an avalanche (which resulted in great feelings of guilt), the reality of being the prime minister’s wife at 29 years his minor, and then, ‘helping him die’ for a month in 2000.

Trudeau’s children ended up buying her a dog so she would get out and walk it. She said it is important when you are walking to be looking up, not down at your feet, meeting the eyes of other walkers and dog walkers, seeing the sky and the flowers.

There are three things to watch that are important when trying to live a happy, balanced life, she said. The first two are your mind and body. Keeping active increases serotonin, while the third is your spirit. You have to forgive yourself, she said.

“My doctor kept saying to me, ‘Margaret, you’ve got to forgive yourself. Sometimes the way you sound, you’d think you were an axe murderer. You’d think you killed all your children. The guilt there, and misdemeanors and bad judgment calls and acting out.’ He said, ‘No, you’ve got to forgive yourself, and you’ve got to forgive others who didn’t understand,’” she said. “He said ‘Start living in the day, today is all we have, get into the now.’”

Cooking, calling a friend to talk, going to see a movie, doing an act of kindness and being warm-hearted are all things Trudeau said helped her get better. 

In the end, the most important thing, she said, is to have hope that things will get better, and to know mental illness is not a character flaw. People who suffer from it are not bad people, she said, but just need help to find balance. The public should not dismiss them and push them away, she said.

The talk was well received by the crowd of 160, and Trudeau answered all the questions from the audience after her talk and chatted and had her photo taken with many of them afterwards.

After years away from the media spotlight, Trudeau has been touring the nation to raise awareness about mental illness, however she also shares other stories.

During the question period, things took a lighter stance, as audience members had questions ranging from serious personal concerns to Trudeau’s love life (She was asked if she had a boyfriend and if she could share any Rolling Stones stories).