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LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Dr Phil McGraw recently appeared on ‘Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace?’ and opened up about the reason behind his decision to end his eponymous talk show after 21 years of a highly successful run. During the conversation, he told the CNN anchor that he did everything on his show that he “set out to do.”
The ‘Dr Phil’ show, which was created by Dr Phil and Oprah Winfrey in 2002, finally came to an end on May 25. “I have been blessed with over 25 wonderful years in daytime television,” McGraw said in a statement back in January. “With this show, we have helped thousands of guests and millions of viewers through everything from addiction and marriage to mental wellness and raising children. This has been an incredible chapter of my life and career, but while I’m moving on from daytime, there is so much more I wish to do,” he added at the time.
‘I wanted to push mental illness to the forefront’
During the interview, Wallace asked Dr Phil the reason behind the closure of his highly successful show. “So you are ending your show this spring after 21 years on the air. And over all that time you have either been the number one or the number two most watched show in daytime syndicated talk shows. So why stop now?” the host asked.
“Well, you know, 21 years is a long time. And I've done the things that I've set out to do,” Dr Phil replied. The beloved longtime anchor then shared that he initially wanted to start the talk show with the aims of addressing the "silent epidemics," like mental health issues, and “talk about things that matter to people who care.” “And I really wanted to push mental illness to the forefront of the narrative in America,” he added.
‘We compare our reality to other people's fantasy’
Dr Phil also spoke to Wallace about the impact of social media on mental health. Wallace first pointed out how Dr Phil read studies that said anxiety, stress, and depression are big problems at the moment and how teenage girls harbor suicidal thoughts and want to hurt themselves now more than ever. “What's going on?” the CNN host asked.
“Well, you know, everybody thinks that the pandemic is perhaps behind this. But that trend really started back in '09, '10. it's like a big freighter flew over the United States and dropped smartphones on everybody,” the psychologist replied. “And young people started watching people live their lives, instead of living their own lives. And those lives they were watching, were fantasies, and we compare our reality to other people's fantasy. And by comparison, we come away feeling worse about ourselves,” he stated. Throughout the ‘Dr Phil’ show, the beloved host provided “life strategies” for his guests from his life experience as a clinical and forensic psychologist.
