Actress Ashley Judd reveals childhood abuse in new memoir

(NewsCore) - NEW YORK -- Actress Ashley Judd detailed a childhood "fraught with neglect, abuse and debilitating depression," in her memoir that hit the bookshelves Tuesday.

In "All That Is Bitter and Sweet: A Memoir," the 42-year-old daughter of country music star Naomi Judd described her tumultuous upbringing surrounded by her caregiver's drug use, her mother's abusive, drug-addicted boyfriends and sexual abuse at the hands of an older man.

"I was taught to believe that our lifestyle was normal and never to question it or complain, even when I was left alone for hours, sometimes days at a time, or when I was passed without warning to yet another relative," Judd revealed in her book, which she said was written with the consent of her mother.

"I loved my mother, but at the same time I dreaded the mayhem and uncertainty that followed her everywhere...I often felt like an outsider observing my mom's life as she followed her own dreams," the actress added in excerpts revealed in an interview on NBC's "Today" show Tuesday.

Judd was a toddler when her biological father, Michael C. Ciminella, divorced her mother and she was raised in her mother's native Kentucky as the aspiring singer pursued a career in country music.

As a young child, she was surrounded by a bevy of her mother's boyfriends and was often left alone to fend for herself.

"An old man everyone knew beckoned me...and offered me a quarter for the pinball machine at the pizza place if I'd sit on his lap," Judd wrote.

"He opened his arms, I climbed up, and I was shocked when he suddenly cinched his arms around me, squeezing me and smothering my mouth with his, jabbing his tongue deep into my mouth," she added.

Despite her dysfunctional upbringing, Judd told the NBC morning show her "mother loves and adores me, and my dad loves and adores me. They did then and they do now."

Though Judd's half-sister, Wynonna, 46, joined their mother in the music business, Ashley chose Hollywood over Nashville and appeared in films such as "A Time to Kill," "Double Jeopardy" and "De-Lovely."

In 2010, she graduated from Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government with a Master's degree in Public Administration (MPA) and currently serves as the Global Ambassador for YouthAIDS and supports numerous humanitarian efforts that promote the end of genocide and political violence.

She is married to Scottish auto racer Dario Franchitti, 37.

Read more: http://ballantine.atrandom.com