James Middleton Says He 'Pushed' Family Away During Dark Time When He Almost Took His Own Life

Kate Middleton's brother detailed in new memoir, 'Meet Ella: The Dog Who Saved My Life' how his dog was instrumental in helping him through a difficult period

James Middleton is getting candid about his mental health and detailing a period of time when he was "unreachable" by his "loving and close-knit" family.

In an excerpt from his forthcoming memoir Meet Ella: The Dog Who Saved My Life, published by the Daily Mail on Sept. 14, Kate Middleton's 37-year-old brother wrote of a time several years ago when he felt "suicidal" and that life was "no longer worth living."

"I contemplate ways of dying so I can get off the giddy roller-coaster that is sending me to the brink of madness. I cannot sleep because my mind is in tumult," he wrote in the book, set to be published on Sept. 24 in the U.S.

"The insomnia is dizzying. I am utterly exhausted. I feel misunderstood; a complete failure. I wouldn’t wish the sense of worthlessness and desperation, the isolation and loneliness, on my worst enemy. I think I’m going crazy."

"Yet I know I am privileged; fortunate, too, to have a loving and close-knit family — Mum and Dad, my sisters Catherine and Pippa, their husbands William and James — but I push them all away," James, the younger brother of the Princess of Wales, continued. "I do not answer their phone calls. Emails remain ignored. Invitations to visit go unheeded. I hide behind a double-locked door, unreachable."

Related: James Middleton Announces New Memoir About Beloved Dog Ella — and the Story He Included to Share with His Son

James then reflected on a night in November 2017 when he reached his "lowest ebb" — as he considered "jumping from the rooftop" of a building in London.

"I wonder, if I jump, could it possibly be construed as a tragic accident? That way my family, although they would grieve desperately, would be spared the added torture of ­knowing that I had ended my life by suicide," he continued, adding that someone was watching him during the troubling moment as he stood on the rooftop.

"As I pace, I look down through the skylight and see my spaniel Ella’s gentle eyes looking back up at me. Like me, she has been wakeful all night. She senses my strange, agitated state of mind."

As he wrote in the excerpt, he then saw his dog "imploring me with her eyes to come down" from a ladder and he considered what life would be like if he and the spaniel didn't have each other. After an hour of him pacing, he wrote, Ella had still "not moved."

"I haul myself back from the brink, slowly climb down the ladder and stroke Ella’s silky head. She is the reason I do not take that fatal leap," James wrote. "She is Ella, the dog who saved my life."

Related: James Middleton Issues Plea to Help Stranger Experiencing His 'Worst Nightmare'

James announced Meet Ella back in March, noting in an Instagram video, where he proudly held up the first manuscript, that he and his dog were "inseparable for 15 years" before her death in 2023.

“I know many of you have your own Ellas or might be in need of one. I hope this book will also help us to talk more openly about our mental health, our need for connection and the way in which the animals that we think we are taking care of are actually looking after us in return,” he said at the time.

Ella died in January 2023 following a “short illness,” James revealed at the time.

As he told Tatler, the dog was around for "so many of the important moments of my life," including when he met his wife Alizee Thevenet. The pair, who are pet parents to six other dogs, announced the birth of baby son Inigo in October 2023, less than a year after Ella's death.

“Another of the reasons that I wanted to write this book was so that I could tell Inigo the story of how I met his mother,” James told the outlet, the story being that his dog ran up to Thevenet at a restaurant.

"I hope that by writing this book, I might help other people to talk about their mental health — whether their difficulties are in the past or something they’re experiencing currently,” James later told Tatler.

If you or someone you know needs mental health help, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor.

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