Gwyneth Paltrow details terrifying 'heart attack' scare during darkest period

Gwyneth Paltrow recalled a frightening moment when she woke up in a London hotel believing she was having a heart attack.

The moment occurred when she was deeply grieving the death of her father, Bruce Paltrow, in 2002.

While Paltrow was struggling to cope with the loss she said on The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter podcast that she felt like she was "going to die of grief."

Looking back at the time, the actress shared, "There was one night where I woke up and I thought I was having a heart attack in London. And the only reason I didn't call an ambulance was 'cause I didn't know it's 999 [in Britain] not 911 [as in America]. I was so racked with grief."

However, Paltrow shared she survived that night and to help her process her emotions, she turned to work and took the role of poet Sylvia Plath in the 2003 film Sylvia.

"It kind of saved my life," Paltrow admitted. "It's really the way that I process through things. It's the way I access the darker parts of myself that I don't like that much and let them come up and out."

"It was such a blessing having to get up every day and have somewhere to go ... Just to have the structure of the day so have somewhere to get up and go and all day long I was just mining it [the grief] and letting it out and letting it out. And listening to Sigur Ros and sobbing and letting it out and it really saved me," she added.

Days after her father's death, Paltrow met Chris Martin. They tied the knot and welcomed two kids, Apple and Moss, before parting ways in 2014 after a decade of marriage.