Margaret Trudeau. Picture thanks to the Moose Jaw Times-Herald

Blog: I recently had the honour to interview Margaret Trudeau after she gave a speech at the Prairie South School Division Teachers’ Association annual convention in Moose Jaw.

She was a fascinating speaker and not only spoke about her life with Pierre Trudeau but also her fight with bipolar disorder.

Ms Trudeau described her life as the wife of the prime minister and what was really going on behind the scenes.

Her aimwas to talk about mental illness in order to dispel the stigma that leaves so people afraid to come forward and get the treatment they need.

Ms Trudeau was thrust into the limelight in 1971, at the age of 22, when she married Pierre Trudeau.

The first trigger to her depression was after the birth of the couple’s second son, Sacha.

Ms Trudeau was diagnosed with postpartum depression but her bipolar disorder was not yet recognized.

She was a very amusing, honest and vibrant speaker — one of the best I have ever seen.

She told the audience of her first meeting with Pierre Trudeau in Tahiti.

“I was very interested in the water-ski instructor who was awful cute,” she said.

“The water-ski instructor was very fickle, but Pierre was always there.”

But the couple did not anticipate the “deep depression” that would overcome Ms Trudeau.

She said the psychiatrist did not listen to her when she said she had completely changed.

She said postpartum is often a trigger for someone who suffers with an underlying mental condition and she warned society ought to watch its mothers carefully.

“They (should be) allowed to confess they are overwhelmed, anxious and their world has changed completely,” she said.

Ms Trudeau, a mother of five, went on to discuss her quest to find treatment for her depression as well as her split from Pierre, saying she “could not live as a rose on his lapel,” referring to Pierre’s practice of putting a fresh rose in his lapel each morning.

She then told of the devastating time in her life when her son Michel was killed in an avalanche in British Columbia, and Pierre’s death two years later.

After hitting what she described as “rock bottom,” she admitted herself into hospital and began the treatment which helps her today.

She began a three-year process of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.

“It was acceptance of the condition,” she said.

Now Trudeau describes the illness as a “gift”.

“If we were all the same and nobody fell down or climbed up, we would not have any art, culture, diversity, we would not have any spice,” she said.

“There is help out there. I can testify to that.”

What most impressed me about Trudeau was the fact that she stayed behind after her speech to talk to many of the teachers and was enthusiastic and friendly to all.

Some she took aside so they could speak to her in private and she was willing to pose for pictures with anyone who asked.

You could see she not only gets enjoyment from public speaking but also from interacting with her audience.