Hayden Panettiere shares ‘shocking’ moment she was put into bed with ‘very famous man’ at 18 years of age

Hayden Panettiere had a harrowing experience when she was 18. Photo / Getty Images

Hayden Panettiere has reflected on a terrifying experience of being put into bed with a “very famous man” when she was only 18 years of age.

The 36-year-old actor has revealed in her memoir This Is Me: A Reckoning that she was coerced into getting in bed with the “undressed” older celebrity while on a boat and has explained during an appearance on Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast that she now knows how naive she was about the severity of the situation.

Shetty said: “You write about a moment in your career where a friend of yours takes you on to a boat. You’re led to a room which has an older man in it and then basically told to perform sexual acts.”

Panettiere, who recently came out as bisexual, responded: “The fact that I was 18, even though I’d lived such a huge life and I thought I was oh so mature at 18 ... scientifically, your frontal lobes don’t develop until we’re what, 25, 26?

“So even though I felt like I could make healthy decisions, safe decisions, I wasn’t capable of being fully aware of what was going on around me.”

The Heroes actress claims that the individual who led her into the shocking situation was a friend who she trusted and considered as a “protector” before they “physically put me in the bed next to this undressed man who was very famous”.

Panettiere recalled how she was taken downstairs into a small room before being put in bed with the unidentified man, who she claims behaved “like this was just an average day for him”.

She explained how she became “ferocious” at that moment.

Panettiere said: “That lion in me, that fire in me ... my hair stood on end ... I was like, ‘This is not happening’, before running out of the room and trying to hide.

“There was no jumping off and swimming away. And there was nobody who was going to be empathetic to my situation. I realised that this was nothing new to them.”

Panettiere’s revelation comes after she came out as bisexual last week, after years of feeling “forced to be perfect”.

The Nashville star told Us Weekly: “It’s sad that I had to wait till I was 36 years old to share that part of me, but better late than never, right?

“I’ve chosen to share it with the world, I’m comfortable saying I’m bisexual. I’m comfortable to confidently say that, yes, I am bisexual. I said it!”

Sexual harm