Warning: This article contains content about the sexual abuse of a minor. Reader discretion is advised.
Actor Lukas Gage has spoken publicly for the first time about being sexually abused by a counsellor at an acting camp when he was just 11 years old.
The White Lotus and Euphoria star shares the harrowing experience in his debut memoir, I Wrote This for Attention. Now 30, Gage recounted the abuse during an emotional interview on the Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast with host Amanda Hirsch.
“I didn’t even realise it was a thing,” he said. “I think there’s a real stigma behind it, because I didn’t do anything.”
“You feel there’s a participation of you, and it wasn’t until I had a therapist be like, literally had to break it down for me like in my twenties. [They said] ‘You’re in your twenties, this person was in their twenties, would you ever do anything with an 11-year-old?’ I’m like, no. No. But that was a hard part to talk about.”
He went on to describe how the trauma left him dissociated at the time: “I left my body. There was a feeling that I was a willing participant.”
The actor, who identifies as queer, admitted that it took years before he could even tell his mother—only doing so by giving her a copy of his memoir.
“I sat her down and I was like, ‘Look, I hate talking about this. I hate having this talk with you. I hate having shame about it because we shouldn’t have shame about it. I just want to warn you, there’s probably a part that’s gonna be disturbing for a mom to read, but you did nothing wrong, and it wasn’t because of a lack of your parenting or anything.’ It was hard for her to read.”
Speaking to US Weekly, Gage reflected on how painful it was to witness his mother’s reaction: “It killed [him] to hear her so hurt,” adding, “There was nothing she could’ve done to protect me. The world is a crazy, scary place, and you can only protect your kids so much.”
Throughout the conversation, Gage shared how humour has helped him cope with trauma, often using it as a means of reclaiming his story.
“I talk about the darkest stuff in my life with a laugh and then I talk about the most mundane details (and) I’m super serious about telling a story about getting a coffee that nothing dramatic happens,” he said.
“Talking about the molestation, I feel like we [are expected] to be small when we talk about it. For me that was a way for me to gain my power back and to use a little bit of humility to gain my narrative of that story and not let it make me feel weak and small and shameful. Humour, I lean into it to feel strength.”
He also confirmed that therapy and honest conversations with loved ones have helped him process the trauma, saying he no longer feels “like I’m a weird freak that it happened to. It doesn’t have this weight.”
In his memoir, Gage also explores other deeply personal experiences, including a difficult upbringing, his diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder, and the intense six-month marriage to hairstylist Chris Appleton, which ended in divorce in 2023 following what he describes as a “manic episode.”
