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Mandy Moore describes marriage to Ryan Adams: 'I felt like I was drowning'

The "This Is Us" star shares details of their failed union — from first meeting to divorce.
Mandy Moore
LOS ANGELES, CA - SEPTEMBER 17: Mandy Moore attends the 70th Emmy Awards at Microsoft Theater on September 17, 2018 in Los Angeles, California.FilmMagic
/ Source: TODAY

Mandy Moore recently opened up to The New York Times about what she called the "psychologically abusive" behavior she endured during her nearly seven-year marriage to Ryan Adams.

And now she has even more to say on the subject.

The actress originally spoke out in what was part of a larger article on the indie rocker's alleged troubling behavior toward a number of women and associates, who also spoke to the publication. But in a new interview for the "WTF With Marc Maron" podcast, she put the spotlight solely on the dysfunctional, "untenable and unsustainable" union she shared with him.

Image: The 2012 MusiCares Person Of The Year Gala Honoring Paul McCartney - Backstage And Audience
Mandy Moore and Ryan Adams went their separate ways in 2015 and divorced the following year.Kevin Mazur / WireImage

Moore met Adams "as a 23-year-old impressionable young woman." Both were on tour at the time, and she recalls being "really taken by him" from the very start.

By the time she was 24, they were already married, but it was nothing like she'd imagined. He was busy penning music and poems and recording. And she was busy ... not having much of a career at all.

"I was living my life for him," she said, looking back on it now. "Yeah, I was taking care (of him), being the mother. ... It was an entirely unhealthy dynamic."

A dynamic that left her feeling as though she'd been erased.

"I had no sense of self," she explained. "I was imperceptible. I was so small in my own world. ... My co-dependency fed into his codependency. I was so not serving myself. ... I felt like I was drowning. It was so untenable and unsustainable and I was so lonely. I was so sad. I knew that this wasn’t the rest of my life. I knew that this wasn’t the person I was supposed to be with.

When she tried to tend to herself, to focus on her own work, Moore said things only got worse.

"I would do things here or there, but it became abundantly clear while I was working, things would completely fall apart at home," she told Maron. "I couldn’t do my job because there was just a constant stream of trying to pay attention to this person who needed me and wouldn’t let me do anything else."

The situation brought her to tears for "months and months and months," but it also brought her to the realization that it had to end. And once it was over, it became clear — almost immediately — that she'd made the right decision.

"Six months after I filed for divorce and the divorce was final, I had (the role of Rebecca on 'This Is Us')," she said.

And two years after that, Moore walked down the aisle again — this time, alongside Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith and with absolutely no regrets.