In an interview with The New York Times, Shailene Woodley revealed that she was “very, very sick,” in her early 20s, causing her to pass up roles after the Divergent franchise.

According to an article published by Insider, the 28-year-old actress did not specify the illness, but she expressed how the illness impacted her life after the film trilogy, which was released in 2014.

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"I haven't spoken much about this yet publicly, and I will one day, but I was very, very sick in my early 20s. While I was doing the 'Divergent' movies and working hard, I also was struggling with a deeply personal, very scary physical situation," Woodley said in The New York Times interview.

As a result, Woodley said that she had to turn down roles. "Because of that, I said no to a lot of opportunities because I needed to get better, and those jobs ended up going to peers of mine who I love," the actress said.

She proceeded to say in the interview: "There was a mix of people saying, 'You shouldn't have let that go' or 'You shouldn't have been sick.' That was combined with my own internal process of, 'Am I going to survive what I'm going through right now and ever be healthy, or even have the opportunity to work on projects I'm passionate about again because of the situation I'm in?'"

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"I was in a place where I had no choice but to just surrender and let go of my career, and it brought out this negative voice in my mind that kept spinning for years and years afterward," Woodley said.

Before The New York Times interview, Woodley has mentioned in the past her desire to walk away from Hollywood.

In an interview from 2018 with Net-a-Porter's PorterEdit, Woodley said that she almost stopped acting after Divergent: Allegiant performed poorly in theaters.

"I felt it was time to do something different," Woodley said. "I called my agents and said, 'Please don't send me any more scripts. I need to explore other avenues.'"

Since the Divergent series ended, Woodley has starred as Jane Chapman in Big Little Lies. Her most recent leading role was in Endings, Beginnings, which is set to be released in May 2020.

According to an article published by Glamour, she detailed how thankful she is to have overcome the illness.

"Now I'm on the other side of it, thank God. A lot of the last few years has been about focusing on mental health for me, and it's a slow process," Woodley said. "But because of that work, I feel very grounded and rooted in who I am and very clear about everything in my life, whether it's my career or my relationships or my own internal worth. I feel very grateful to have walked that line of fire, because now I know what I don't want to ever go back to," Woodley said.

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