Tom Holland reveals he has been sober for one year to improve his mental health

Tom Holland has revealed he has stopped drinking and is now one year and four months sober.

The British star learned a long time ago that being an actor is sometimes physically gruelling.

But what about the unseen strains and wounds that come hand in hand with a job that requires a person to convey complex, raw emotion?

Well, the 26-year-old has now learned injuries to the human mind can cut just as deep.

"I’m no stranger to the physical aspects of the job, doing the whole action-movie thing," Holland told Entertainment Weekly.

"But the mental aspect, it really beat me up, and it took a long time for me to recover afterward, to sort of get back to reality."

But while Holland was working on the set of his next project, a ten-part TV series called The Crowded Room, he knew something had to give.

"I remember having a bit of a meltdown at home and thinking, like, 'I’m going to shave my head. I need to shave my head because I need to get rid of this character'," the Spider-Man actor said.

"Obviously, we were mid-shooting, so I decided not to."

AppleTV+

He added: "It was unlike anything I've ever experienced before."

As a result, the British actor decided to step away from the drink, and hasn't looked back since.

Working on Apple TV+'s The Crowded Room, which Holland described as 'an insight into the power of the human mind' and how 'we can deal with trauma', taught him to recognise his triggers.

He added that he hopes fans will learn a thing or two and that the series will leave viewers with 'more respect and more sympathy for people who are going through mental health issues'.

He added: "I hope that people will feel educated about the powers of mental health, the struggles, [and] our incredible abilities to survive."

AppleTV+

The psychological thriller is based on the real life story of Billy Milligan, a man who was at the centre of a highly-publicised court case in Ohio in the late 1970s.

After a series of events and tragedies, Milligan (played by Holland) winds up having a sequence of discussions with investigator Rya Goodwin (played by Amanda Seyfried).

It's through these chats that he eventually comes to better understand his own mental health, the people in his life, and the tragic events that led up to the incident that saw him jailed.

The first three episodes of the series will air on Apple TV+ on June 9.