I saw Hayden Panettiere in May at what would become her last Los Angeles book event, a conversation about her bestselling memoir, “This Is Me: A Reckoning,” moderated by podcast host Alyshia Ochse.

Hayden was disarmingly candid about her struggles with postpartum depression and addiction, conditions that had become painfully intertwined in her life.

She spoke about losing custody of her daughter, the death of her younger brother, and the end of her marriage. Her voice shook at times. But she sounded hopeful. Strong. Like a woman who had finally found her footing.

She was determined to tell her story, she said, so that others struggling with postpartum depression, trauma and addiction might feel less alone and perhaps find the courage to ask for help.

Three months later, Hayden is dead at 36. 

Her cause of death has not yet been determined. 

The toxicology report has not been made public. But I fear it will show that Hayden died by accidental or intentional overdose, the two leading causes of death from complications of postpartum depression and anxiety.

For those of us who have survived postpartum depression, her death is especially painful because we know how dangerous maternal mental illness can become — and how many women still suffer without adequate help.

Consider this staggering fact: Complications of postpartum depression and anxiety are now the leading cause of pregnancy-related death in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control, they account for 27.7% of pregnancy-related deaths, compared with 10.9% from hemorrhage and 5.1% from hypertensive disorders of pregnancy. The CDC category includes deaths from suicide and substance-use-related overdose.

And yet maternal mental illness remains surrounded by a shroud of silence and shame.

I bought Hayden’s memoir that night and planned to ask her to sign it. But the line was long, it was late, and I needed to get home to relieve the babysitter. 

I figured I would reach out to her later. My husband, journalist Dominic Patten, knows her publicist.

Maybe we would grab coffee. I would tell her about my own journey through postpartum depression, the book I’m writing about it, and the California Perinatal Wellness Alliance, the mental health alliance I co-founded to fight for better care for pregnant and postpartum women.

I thought there would be time. 

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Millions of mothers experience perinatal depression or anxiety every year in the United States. I was one of the lucky few, if you can call admitting yourself to mental hospital lucky, that is.

After my daughter was born, her pediatrician recognized that something was terribly wrong with me. I entered an intensive outpatient psychiatric program at UCLA, where for five months I received specialized treatment for postpartum depression. 

I recovered. Too many women never get that chance.

Specialized perinatal psychiatric programs like the one that treated me remain scarce in the United States. We need far more of them. But we also need intervention long before a woman reaches the point of needing intensive psychiatric care: earlier and repeated screening, better training for healthcare professionals, stronger insurance coverage and systems. We need a system built to recognize and treat postpartum depression before more mothers die.

We need to treat maternal mental health with the same urgency we bring to hemorrhage, preeclampsia and other potentially fatal complications of pregnancy.

But none of that will happen overnight. There is something we can offer right now: our stories.

Near the end of Hayden’s conversation that night, Alyshia Ochse told her that Hayden’s willingness to speak publicly about her mental health had given Alyshia the courage to be honest about her own struggles. She told Hayden that her openness had saved her life.

Hayden’s response has stayed with me ever since. “This is worth it,” she said. “I can leave the world knowing I left it a better place.”

The tragedy is that she shouldn’t have left it at all.

Hayden Panettiere understood something that those of us who have lived through maternal mental illness know intimately: Silence can be dangerous, and telling the truth can be a lifeline.

She told the truth. Now the rest of us need to make sure women who hear it have somewhere to turn.

Devorah Herbert is a multi-Emmy nominated production designer and a maternal mental health advocate.