Valerie Bertinelli reflects on emotionally excruciating past 8 months

Valerie Bertinelli is sharing her takeaways from a difficult year.

The One Day at a Time star published a vulnerable Instagram post charting “some of the most emotionally excruciating eight months” of her professional and personal life on Friday. 

In 2024, the actress joined The Drew Barrymore Show as a lifestyle expert and began hosting Bingo Blitz on the Game Show Network, and also released a cookbook, Indulge. “And I still got my exhausted, sleepless ass up in the morning, put on a good face, and showed up, when all I wanted to do was stay in bed and sob,” Bertinelli wrote. “This is not to say I feel sorry for myself because I don’t.”

Following her 2022 divorce from Tom Vitale, Bertinelli began dating writer Mike Goodnough in January 2024, but the couple ultimately parted ways this past November.

“Nobody has the market cornered on grief and heartache,” Bertinelli wrote. “People go through hard s— all the time. You just do what you have to do to get through what you have to get through.”

Despite her struggles, Bertinelli views the period as a learning experience. “I don’t know that I would change any of it,” she wrote. “I’ve learned so much more about my strength, my weaknesses, my patience, my resilience, and my worth. I still have more inner work left to do… and I’m okay with that. It’s the good work.”

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The Hot in Cleveland star also offered the wisdom she’s gained from enduring a complicated era of her life. “If I could give you anything of value from my experience it would be this: Don’t let the challenging days make you forget how far you’ve actually come,” she wrote in her post. “No matter what, always believe in your core self. Do not allow the opinions of others or their experience with you color what you think of yourself. You did your best with what you knew at the time.”

Bertinelli concluded her lengthy message with a call for her followers to “learn to love yourself,” adding, “When we fall or get pushed down again, we can either wallow, navel-gaze, and be a victim, or we can get our asses back up and live our big, beautiful life.”