Jake Lloyds Mother Shares Her Sons Mental Health Struggle Following Star Wars

With The Phantom Menace celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, it also marks Jake Lloyd's 35th birthday (the boy who played Anakin Skywalker). In an interview with Scripps News, Lloyd's mother, Lisa, shares her son's story and how the actor has battled against mental illness for many years. She also explains how her son Jake never experienced the backlash following his performance in The Phantom Menace.



Lisa Lloyd noted that her son, Jake, started developing issues in High School. At first, Jake was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Jake started taking medications but his mother says that nothing worked. Then in 2008, after dropping out of college, Jake was diagnosed with schizophrenia:

When Jake received the diagnosis, his mother Lisa said that it threw him further into depression. It didn't help that Jake also has a neurological condition called anosognosia, which causes a patient to not be aware of or unconsciously deny their symptoms. This led to him not taking medications or going to treatment, thinking nothing was wrong. It also led to self-medication through the use of illicit drugs.



In 2015, his mother tells of how Jake was under arrest after leading police on a car chase before crashing. At the time, Jake was not taking his medication. While Jake spent 10 months in prison, Lisa fought to get him admitted to a hospital instead, but she was told there weren't any available beds:

After being released from prison, Jake moved to California where he lived with his mother. Even then, his struggles continued, including one episode where he called his mother saying he had been shot inside his apartment. But in actuality, Jake was suffering from another hallucination.



It didn't help that, in 2018, his sister Madison died at the age of 26. Lisa explains that Jake's younger sister, Madison was a source of encouragement. Then in 2023, Jake suffered a psychotic breakdown while driving on the freeway. He then was admitted to a hospital and received help at a mental health rehabilitation facility:

He is currently 10 months into an 18-month stay at a rehabilitation center. For those who think Jake's mental health issues were a result of the negative backlash following The Phantom Menace, his mother Lisa doesn't think so. She says that she protected him against the negative discourse and that it would've happened anyway due to his father's side of the family also having a history of schizophrenia:

Source: Scripps News.



In fact, Jake is still a big fan of Star Wars. His mother gave him an action figure of Ahsoka Tano for his birthday and he still likes wearing Star Wars shirts in public:

Lisa ends on a positive note, saying that his son is 'doing much better than I expected.' She also states that Jake is 'becoming a little bit more social,' and is 'more enthusiastic about hanging out with family friends at barbecues and celebrating holidays.'



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