HARRY POTTER - ROWLING: 'I CAME CLOSE TO ENDING IT ALL'

HARRY POTTER author J. K. ROWLING has stunned fans by admitting she was on the brink of suicide when she was a struggling young single mum. The novelist - now worth around $1.09 billion (GBP545 million) - succumbed to depression in her early twenties when her husband, Portuguese journalist Jorge Arantes, left, leaving her to bring up baby Jessica alone. Rowling admits she sought professional help when she started toying with the idea of ending her life. She says, "Mid-twenties, my life circumstances were poor and I really plummeted. The thing that made me go for help was probably my daughter. She was something that earthed me, grounded me, and I thought, this isn't right, she cannot grow up with me in this state." And the author's battle with her dark thoughts wasn't made any easier by the poor medical advice she received from her local doctors' surgery in Edinburgh, Scotland. She adds, "She (the medical advisor) said: 'If you ever feel a bit low, come back and speak to the practice nurse,' and dismissed me. We're talking suicidal thoughts here; we're not talking 'I'm a bit miserable'. "Two weeks later I had a call from my regular GP (General Practitioner) who looked back over the notes. She called me back in. She saved me because I don't think I would have had the guts to go twice."