Carried: A Conversation with Sam Humphrey on Mental Health, Family Caregiving, and Resilience

In Recognition of National Family Caregivers Month - November 2025

Mental health rarely happens in isolation. When one person struggles, an entire family feels the impact. When one person begins to heal, everyone begins to breathe again.

That truth lies at the heart of our latest Raregivers conversation with Sam Humphrey, the actor and advocate best known for The Greatest Showman. In Part 2 of his story, released this November for National Family Caregivers Month, Sam speaks about his ongoing journey through mental health challenges and how his family carried both his pain and their own.

The Cost of Hiding

As a child, Sam faced life-threatening medical complications and the emotional toll that came with them. By fifteen, he had already been told he might not live past eighteen. That sentence didn’t just weigh on him. It weighed on his parents, his brother, and everyone who loved him.

While Sam wrestled with hopelessness, his family lived in quiet fear. They witnessed his suicide attempts. They stayed present through years of suicidal thoughts that lingered like a shadow over their home. They managed hospital visits and medical care while holding on to a kind of hope that often felt impossible to sustain.

“I felt like a burden,” Sam says. “But I didn’t see what my family was carrying.”

That realization became the turning point. For years, Sam had tried to protect himself by hiding. He performed confidence while quietly falling apart inside. Acting was both an escape and a mask. But behind every performance was a family watching, loving, and waiting for the real Sam to come back to them.

When One Person Struggles, a Family Suffers

Family mental health is often the silent partner in any illness. Parents, siblings, and spouses carry an invisible weight. They live in constant awareness of someone else’s fragility while trying to hold their own emotions together.

Caregivers in rare disease settings often live in a state of constant survival mode. They make appointments, advocate for treatment, and keep life moving while their hearts break behind the scenes. When mental health struggles are part of the picture, the emotional strain multiplies. The fear of losing someone becomes a daily companion.

Sam’s story brings that truth into focus. His family didn’t only care for his medical needs. They carried the emotional aftermath of each crisis. They grieved in silence, prayed for safety, and tried to stay strong while feeling powerless. Their resilience became the foundation that allowed Sam to keep fighting for his life.

The Decision to Be Seen

The real transformation began when Sam decided to stop hiding. That choice was not a single moment of clarity but a gradual act of courage.

He started therapy. He began to share his thoughts honestly. He opened up about what he had been through. With that honesty came relief, not only for him, but for his entire family. Therapy became a shared language. It allowed them to talk about fear, grief, and love without shame.

Through that process, creativity also became healing. Art and design gave everyone a way to express what words could not. And from that creative spark came The Little Guy Collective, a community Sam built to remind others who feel small or unseen that their lives have meaning.

The project became proof of what is possible when families face mental health challenges together. Healing does not happen alone. It happens when we stop pretending, start talking, and make room for truth.

The Mental Health of Caregiving

This National Family Caregivers Month, we turn our attention to the mental health of those who carry others. Family caregivers are often the first to notice when something is wrong, but they are also the last to receive support. They keep showing up even when exhaustion runs deep. They steady others while quietly unraveling themselves.

Sam’s story shows what can happen when those caregivers are included in the conversation. When one person heals, the family begins to heal too. When one person speaks, everyone learns how to listen.

Mental health is not an individual issue. It is a family reality.

A Message for Every Family Living This Story

This conversation is for every parent who has watched their child slip into darkness and felt helpless to pull them out. For every sibling who carries unspoken fear. For every caregiver who lies awake wondering if they have done enough.

You are not alone.

Healing begins when families tell the truth about what they feel and what they fear. It begins when we choose compassion over silence. It begins when we understand that being “strong” does not mean being invulnerable.

As Sam reminds us, “Vulnerability isn’t weakness. It’s the moment we stop hiding and start being seen.”

Watch Part 2 of our conversation with Sam Humphrey and join Raregivers in honoring the families who carry both love and survival every day.