Charlize opens up about her alcoholic dad

WHEN she was 15 years old her mother‚ Gerda‚ shot her father dead after he came home and attacked his wife.

And although that would traumatise many‚ Benoni-born actress Charlize Theron has said living with her alcoholic father was far worse.

“I was floating through Europe‚ working as a model‚ and living a gypsy life.

“I pretended it didn’t happen. I didn’t tell anybody. I used to say my dad died in a car accident‚” she said during an interview with Howard Stern.

It was only in her late 20s‚ when her decade-long relationship with Stuart Townsend was coming to an end‚ that she sought therapy.

Theron admits that as much as that night was traumatic for everybody involved‚ it was in therapy that she realised how living with her father had really affected her.

“The things that affected me, a child living with an alcoholic and not knowing what was going to happen and not knowing how my day was going to do. And all of it dependent on somebody else and whether he was going to drink.”

In the lengthy interview with the infamous radio jock‚ Theron said she did not like to dwell on things.

She said her mother‚ who lives just up the road from her in the US‚ was a huge inspiration. “Her philosophy was: ‘This is horrible. Acknowledge this is horrible.’

“Now make a choice. Will this define you? Are you going to sink or swim?’ That was it.”

She admitted that while both she and her mom had dealt with that night‚ it was coming to terms with how they lived their everyday life that they still had to deal with.

Theron‚ whose latest film‚ Atomic Blonde‚ is due for release soon‚ admitted that as a teenager she had not drawn much male attention. – TshisaLIVE