Mischa Barton: 'Trauma doesn't go away overnight'

Mischa Barton still struggles with the trauma she suffered after becoming a global superstar in the early noughties.

The London-born star has been acting since childhood, with eagle-eyed fans recognising her from 1999’s The Sixth Sense.

But it was her casting as rich Californian teen Marissa Cooper in The O.C., which debuted in 2003, that made her a household name and one of the most famous young stars on the planet.

What ensued were endless headlines about Mischa, plus paparazzi chases that she describes as “very Hunger Games” in an interview with the Sunday Times.

“You can go to therapy every day for the rest of your life, but there's just a certain amount of trauma from all that I went through, particularly in my early twenties, that just doesn't go away overnight,” she opened up to the publication.

Mischa, who moved to America as a child, has previously revealed she suffers with post-traumatic stress disorder from her time as an A-list actress and in the years since The O.C. has taken on much more low-key roles, including her latest job in recently revived Australian soap Neighbours.

Elsewhere in the interview, she spoke about her court battle with ex-boyfriend Jon Zacharias who she alleged tried to sell a covertly recorded sex tape plus nude snaps of the now 37-year-old.

The 2017 revenge porn case was found in her favour, with Zacharias ordered to hand over all explicit content and to stay 100 yards away from her at all times.

“(It was) one of the worst and most gruelling experiences of my life,” she recalled. “It’s shocking to realise that there is that type of darkness in the world. And you wonder what you’ve done to attract it.”